Efficient beams overheating.

[Stealthie]

This is odd.

I've been using my 'vette constantly at CGs for the last 3 weeks so I'm pretty familiar with the way it works.
It's got a pair of 4A beam lasers with G5 efficient mods and they fire pretty-much indefinitely.

In fact, immediately after modding them I took off, pointed my 'vette at the nearest cliff-face, set 4 pips to weapons and just kept firing for as long as possible to see what'd fail first.
After a couple of minutes of continuous fire and no sign of them losing power or overheating I decided they were fit for purpose.

Except that's suddenly not the case any more.

Just been out to a HazRes for this week's CG and both my lasers overheat after around 10 seconds of continuous fire.

I even tried moving away from combat, pointing them at an asteroid and firing them and the same thing happened.
They fire for about 10 seconds and then overheat.

Systems HUD is showing them as 100% functional, along with everything else.

Is there something I'm missing or have FDev slipped a sneaky nerf into the game?

 

[IndigoWyrd]

This is odd.

I've been using my 'vette constantly at CGs for the last 3 weeks so I'm pretty familiar with the way it works.
It's got a pair of 4A beam lasers with G5 efficient mods and they fire pretty-much indefinitely.

In fact, immediately after modding them I took off, pointed my 'vette at the nearest cliff-face, set 4 pips to weapons and just kept firing for as long as possible to see what'd fail first.
After a couple of minutes of continuous fire and no sign of them losing power or overheating I decided the were fit for purpose.

Except that's suddenly not the case any more.

Just been out to a HazRes for this week's CG and both my lasers overheat after around 10 seconds of continuous fire.

I even tried moving away from combat, pointing them at an asteroid and firing them and the same thing happened.
They fire for about 10 seconds and then overheat.

Systems HUD is showing them as 100% functional, along with everything else.

Is there something I'm missing or have FDev slipped a sneaky nerf into the game?

By chance is this particular HazRES in a ring around a brown dwarf?

I haven't been on Elite since last week, needed a hiatus, so I haven't seen the current CG's.

But, if this Haz IS near a brown dwarf, then this is correct, you're going to build a lot more heat a lot faster from the presence of the star.

 

[Stealthie]

By chance is this particular HazRES in a ring around a brown dwarf?

Heh, I was just wondering if some kind of environmental condition might be responsible.

It's the HazRes at lambrayeque (sp?).
It's in a ring around a planet a couple of minutes SC from the star, although I honestly can't recall exactly what sort of planet it is.

Main point, though, is that it's the same HazRes I've been shamelessly harvesting for 3 weeks without these problems arising before.

It's not like it's a subtle change either.
Last week I could point my lasers at an Anaconda and keep shooting until it explodes.
Today I can't even finish off something like a Cobra without having to stop so my lasers can cool down.

Quite concerned about this cos my 'vette was almost entirely built around those lasers and now they're suddenly close to useless. [where is it]

 

[CzłowiekImadło]

By chance is this particular HazRES in a ring around a brown dwarf?

I haven't been on Elite since last week, needed a hiatus, so I haven't seen the current CG's.

But, if this Haz IS near a brown dwarf, then this is correct, you're going to build a lot more heat a lot faster from the presence of the star.

I have also noticed, that my 'vette builds up much more heat from boosting and FSD when close to a planetary surface (not sure about weapons, I think I never fired my beams on surface). I think any nearby stellar body may cause this, though stars probably make it much worse.

 

[the100thmonkey]

Well there haven't been any patches in the time-frame you're talking about, so something has changed at your end.

Stupid question: Do you have 4 pips to WEP? Heat builds up quicker with fewer pips.

 

[Non Grata]

Heh, I was just wondering if some kind of environmental condition might be responsible.

Hazreses at planets with high surface temperatures will do this. Are you sure you're still at the same planet? Not sure if two different hazreses around the same planet could have different temperatures.

 

[Stealthie]

Well there haven't been any patches in the time-frame you're talking about, so something has changed at your end.

Stupid question: Do you have 4 pips to WEP? Heat builds up quicker with fewer pips.

Yep, 4 pips to weapons.

Must admit, it's got to the point where I'm pretty-much flying the 'vette on "autopilot" so I am a bit worried I might've done something out of the ordinary and then, because I'm so used to the routine, can't remember what it was.

I can't even think of something you could do which'd screw up the laser like that though.
It's not like you can mess with the output of the PP or PDist and make it happen.

Just occurs to me, the one thing that has changed was that I finally got the last bit of required rep' so I made trade-elite (from the trade CG) a couple of days ago.
Surely the game doesn't nerf your weapons depending on your rank?
To reiterate, it's not that the baddies are harder to kill either. The lasers just flat-out don't fire for as long.

 

[Cypher2139]

It's weird you should mention this, I was thinking in the last week or so "Hmmm, my ships seems to be a bit hotter".

Like not a lot, maybe no more than 5-10°C during combat. But just enough to be noticeable. I'm sure I haven't made any changes to my build other than what it's normally fitted with, maybe I was just swapping modules and swapped a incorrect booster somewhere and didn't notice?

