You dont turret those small hardpoints on the back/bottom of the conda either?
Ships Bi Wave Shields. Is it always better to go fast charge?
- Thread starter Yingnei Gasua
- Start date
Brilliant argument, indeed, all those points I didn't tough about !
but you did spot the irony, right?
No?
You're telling him that he is wrong... because " Prismatic.s "eat" a lot more from your distributor "
I mean really? Prismatics are the gentlest shields when it comes about PD. They eat a lot less (the least actually) than other shields, not a lot more..
They have the lowest recharge rate which is the only thing that matter when it comes about distributor
A 7A PD with charge enhanced and super conduit need only half pip to recharge the shield at maximum rate allowed by a 6A prismatic.
Last edited:
Nop, not worth, imho, the trade for lower damage vs more angles, since I try to always fight dynamic, chasing the opponents, so I will always try to face the most dangerous NPC and tanking the small ones - I realized long ago, when facing 3-5 NPCs, the best strategy is to focus all your firepower against the "leader", the bigger / stronger of them, ignoring others - so you can eliminate the biggest threat as fast is possible, avoiding unnecessary damage; When your firepower is divided between 3-5 target, you will face more time multiple weapons fire, and you will take much more damage;
More to that, since I use plenty of MCs. in my Conda build, is in my best interest to stay close, at some 5-600m to my opponent, where the MCs have the best damage. At that range also the non-stop chaff some NPC use become useless for them
When you fight at blank-range, in a big ship with a kinetic build, is another HUGE advantage - you always have access to one more deadly weapon, the ram !
Here the difference of damage output between turreted and gimballed make a lot of sense. Many times when you kill the "leader" of a NPC wing you may see the last ship running away - I found that always funny .
Last edited:
but you did spot the irony, right?
No?
You're telling him that he is wrong... because " Prismatic.s "eat" a lot more from your distributor "
I mean really? Prismatics are the gentlest shields when it comes about PD. They eat a lot less (the least actually) than other shields, not a lot more..
They have the lowest recharge rate which is the only thing that matter when it comes about distributor
A 7A PD with charge enhanced and super conduit need only half pip to recharge the shield at maximum rate allowed by a 6A prismatic.
"They eat a lot less (the least actually) than other shields, not a lot more.."
Prismatic 7A Power Draw 7,35 MW
Bi-wave 7C Power Draw 3,5 MW:
Are you again "ironic" or the math is not your strong ?!
For me, MORE than double power required is A LOT MORE. I suppose for most folks here also
Not to comment about the recharge time of a prismatic vs a bi-wave...
(source :
The trade for 15%20 more HP is not the best - a lot heavier, significant longer recharge and significant more power required. If you are a trader, this will not be an issue;
But for a fighting ship, in PVE, if you want to stay as long possible in the fighting zone, Bi-wave all day long. Just my 2 cents.
I do not say bi-wave are always the best,
For JUST one long-endurance fight, to outlast your opponent - Prismatics (higher raw strength). But that obvious will not work well in CZ, ResH or CNP where you will face dozens of ships.
For many fights, one after another one - Bi-Weave (faster recharge between fights). That is why ALL my combat ships, obvious in PvE, are loaded with Bi-Wave.
Last edited:
I learned the nuances of biweaves building a 7c biweave clipper. big ol recharge rate & small distributor & learning to use that shield as a 5th hardpoint taught me more than any other build tbh. ofc it was more of an art with the old engineering; its now much more off-the-shelf. but still a good exercise for any budding bespoke engineers out there..
![[VR] Merkir](https://d2aefvhu2f0gi9.cloudfront.net/data/avatars/m/141/141091.jpg?1553527154){kind=avatar}
"They eat a lot less (the least actually) than other shields, not a lot more.."
Prismatic 7A Power Draw 7,35 MW
Bi-wave 7C Power Draw 3,5 MW:
Are you again "ironic" or the math is not your strong ?!
For me, MORE than double power required is A LOT MORE. I suppose for most folks here also
You're going to need to learn the difference between the power plant and power distributor, as you're mixing them up. Take a quick look at the documentation for each. In the case of shields, the shield power draw is provided by the power plant, but shield recharge is provided by the power distributor. Thus, Prismatics with their lower recharge rate drain the power distributor much more slowly than bi-weaves.
Strange, I never thought about it, but for some reason it seemed that the prisms would charge slower but take more energy from the distributor.
You sure about that? EDSY shows the same Distributor Draw = 0.6 MW for both stock 7A Prismatics and stock 7C Bi-weaves (and every other stock shield generator, regardless of class and rate). For 7C Bi-weaves Thermal resistant / Fast charge it's still 0.6 MW. Applying Thermal resistant / High capacity to 7A Prismatics increases this value to 0.75 MW.
Am I missing something?
Yeah sure you try to learn me the difference between distributor and power plant dude ?! Avoiding the fact I stipulated - one need more than double power than other, and if you DO NOT have that power you are screwed ? Allow me to teach you another difference between distributor and power plant : you can have the best distributor there but if your power plant cannot produce the juice needed your shield will NOT recharge ! So that show why is the power requirement so important, and was that the argument I did. Biwave can work with less than half the power you need for a prismatic, and that translate in more power for weapons and systems. Add the extra weight and bad regen rate and that is I say is not a great trade, for prolonged combat.
You won't find any torpedo in Solo, I still wait for a NPC shooting torpedoes at me
You cannot talk about distributor only, you must consider BOTH parts : if the distributor is not fed by a power plant with the required power - your shield will not charge in the time you expect. Simply as that.
