Ship Builds & Load Outs Why do rail guns stop at class 2

[KayAitch]

I really want to like rails. They're great to fire and quite satisfying. They seem a bit weak though, especially given the low ammo on them.

But the oddest thing is that there are only C1&2 rails, no C3 and only Plasma and Cannon at C4.

Why? Surely rails would be a really great counter point to those guns at C3 and especially 4. A C4 rail should let you kill a ship through another ship, which would be awesome.

 

[Ceekay]

A C4 rail should let you kill a ship through another ship, which would be awesome.

That's the problem right there they'd be massively over powered and because of the high velocity projectiles easier to use than cannons and PAs, same applies to the m-cannon with its high ROF a class 3 or 4 would be a monster!

 

[Psycho Romeo]

Medium rails do 43.22 MJs of shield damage per shot. It's third place for single shot damage. Based on other weapon scaling trends, large weapons do about 2x~3x the single shot damage of medium, which would bring a large rail to doing about 100%~150% the damage of a large plasma accelerator.

 

[KayAitch]

That's the problem right there they'd be massively over powered and because of the high velocity projectiles easier to use than cannons and PAs, same applies to the m-cannon with its high ROF a class 3 or 4 would be a monster!

I disagree - class 3 and 4 mounts are quite hard to get, you usually sacrifice other weapons to get them, for instance the whole point of the FDL (and it's big advantage over the Clipper, FAS and the like) is one class 4 hardpoint - that should be able to hold some pretty boss guns.

They don't scale guns up - a class 3 rail would do about the same raw damage as 2x class 2. Instead they scale them down - small and medium guns are nerfed against medium and large ships (this stops C3 guns one-shotting Eagles and Sidewinders). So if you're shooting an Eagle a C3 does twice the damage as a C2, if you're shooting a Python the C3 does the same damage, but the C2 does about 60% of what it did to the Eagle.

All this means that C2 rails, even lots of them, do fairly little damage to big ships, and that C3 rails wouldn't be too OP against small ships.

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Medium rails do 43.22 MJs of shield damage per shot. It's third place for single shot damage. Based on other weapon scaling trends, large weapons do about 2x~3x the single shot damage of medium, which would bring a large rail to doing about 100%~150% the damage of a large plasma accelerator.

C3 guns do about 2x the damage of C2 guns, and the C2 PA does more damage than the C2 rail to shields, so I'd expect the same of C3 and on up.

 

[Psycho Romeo]

C3 guns do about 2x the damage of C2 guns, and the C2 PA does more damage than the C2 rail to shields, so I'd expect the same of C3 and on up.

Not sure where you're getting your figures. Medium rail does about 60% more damage than a medium PA.

 

[KayAitch]

Not sure where you're getting your figures. Medium rail does about 60% more damage than a medium PA.

Where's that figure from? I thought rails did a lot less damage to shields than PA.

 

[Pepe]

rails would be a really great counter point to those guns

There's your answer, mate

Rail makes small platforms deliver strong punch, like Eagles and Vipers. It's funny. Or you can put four small rails on your Asp and make 24 (comparative) damage in one shot. It's powerful.

When it comes to big ships, think about plasma as a mortar and rail as a sniper. Really powerful one would be able to kill people from far, while busy scanning targets, or while they are typing. They could lose their equipment, as well. Every troll likes to instakill iddle players more than anything in the world. It'd be frustrating. And frustrated players do not buy games.

 

[Psycho Romeo]

Where's that figure from? I thought rails did a lot less damage to shields than PA.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=140240

 

[KayAitch]

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=140240

I stand corrected, though does that take account of the ship size nerf? Surely C2 rails take a big hit when used against medium and large ships?

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There's your answer, mate

Rail makes small platforms deliver strong punch, like Eagles and Vipers. It's funny. Or you can put four small rails on your Asp and make 24 (comparative) damage in one shot. It's powerful.

When it comes to big ships, think about plasma as a mortar and rail as a sniper. Really powerful one would be able to kill people from far, while busy scanning targets, or while they are typing. They could lose their equipment, as well. Every troll likes to instakill iddle players more than anything in the world. It'd be frustrating. And frustrated players do not buy games.

We're talking about C3 weapons - a C3 beam will kill an Eagle in a few seconds and it's much harder to hit a small fast ship with rails, especially in anything that can carry C3 or C4 mounts. A C4 rail on an Anaconda would only really be useful for other massive ships and the odd surprise attack.

 

[Pepe]

A C4 rail on an Anaconda would only really be useful for other massive ships and the odd surprise attack.

Exactly that, mate. Traders would die even faster and at even longer range.

And surprise attacks... Being instakilled while typing "Hello" would impact social part of this game (and even game sales, imho).

You probably play to have fun, but there are many others than play to take fun from somebody else.

