Which Gimballed would you go for

[catanonia]

My goto RES ship is my Vulture with dual C3 gimballed Beams on it. I have some strict module management to get these to work, but they work very well.
I can take down a NPC Conda shields with 2 full weapon banks of charge with them and anything smaller is usually 1 pass with the dual beams to get shields down. They are not as effective on the hull, but they still do serious damage and anything less than a Clipper / Python NPC is history in usually 1 pass.

But I have been thinking about DPS and whether this is the best choice of laser weapon.

Gimballed = More on target as long as nose onto the target
Fixed = More DPS assuming you are actually on target

So gimballed vs fixed I am happy with and I prefer gimballed and it suits my style more.

But what about Pulse and burst lasers. Are they more DPS than Beams ?

What lasers would you use ?

 

[andyraptor]

My goto RES ship is my Vulture with dual C3 gimballed Beams on it. I have some strict module management to get these to work, but they work very well.

But I have been thinking about DPS and whether this is the best choice of laser weapon.

Gimballed = More on target as long as nose onto the target
Fixed = More DPS assuming you are actually on target

So gimballed vs fixed I am happy with and I prefer gimballed and it suits my style more.

But what about Pulse and burst lasers. Are they more DPS than Beams ?

What lasers would you use ?

get the "Americanism" out of your mind

enjoy your own game and game play style.... getting a chart out with DPS is meaningless... do you hit the target with every shot? ...

 

[Lateralus]

Having two C3 beams fixed or gimballed is too much for the Vulture's capacitor and you'll only get a few seconds of fire...if you must have both as lasers I suggest one beam and one pulse as they will fire for much longer.

As far as fixed vs gimballed I would say if you're going for enemy subsystems or you want to render enemy chaff useless go with fixed, if not go with gimballed as you will achieve more DPS with them.

 

[the100thmonkey]

I use C3 gimballed pulse lasers for two reasons:

1. They just fire forever. The distributor takes a long time to run out.
2. Heat management. I can't recall if the Vulture is particularly sensitive to heat (I haven't flown one in a long time), but pulse lasers have superior thermal efficiency.

You can basically fire longer, which makes up for the time beam lasers can't fire because the distributor is recharging or your heat levels needs to come down.

I think you also have a bit more headroom for other modules, e.g. shield boosters.

 

[Brujah]

It depends. If you're highly accurate, you'll probably get better value from Beams. If not, then Pulses DO have higher DpE (Damage per Energy).

I tend to stick with Gimballed Pulses because of their lower power requirements for fitting. Also, I fly FA-Off, so the chances of my consistently hitting with a Fixed weapon are pretty low.

 

[catanonia]

Having two C3 beams fixed or gimballed is too much for the Vulture's capacitor and you'll only get a few seconds of fire...if you must have both as lasers I suggest one beam and one pulse as they will fire for much longer.

As far as fixed vs gimballed I would say if you're going for enemy subsystems or you want to render enemy chaff useless go with fixed, if not go with gimballed as you will achieve more DPS with them.

Sorry but wrong as I have been doing it for ages.

4 pips to weapons, hold trigger with dual C3 beams until the bank is empty, Usually takes 5 seconds or a little more and get overheat message sometimes, but not enough to damage the ship. This is plenty to destroy most ships under Clipper in 1 pass.

I have A class everything and cargo hatch powered off with all other modules on low priorities. I also have hull re-enforcements, chaff, kws and interdictor unit, all on low priority.

Works perfect.

I might try burst lasers to see if they work with more punch on the gimballed.

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It depends. If you're highly accurate, you'll probably get better value from Beams. If not, then Pulses DO have higher DpE (Damage per Energy).

I tend to stick with Gimballed Pulses because of their lower power requirements for fitting. Also, I fly FA-Off, so the chances of my consistently hitting with a Fixed weapon are pretty low.

Thank you, someone that actually answered the question rather than attack the post.

+ rep

 

[Lateralus]

Sorry but wrong as I have been doing it for ages.

4 pips to weapons, hold trigger with dual C3 beams until the bank is empty and get overheat message for about 2 seconds.
I have A class everything and cargo hatch powered off with all other modules on low priorities.

Works perfect.

I might try burst lasers to see if they work with more punch on the gimballed.

4 pips to weapons isn't always a good idea though in a combat scenario, and a beam + pulse will always fire for longer than 2 beams at once.

As others have said heat is less of an issue too.

EDIT: By combat scenario I mean an area where you're likely to get shot at by other hostiles other than the one you're shooting at.

 

[Brujah]

This is a handy page to bookmark if you're interested in the stats: All Weapon Stats In Actual Values

It's possible they're no longer accurate as they're relatively old now, but from my experience they appear to be about right.