Since one draw more than double the power than the other, draw your own conclusion. And yes, I think you are right on your assertion, that extra HP on a prismatic have a cost, those extra MJ do not come from thin air.
Last edited:
If you have the power from your power plant to power the Shield Generator then it is on. If you don't, then it is off. That is all the PP has to do with it. It doesn't matter if it is recharging, full, or broken and coming back up, it always takes the same amount of PP power to be on.
It doesn't matter what the distributor draw is at any given time, if your ship has enough power to turn the PD on, then it is on, and the the needed power to turn it on does not change.
PP requirements are static and outside of initially setting your ship up with enough power to run everything, bear no impact at all on the PD or Shield functions so long as the PP is functioning.
"They eat a lot less (the least actually) than other shields, not a lot more.."
Prismatic 7A Power Draw 7,35 MW
Bi-wave 7C Power Draw 3,5 MW:
Are you again "ironic" or the math is not your strong ?!
For me, MORE than double power required is A LOT MORE. I suppose for most folks here also
Not to comment about the recharge time of a prismatic vs a bi-wave...
View attachment 203224
(source :Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNs2tAkuzLE )
The trade for 15%20 more HP is not the best - a lot heavier, significant longer recharge and significant more power required. If you are a trader, this will not be an issue;
But for a fighting ship, in PVE, if you want to stay as long possible in the fighting zone, Bi-wave all day long. Just my 2 cents.
I do not say bi-wave are always the best,
For JUST one long-endurance fight, to outlast your opponent - Prismatics (higher raw strength). But that obvious will not work well in CZ, ResH or CNP where you will face dozens of ships.
For many fights, one after another one - Bi-Weave (faster recharge between fights). That is why ALL my combat ships, obvious in PvE, are loaded with Bi-Wave.
You are really confused about what PP does for shields and what PD does for shields. Also about what is affecting the recharge time of shields.
Both @Vedmo and @Merkir are trying to explain things to you, but you somehow refuse to absorb and process the information
And stop trying to twist things around, my post referred to your lack of understanding shields and PD
see? ^^
try this empiric test:
Check this coriolis build: Python with 7A PD and 6A prismatics. Notice the recharge rate in the shield specs. 1/s
Play with the Pips and notice the recharging time for primatics. 0.5 pips in SYS is enough to recharge the shields at max rate.
Then check this coriolis build for the same Python but with 6C bi-weave. Notice the differences in recharge rate in the shield specs. 3.2/s
Play with the Pips and notice the recharging time for bi-weaves. 1.5 pips in SYS is required to recharge the shields at max rate.
And this was an ideal case with the PD one size bigger than the shields.
But size 7 and size 8 bi-weaves are really and i mean Really taxing on PD. Low draw is usually the best experimental there.
edit: "to recharge the shields at max rate" by this i meant keeping the Sys cap at max.
Have to specify this because the PD does not recharge the shields directly. It charges the Sys Cap and this in turn is charging the shields
Last edited:
The whole discussion here was about choosing between fast recharge biwave, or other build, and that later come to power consumption. I stated the prismatic offer a small increase in HP in a trade for much bigger increase in weight, power consumption and regen rate, moment when you jump in and started posting blind data, out of context, in a futile show of "teaching" others about differences between PP and PD, when in fact NONE of your arguments ever manage to contradict the fundamental fact: a prismatic is MORE more power hungry than a biwave.
More power hungry, heavier, more expensive, and with a significant lower regen rate, all in exchange for a relative small increase in HP .
And that was the whole point, imo, on this topic. A question about biwave.
Getting here builds from Coriolis will not alter the facts " but you somehow refuse to absorb and process the information " (sic ! ) ;[/QUOTE]
Like ignoring the whole topic of the OP question in order to jump in and post short sentences about irony. Sure that helped a lot the OP here, indeed.
It seems to me, you are more interested in engaging in personal disputed than making a positive approach to the OP question.
In the light of that,, I will not engage in other arguments with you. It will go nowhere.
Have a nice day.
Last edited:
Yes. See below.
EDSY says the Distributor Draw is 0.6 MW to recharge 1 shield unit.
It then shows that each shield has a different Recharge Rate as follows:
6C Bi-Weave recharges at 3.2 units per sec. This gives a distributor draw of 0.6 x 3.2 = 1.92 MW
6A Standard recharges at 1.3 units per sec. This gives a distributor draw of 0.6 x 1.3 = 0.78 MW
6A Prismatic recharges at 1.0 units per sec. This gives a distributor draw of 0.6 x 1.0 = 0.6 MW
No expert .. PvE only ... but here’s my 2-penneth...
On ships with 4 or more Utility slots I generally go Thermal Resist / Fast Charge on a BiWeave shield then one G5 Kinetic Booster to even out the resistances and all the rest Resist Augmented for max protection / minimum recharge time. Obviously that does leave you exposed to PAs since the resists won’t help you there.
However, I’ve recently spun up a Viper MkIV in a fit of nostalgia ... for that, I went with MultiWeave on the BiWeave shields in order to get the resists up a little higher as there’s only so much you can do with 2 utility slots.
On ships with 4 or more Utility slots I generally go Thermal Resist / Fast Charge on a BiWeave shield then one G5 Kinetic Booster to even out the resistances and all the rest Resist Augmented for max protection / minimum recharge time. Obviously that does leave you exposed to PAs since the resists won’t help you there.
However, I’ve recently spun up a Viper MkIV in a fit of nostalgia ... for that, I went with MultiWeave on the BiWeave shields in order to get the resists up a little higher as there’s only so much you can do with 2 utility slots.
And that's the part I was missing! Thanks!
It's amazing that after over three years of playing there're still important things to learn in the game!