Best & Worst Weapons

[sun1404]

Shields are very good and all, but it's not your only HP bar, so to speak. There are level 10 (and more) armors, and what are they but the best protection available? There are enemies that can't be taken down with your shield still standing, unless you're an expert, and a very patient pilot, or you're using some god-shield. I'm one of the players that focus on shields, but I never flee just because my shield goes down. You still have Domina's Sustain in the worst case.

[PM]

For me, solar armor is a no-brainer up until I get a jumpdrive. Fuel is a huge money-sink for players who do not rush through systems. Also, fuel is a valuable commodity that can be used to profit if not consumed. (For example, ice farms pay the most for helium fuel.) I agree that the player should flee when shields go down, although that requires a cowardly playstyle, not unlike one encouraged by other roguelikes. Barring (Ares) shield-killer weapons, if the enemy can cut through shields, they can cut through armor almost as easily (or very easily in case of solar armor use), and some enemies inflict dangerous status effects (or one-hit kill in case of final boss) if their shots hit armor.

[sun1404]

I mostly pay for my fuel. The lost money can be recovered by a short farming. though I always keep at least one solar item (panel, armor, whatever) in case of emergency. It's not all that expensive, IMO, especially after finding a CSC. Then you get free refuel after a few missions.

Also, yes, if I must fight Dwarg, Ventari, Sapients, or the like, I'll want my shield up, and probably flee if my armor isn't immune to their status effects. But against other enemies, letting them scratch my armor (or even make a dent or a rip) just speed up the fight and add that much more thrill. A patch spider or two would quickly cover the repairs.

[PM]

Early game, I never have enough cash (barring that CC playtest with the stock market), to get everything I need, even if I do not need to pay for fuel. CSCs do not appear until around Jiang's Star or after. I rarely get that far before I find a jumpdrive. Once I get the jumpdrive, I warp to either Sisters or CSCs for cheap fuel. Until then, solar armor is the only viable option for free fuel.

[sun1404]

Well, I have a pretty low standard for early game devices, and get more ambitious later on (I never finish a game without a Phobos's complete set acquired, at least after I figured out how to beat it effectively.) so that's maybe why I don't need solar things as much.

[Aeon Blaze]

I use the solar armor in tandem with solar array up until i get 150MW reactor then i dump the whole set, i manage get enough fuel from dwarg masters and sungs slaver. And sitting near a star for so long just to refuel 150mw or above reactor is not worth to me.
In the outer realms there is lot of Pteracnium fuel that can be looted or i get free refueling from CSCs..

[catfighter]

Although solar devices are useful, I almost never use them. Fuel has only ever been a problem once, because I spent all my money on a drive upgrade that I found in Eridani. If you save every fuel rod you find and take the time to spawn and kill Vikings (they are really easy to kill and have a lot of fuel rods) you can make it a fair distance without ever buying fuel.

[josh19967]

I tend to go solar armor all the way until I reach a CSC and get free fuel rights from them. Then I stay close to them until I can get a hyperion and be on my way. Sometimes I won't go ahead with my game unless Eridani spawns a full set of solars.

[Watch TV, Do Nothing]

You're all nuts.

Incidentally, has anyone come up with good strategies for busting capital ships? They seem to take forever to kill now, especially with energy weapons.

[josh19967]

For Ranx Dreads, I use any weapon with a high ROF to take down its kilotons
Phobos are just plain scary =P
But really, a lot of my capship-busting capability comes from the fact that I rush systems then backtrack, so I'm often flying around with the IFC when I'm taking down the Aquilas
So yeah, rush, get lvl VIII-X devices, backtrack, stomp.
(However, I did take down the Kronosaurus with a Solon shield and solar armor)

[Song]

Incidentally, has anyone come up with good strategies for busting capital ships? They seem to take forever to kill now, especially with energy weapons.

"Shoot it until it dies"

[EditorRUS]

>>Incidentally, has anyone come up with good strategies for busting capital ships? They seem to take forever to kill now, especially with energy weapons.

I have plenty of them.

1. Shoot until it explodes.
The most obvious way to go through.

2. Special tactic
That includes ways for destroying some high-level ship while you have bad equipment.
You can use EMP cannon or any device disrupting stuff, that's usually enough.
Ranx Dreadnoughts seems to have weakness - it's EMPable, so, i can kill roughly 5 ranx dreadnoughts with only ion cannon and emp cannon while having simple blast plate installed.
Unfortunately, it can be REALLY LONG, but works, though.
But, i prefer to use ferian plasma as no one resist to that stuf.

3. Luring. And making war, of course.
One of the most powerful tactic for EVERYTHING. Seriosly, try to lure a phobos to a ferian colony and make them destroy it - it will be messy. Although all the ferians usually die during the war, phobos is about to death too, so, you can kill him easily. That's also brilliant way to make a lot of loot - ferians high level ore, maybe ferian plasma, and phobos' stuff. But, well, sometimes there's no ferian colonies in system. Well, you can lure it to any friendly station. I think one of the best: corporate command. The coprorate cruiser is pretty dangerous for anything, so, if you help him with a phobos - you'll win and also loot them all (destroyed corporate station, sometimes you can obtain ramissier gotha-4000, and, of course, phobos' stuff)

[catfighter]

Luring enemies to friendly stations is a really effective tactic, but that can sometimes leave you stranded without any nearby source of fuel if you have really bad equipment (I died once because a ranx dreadnought destroyed the only refueling station in the system when I was almost out of juice). Weapons with a large damage area are excellent for hitting small critical spots, although they are not too common in the early game.

[Song]

A true pilgrim lures their enemies into destroying their own station in such a way that the station explosion takes them out.



....Although this is only really possible to pull off reliably against the centauri.

[Transcendi]

The slam cannon and heavy slam cannon are underpowered.
31.5dps that hits only one time in three against anything that can move compared to 33dps that can actually hit things reliably
47.25dps that hits slightly more often but is now up against the fast moving, 70dps lancer with 50% more range (it's also cheaper)

Heavy recoilless cannon. Very underpowered.
You will never ever hit something mobile with it (they move at the same speed as mags, which can be the highest damage weapons in the game (and come with high WMD) excluding the Iocrym main plasma weapons* and generally have dps twice what you'd expect (from an ammunition using weapon of their ammo level) to make up for their slow speed) and it does 24dps compared to the 30dps of the lasers. A number of kinetics are a bit weak, but this one really is.

Dragonfly missile system. Very underpowered.
An ammo weapon doing the same damage a non-ammo weapon of the same level should be doing AND it's firing it all over the place. Yikes.

Lancer cannon. A bit overpowered.
Extra 50% range and a very slight damage edge with no downsides.

Absolution cannon. Still terrible.
6 dark acid dps (comparable to 15 particle dps) on a slow, fragile and short ranged delivery mechanism. The particle cannon far out-damages it until it starts getting completely negated at armor level 9. Can't even be used against the Xenophobes because the projectile will get destroyed by their lancers. Probably needs actual changes to the level damage adjustment curves to fix.

* Just looked it up, apparently not the case any more (I last checked all weapons a few versions ago) as the Gotha missiles now do double their previous damage (they need their cost and mass updated to reflect this, 100 WM7 thermo damage per 50 cred, 50 kg missile is very high)...