 

[Aris_]

Even with the best pd and over the limit charge enhance 2 h eff beams are sustainable for about 40sec 4pips and thermal vent

 

[Ralron]

did you recently also get a G5 OVER CHARGE Power Plant engineered?

like did you change ANYTHING since you got the Efficient upgrade?

did you change your POWERPLANT or POWER DISTRIBUTOR when you did the trading and put the wrong once back on?!


PS: dont do trading in a @#$%^ Vet.. haha :x

 

[Stealthie]

did you recently also get a G5 OVER CHARGE Power Plant engineered?

like did you change ANYTHING since you got the Efficient upgrade?

did you change your POWERPLANT or POWER DISTRIBUTOR when you did the trading and put the wrong once back on?!


PS: dont do trading in a @#$%^ Vet.. haha :x

Nup.

I've got the 'vette and my Cutter parked up in Kamadhenu.
The "routine" involves using the Cutter to farm the trade CG and then jumping in the 'vette to shoot at stuff for that CG.
'Vette was working fine last week and it's been parked-up at Shajn market ever since.

Had enough of hauling Palladium tonight so I jumped into the 'vette and the lasers are borked. [sad]

 

[Nick90z32tt]

I just flew back to my 'vette to make sure. Never ending huge fixed beam lasers still working as intended here.

 

[Ian Skippy]

Something is up Stealthie. Can you post screenies of your fire group and modules tabs?

 

[NascentChemist]

Do you have thermal vent on them? If so, you'll have have a harder time keeping continuous fire on a Cobra than a 'conda. Missed shots with thermal vent have an increased heat generation. I had my 'vette set up similarly before, and fighting small ships made it toasty.

Now that I'm thinking, does anyone know exactly what thermal vent does while on target? The text makes it seem that it cool your ship, but does it actually just increase the thermal efficiency of the weapon? I ask because I've got thermal vent on a small beam laser right now, thinking that it could help offset the heat of 2 huge PA's.

 

[nanite2000]

Was your original test against the cliff face performed while stationery? If so, that's probably the key difference: maneuvering uses your thrusters which in turn generate heat. If your thrusters are engineered with Dirty tuning, they will generate even more heat.

NOTE: Travelling in a straight line will not generate a much heat as combat maneuvers, which use all your thrusters.

 

[Gunnet]

They stop firing because the weapons capacitor drains? If that's the case, the overheating is incidental and the problem is either increased capacitor draw or decreased capacitor recharge.

You said you still have four pips to weapons, and I'm assuming that you haven't swapped out or rerolled your power distributor. So something is drawing weapons power. It wouldn't need to be much, since even with a good charge enhanced roll on the PD and good efficient rolls on the beams, there's going to be very little headroom.

Have you checked that no other weapons have ended up in your beam fire group? Or carrying any turrets which you might have accidentally set to fire at will?

Edit: Sorry, just reread and realised that you might actually just be letting off the trigger when they start to overheat. That changes things a bit, but there being other weapons in the same fire group could still be the problem.

 

[yolomcbobbinz]

Throw some thermal vents on them no more heat issues until you drain the cap

 

[rrobes]

This happened to me. Same scenario, my Corvette was fine one day, then it wasn't.

I was running an OC 7A PP w/ 40+ output which was enough for my draw but I decided to replace it with an 8A OC, 50+ output. No more overheating.

Don't know the size of your PP, but that cured mine, wasn't cheap.

I also run an CE 8A PD.

 

[yolomcbobbinz]

Do you have thermal vent on them? If so, you'll have have a harder time keeping continuous fire on a Cobra than a 'conda. Missed shots with thermal vent have an increased heat generation. I had my 'vette set up similarly before, and fighting small ships made it toasty.

Now that I'm thinking, does anyone know exactly what thermal vent does while on target? The text makes it seem that it cool your ship, but does it actually just increase the thermal efficiency of the weapon? I ask because I've got thermal vent on a small beam laser right now, thinking that it could help offset the heat of 2 huge PA's.

They won't get your ship near frosty cold especially one small one, I have 4 med with vent and when not boosting my heat lowers from 50% to 35% even when missing I haven't really noticed a large heat gain increase maybe 10% until my cap hits 50% then the heat takes a toll reaching 90% on full cap drain, but if the OP is using fixed it might be the culprit for the over heating, I always use gimbal beams

 

[NascentChemist]

They won't get your ship near frosty cold especially one small one, I have 4 med with vent and when not boosting my heat lowers from 50% to 35% even when missing I haven't really noticed a large heat gain increase maybe 10% until my cap hits 50% then the heat takes a toll reaching 90% on full cap drain, but if the OP is using fixed it might be the culprit for the over heating, I always use gimbal beams

Alright, so thermal vent does more than merely improving a weapons heat efficiency. Glad to have that confirmed.

I'm considering getting rid of the small beam anyway. Even with the two huge PA's engineered with efficient G5, my distributor has trouble keeping up unless I have 4 pips to WEP. Distributor cap is more limiting than heat, by a wide margin.

Well, I could reroll all the other weapons and focus on a good distributor secondary. They're all just G1 long range. 1 large pulse, 2 med pulses, 1 small multi, and the beam.