 

[ketch1]

Hi I use 1 C3 Beam and 1 C3 Cannon both gimballed if the target uses chaff i just unlock them and fire as fixed then back to gimballed once his chaff runs dry, it works very well for me i am all A rated apart from thrusters which is D3 rated.

 

[Wasp0]

I use a Vulture when i am hunting NPC/or Missions etc. I have tried many many weapon loadout and found 2 beams, although nice, way to short to be useful, and boy the heat!! Even 1x pulse and 1x Beam the actual fire time is all to short. IMHO, either 1x beam and 1x cannon or 2x Pulse.

Also for 2 beams that is some serious module management and i really can'r be bothered to do this in the heat of a Compromised Nav, Combat Zone etc!

As always this post is IMHO, and i am not an expert by far, but i know what suits me!

 

[Deleted member 38366]

In the current scheme of things... Gimbal Pulse Lasers have the best energy/damage efficiency, combined with their good accuracy vs. SubSystems and their low cost.

Although spammy, they just get the job done and offer the best bang for the buck.
A Vulture with 2x C3 Pulse Gimbals can keep them firing for a long time and thus has no issues taking down any Shield, Hull or SubSystem.
In terms of effectiveness, I haven't found anything even close to Pulse Lasers.

Burst Lasers bring more damage on the spot - but their Beam-like Power Draw and reduced SubSystem accuracy kinda puts them more in line with Beam Lasers than Pulsers.
Excellent Shield strippers - but after they're gone, they're kinda begging for you to employ Projectile Weapons to continue or just allow the WPN capacitor to recharge.

 

[catanonia]

With 4 pips to Weapons, 1 to system and 1 to engine , my tactic is normally to KWS them and immediately discharge the dual C3 gimballed beams to either kill them in the 1st pass, or at least take the shields down. I then track behind them for about 5 - 7 seconds (depends on how much target health is left) for the weapons to charge up again (A class distributor) and attack again.

I would say very close to 100% of my gimballed beams hit the target and most fights last less than 30 seconds for ships less than Python. If they chaff, I tend to wait and let the weapons charge up more.

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In the current scheme of things... Gimbal Pulse Lasers have the best energy/damage efficiency, combined with their good accuracy vs. SubSystems and their low cost.

Although spammy, they just get the job done and offer the best bang for the buck.
A Vulture with 2x C3 Pulse Gimbals can keep them firing for a long time and thus has no issues taking down any Shield, Hull or SubSystem.
In terms of effectiveness, I haven't found anything even close to Pulse Lasers.

Burst Lasers bring more damage on the spot - but their Beam-like Power Draw and reduced SubSystem accuracy kinda puts them in more line with Beam Lasers than Pulsers.
Excellent Shield strippers - but after they're gone, they're kinda begging for you to employ Projectile Weapons to continue or just allow the WPN capacitor to recharge.

Ah, exactly the point of the thread and the reason for asking for others experience. Many thanks and worth trying out. + rep


It would seem the difference for me would be in how I fight.

Pulse = keep shooting until dead.
Beam = Destroy in stages waiting for the WPN to charge as I currently do.

The major difference is with smaller ships that I can destroy very quickly with beams which is useful when fighting a wing.

 

[DJ-SLT-UK]

Personally Gimbaled Beams all the way.... I have been using them since I started or atleast once I could afford them and if your ship is powered correctly and modules set correctly, then even with fast heat up its easily avoided when you get within 500-1ls away from an opponent.... put it this way with a Python & maxed out gimballed beams I would destroy all small ships even with shields within the 1st full press on the trigger....now with the anaconda and complete gimballed beams thru-out.... I can almost wipeout most ships before they get a chance to even think what to do.....the closer you are to your target the less heat buildup because the damage is multiplied causing complete destruction or close to it within 1 long press.

So conclusion - Gimbaled Beams all the way...

Regards

CMDR DJ-SLT-UK

 

[RAMJB]

Vulture is EZmode as it is. I dropped the gimballed for fixed on it simply because using that thing with gimballed stuff was so undemanding and easy that it almost felt cheap using it.

And drop those twin beams Just do it.. They're capacitor-inneficient weapons by design. Some ships can run them no problem even when being too capacitor intensive because they have power to spare, others can't. The vulture can't, at least not in pairs. Or I'd rather say, it can do it but is far too inneficient and you'll be stripped of capacitor most of the time. Not to mention you'll have to use four pips on weapons all the time which is obviously detrimental.

I personally run the Vulture with twin C3 fixed pulses and it still fees far too easy (one of the reasons I moved on to the FdL and when I feel the need to fly something smaller I use my Icourier). It's a setup effective both vs shields and vs hull (another reason twin beams is not a good idea - they're great vs shields but marginal vs hull) while being very power efficient as the configuration doesn't force you to run 4 pips on weapons all the time. I'd suggest you going for that and watching for yourself. Your reasoning to use beams is pretty much moot here, btw. Anything you can kill in one pass with your C3 beams you can kill in one pass with C3 pulses too. And you won't strip your capacitor off energy in the meantime so you can keep on going without waiting for a recharge.