 

[Poseidal]

I stand corrected, though does that take account of the ship size nerf? Surely C2 rails take a big hit when used against medium and large ships?

Those are all shield damage - the hull size penalty only affects hull damage so it isn't measured on that.

Also, some weapons don't suffer the hull size penalty as much (or at all) and I think the Railgun was explicitly mentioned as one of them.

 

[Zeta Legion]

Cannons and AFAIK PA's and Rails don't suffer as much size penalty. A C1 Cannon behaves like a C2 weapon for example.

As for Railguns, I would really like a C3/C4 railgun. The problem is the way Rails are balanced right now they would just be flat-out better than PA's and the only thing keeping Cannons afloat would be their phenomenal damage/energy ratio. Either PA's would need to be buffed to compensate for their extremely slow projectile speed or Rails would need to be nerfed to the point that they do somewhat less damage than PA's. Nerfing Rails would probably off the die-hard Railgun fans and buffing PA's would further marginalize Cannons.

 

[KayAitch]

Cannons and AFAIK PA's and Rails don't suffer as much size penalty. A C1 Cannon behaves like a C2 weapon for example.

As for Railguns, I would really like a C3/C4 railgun. The problem is the way Rails are balanced right now they would just be flat-out better than PA's and the only thing keeping Cannons afloat would be their phenomenal damage/energy ratio. Either PA's would need to be buffed to compensate for their extremely slow projectile speed or Rails would need to be nerfed to the point that they do somewhat less damage than PA's. Nerfing Rails would probably off the die-hard Railgun fans and buffing PA's would further marginalize Cannons.

Is that something the devs have confirmed or that we've tested? As I understood Mark Allan's posts all armour has a hardness stat and all weapons a piercing stat and these are compared to nerf small weapons against big ships. It's why you can empty an entire clip of medium missiles into an unshielded Anaconda and only do about 3% damage.

Have they confirmed that some guns are calculated in a different way? Wouldn't that make large cannons devastating against small ships (they aren't)?

Cannons are the fallback weapon if you can't run anything else due to heat and/or power. They're pretty rubbish otherwise.

The lack of variety in balanced weapons generally and C3/4 especially is really frustrating.

 

[CMDR Byr Goefin]

There is a "C3" Railgun, it is called The Imperial Hammer.

But wear your asbestos undies, because they are Super Hot.

 

[Zeta Legion]

Is that something the devs have confirmed or that we've tested? As I understood Mark Allan's posts all armour has a hardness stat and all weapons a piercing stat and these are compared to nerf small weapons against big ships. It's why you can empty an entire clip of medium missiles into an unshielded Anaconda and only do about 3% damage.

Have they confirmed that some guns are calculated in a different way? Wouldn't that make large cannons devastating against small ships (they aren't)?

Cannons are the fallback weapon if you can't run anything else due to heat and/or power. They're pretty rubbish otherwise.

The lack of variety in balanced weapons generally and C3/4 especially is really frustrating.

Cannons do hit as one class above. I'm not certain on PA's and Rails. Large mounts don't do more damage to small ships, they just don't do less to large targets.

And if heat/power was a nonfactor, people would just load up with their favorite flavor of laser in every slot. The limiting factor of laser DPS is very much the capacitor. Not so much for Cannons, Multis, Frags(lol) and PAs.

 

[KayAitch]

Cannons do hit as one class above. I'm not certain on PA's and Rails. Large mounts don't do more damage to small ships, they just don't do less to large targets.

Exactly - I'm shooting Anacondas with medium rails, I want to hit them with large rails.

 

[Krezan]

Have you been hit by twin railguns. Hurts like hell. If they were any larger they would go straight through your ship.

 

[Shadowjester]

As much as people say balancing is the issue, I really do miss my rails in the higher ships. Yes the rail gun is kinda a sniping weapon but take into account there is no magnification feature in game you can only shoot as far as your sensors and reticle allow. Leaving out the ammo count and the lack of indicator for charge time, like sniper rifles they are hard weapons to use and while i hate being one shooted by a sniper i enjoy the variety in the games. As far as i can tell there are only 2 weapons for Large hard points the PA and a Cannon. Balancing is something for the Developers to worry about (hopefully after inspection and not from butt hurt children). With the release of new ships and now a few new weapons from PP some of the old should be looked at to be revitalized; its annoying when you play a game get weapons and armour and once new stuff comes out everything you once had becomes so obsolete as to be a pea shooter in a nuke fight.

 

[YinYin]

Larger rails may just tear your ship apart as you fire them, turning your hull into a limiting factor.



I'm all for it. (keep in mind C2 rails already charge longer than C1 - obviously 3 and 4 would charge yet again longer before firing a shot)

 

[SteveWithaD]

I'm new to rails, been playing with class 2's, but my limited experience tells me anything larger would melt your hull and modules pretty quick, am I wrong on this?