Hey guys. I've just purchased a Vulture and I'm wondering what my hardpoint loadout should be. I currently have a Large Beam Laser coupled with a Large Multicannon, but should I swap out the Beam Laser for a Large Pulse Laser? From what I can tell, the Pulse Laser is better in almost every way apart from the DPS. Are there any hidden advantages to having a Beam Laser than I'm unaware of?
Large Beam Laser or Large Pulse Laser?
- Thread starter Scruffman
- Start date
If you can sustain the beam then it's going to cause more damage. It's not as efficient in terms of cap usage as a pulse but if you can fire it for a good amount of time, they're a great weapon. Especially coupled with a large MC.
I have the kid-version of that Vulture setup. I run a C2 beam with a C2 MC and twin C1 MCs on my CobraIII. I can peel shielding with the beam and then rip up internals with the cannons, throwing in more beam whenever I have the cap.
Pulse does more initial damage (burst) and uses less power (I believe). Beam does more sustained damage (dps) uses more power but is totally cool if you can keep it focused on your target. [yesnod]
Its a preference thing.
Its a preference thing.
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I haven't had my vulture very long. A-rated (well as A-rated as you can make a Vulture and still run life support) and 2 X C3 Pulse lasers. I really like that set-up. Granted, most of my experience is pre 2.1, but I did give a High RES a try before switching over to my T-6 for the hangover CG. It still did pretty well. The main tactics I had to change were to avoid attacking wings like the plague, paying attention to combat ranks, and letting security engage the tougher ships before joining in. Otherwise, no complaints up to this point. I found my Vulture to be a boring experience before the update.
There's a youtube video on this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TR82aPyigMc
I did some math, and it boils down to what percentage of your time is spent on cool-down.
@12.9sec : 43% beam, 31% Pulse - beam starts recharge
@23.9sec : 43% beam, 57% Pulse - pulse starts recharge, beam finishes recharge
@34.9sec : 80% beam, 57% Pulse - pulse finishes recharge
@36.8sec : 86% beam, 62% Pulse - beam starts second recarge
@47.8sec : 86% beam, 88% Pulse - beam finishes second recharge
@58.8sec : 122% beam, 114% Pulse - pulse starts second recharge
@60.7sec : 129% beam, 114% Pulse - beam starts third recharge.
As you can see: they leap-frog as combat continues through drain and recharge cycles. The shorter the recharge (as a percentage of total time), the better beam does; the longer the recharge (as a percentage of total time), the worse beam does. So a 1 sec recharge would make the beam the better weapon and a 60 second recharge would make the pulse the better weapon. At the 11sec quoted: It's something of a wash in most combat.
So, I tried this at home with my Vulture (A power plant, single beam laser), and I have something around a 30 sec fire time with my (normal) 4-pips to weapons, and an 11 sec recharge. What I don't know is how long the pulse lasers would work like that. If they merely doubled: then the beam weapon would be better; but since I assume weapons recharge during fire, the math is more complex (indeed; pulse lasers may have a 100% up-time). So let's assume 43%/12.9sec of fire, 30 sec of fire, and a 41sec total cycle time. Interestingly: that puts damage at 100% at 30 seconds. Add in recharge and it's 100%/41sec or 2.43%/secA pulse laser that never drains does 2.38%/secSo the beam is slightly better (more than slightly if the pulse does eventually drain the engine) in terms of raw DPS. It also will do better though most of each 40sec period (remember: the DPS is higher than 2.43 for the first 30sec, then drops till it hits 2.43 at 41sec, then rises again until 71sec where it begins to drop again. 2.43 is the lowest DPS the beam has. Of course, the pulse will eat less of the engine and so leave room for (more) shield capacitors, or a second energy weapon, which the beam will more severely limit.
I ran beam+Scatter, then dual pulse, and am now trying pulse+multi.
I did some math, and it boils down to what percentage of your time is spent on cool-down.
@12.9sec : 43% beam, 31% Pulse - beam starts recharge
@23.9sec : 43% beam, 57% Pulse - pulse starts recharge, beam finishes recharge
@34.9sec : 80% beam, 57% Pulse - pulse finishes recharge
@36.8sec : 86% beam, 62% Pulse - beam starts second recarge
@47.8sec : 86% beam, 88% Pulse - beam finishes second recharge
@58.8sec : 122% beam, 114% Pulse - pulse starts second recharge
@60.7sec : 129% beam, 114% Pulse - beam starts third recharge.
As you can see: they leap-frog as combat continues through drain and recharge cycles. The shorter the recharge (as a percentage of total time), the better beam does; the longer the recharge (as a percentage of total time), the worse beam does. So a 1 sec recharge would make the beam the better weapon and a 60 second recharge would make the pulse the better weapon. At the 11sec quoted: It's something of a wash in most combat.
So, I tried this at home with my Vulture (A power plant, single beam laser), and I have something around a 30 sec fire time with my (normal) 4-pips to weapons, and an 11 sec recharge. What I don't know is how long the pulse lasers would work like that. If they merely doubled: then the beam weapon would be better; but since I assume weapons recharge during fire, the math is more complex (indeed; pulse lasers may have a 100% up-time). So let's assume 43%/12.9sec of fire, 30 sec of fire, and a 41sec total cycle time. Interestingly: that puts damage at 100% at 30 seconds. Add in recharge and it's 100%/41sec or 2.43%/secA pulse laser that never drains does 2.38%/secSo the beam is slightly better (more than slightly if the pulse does eventually drain the engine) in terms of raw DPS. It also will do better though most of each 40sec period (remember: the DPS is higher than 2.43 for the first 30sec, then drops till it hits 2.43 at 41sec, then rises again until 71sec where it begins to drop again. 2.43 is the lowest DPS the beam has. Of course, the pulse will eat less of the engine and so leave room for (more) shield capacitors, or a second energy weapon, which the beam will more severely limit.
I ran beam+Scatter, then dual pulse, and am now trying pulse+multi.
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Beams take shields fast but kind of skim over hulls, although they still do damage. Pulses will go through hulls and do module damage along the way. I find kill time quicker with pulses.
Also, I find an all pulse or all multi build to be the faster kill, rather than a mix of pulse/beam for shield and multis for the hull.
Also, I find an all pulse or all multi build to be the faster kill, rather than a mix of pulse/beam for shield and multis for the hull.
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Be informed. Check the stats of your weapon. The first two stats you should be looking at: DPS and DPE. DPS = damage per second caused by the weapon. DPE = damage per energy, basically how much damage you get per unit of energy (your weapon energy is the orange WEP bar).
Beam laser has superior DPS, pulse laser has superior DPE.
It displays these stats in outfitting. The Damage per energy is the damage per second divided by the distributor draw.
If you aren't into maths, Truesilver has made a spreadsheet of all the weapons and their stats.
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=246086&highlight=truesilver
Beam laser has superior DPS, pulse laser has superior DPE.
It displays these stats in outfitting. The Damage per energy is the damage per second divided by the distributor draw.
If you aren't into maths, Truesilver has made a spreadsheet of all the weapons and their stats.
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=246086&highlight=truesilver