Another fun alternative is the C3 fixed beam + C3 fixed cannon. another very efficient power setup and very hard hitting. Cannons are hard to use unless you're virtually on top of the enemy but the way the vulture maneouvers that's never a problem, the beam eats up shields really quick and the cannon is great vs hulls. Against ships smaller than an asp however the cannon is quite hard to use, but just a C3 fixed beam is more than enough to do short work of anything smaller than that anyway. It's a tad less versatile than the twin pulse configuration and more optimized vs big ships but it's a lot of fun, and if you use your vulture for hires and hazres farming you want to kill big ships mostly anyway.


Worth mentioning - both the mentioned configurations put less demands on the limited power plant output than twin beams, and you can use that extra output to improve something else. You'll end up with a better rounded ship as a result.

 

[Quineloe]

Having two C3 beams fixed or gimballed is too much for the Vulture's capacitor and you'll only get a few seconds of fire...if you must have both as lasers I suggest one beam and one pulse as they will fire for much longer.

As far as fixed vs gimballed I would say if you're going for enemy subsystems or you want to render enemy chaff useless go with fixed, if not go with gimballed as you will achieve more DPS with them.

Since gimballed weapons drain the capacitor not as fast as fixed weapons that statement isn't necessarily true. Besides, you deal massive damage in those few seconds of fire - which is pretty nice considering you want to keep fights short in order to maximize the damage you take yourself

 

[catanonia]

Stuff.

Thanks, yes the Vulture is easy mode at times and i use it for the assignation / pirate missions to rank up.

I think I will have a play with the Pulse Gimballs and see what happens especially since it has been hinted at that they are more effective against sub systems.
Thanks

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Since gimballed weapons drain the capacitor not as fast as fixed weapons that statement isn't necessarily true. Besides, you deal massive damage in those few seconds of fire - which is pretty nice considering you want to keep fights short in order to maximize the damage you take yourself

Indeed and very useful being able to give maximum damage for a 5 seconds on target when being swarmed by a wing to pick off the smaller targets before hitting the big target.

 

[Lateralus]

Since gimballed weapons drain the capacitor not as fast as fixed weapons that statement isn't necessarily true. Besides, you deal massive damage in those few seconds of fire - which is pretty nice considering you want to keep fights short in order to maximize the damage you take yourself

This is why I have one of each to get a nice balance...high damage and a few extra seconds of fire. You should try it

 

[Wasp0]

In the current scheme of things... Gimbal Pulse Lasers have the best energy/damage efficiency, combined with their good accuracy vs. SubSystems and their low cost.

Although spammy, they just get the job done and offer the best bang for the buck.
A Vulture with 2x C3 Pulse Gimbals can keep them firing for a long time and thus has no issues taking down any Shield, Hull or SubSystem.
In terms of effectiveness, I haven't found anything even close to Pulse Lasers.

Burst Lasers bring more damage on the spot - but their Beam-like Power Draw and reduced SubSystem accuracy kinda puts them in more line with Beam Lasers than Pulsers.
Excellent Shield strippers - but after they're gone, they're kinda begging for you to employ Projectile Weapons to continue or just allow the WPN capacitor to recharge.

To the best of my Knowledge you can't get C3 Pules Lasers????? best available is E3 Is it not? willing to be corrected??

 

[Lateralus]

To the best of my Knowledge you can't get C3 Pules Lasers????? best available is E3 Is it not? willing to be corrected??

C3 as in class 3

 

[Wasp0]

C3 as in class 3

Ah OK, but it is confusing as we are talking about Beams, Burst and Pulse lasers and you can get C3 beams!

Have a good one

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Sorry but wrong as I have been doing it for ages.

4 pips to weapons, hold trigger with dual C3 beams until the bank is empty, Usually takes 5 seconds or a little more and get overheat message sometimes, but not enough to damage the ship. This is plenty to destroy most ships under Clipper in 1 pass.

I have A class everything and cargo hatch powered off with all other modules on low priorities. I also have hull re-enforcements, chaff, kws and interdictor unit, all on low priority.

Works perfect.

I might try burst lasers to see if they work with more punch on the gimballed.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -



Thank you, someone that actually answered the question rather than attack the post.

+ rep

WOW, just tried building a Vulture in Coriolis with 2x C3 Gimballed beams, and the module management is just WOW, would you mind sharing your coriolis loadout with me (us) as i would like to give that a go. I can mange 2x C3 beams and an electric tin opener and that's about it!