Plasma accelerator ammo?

Neofactor · Mar 3, 2015

Why does the plasma accelerator have ammo? Isn't it an energy weapon? And it's already so hard to hit anything with it, so why does it have Ammo at all? Just out of curiosity....

Mohrgan · Mar 3, 2015

Plasma is just another state of matter. You need the initial matter (ammo) to get anything into a plasma state.

Neofactor · Mar 3, 2015

Ah that makes sense. So shouldn't it also be thermal and kinetic then rather than just thermal damage?

Mohrgan · Mar 3, 2015

One idea is that the relatively low amount of matter used is just used as a way to project the vast amounts of energy needed to turn, a metal, into the plasma state. A solid converted into plasma would be mostly an energy weapon in the end.

Don_Von_Hulio · Mar 3, 2015

I never understood why the PA gets 100 while the Rail gets 30.... because of that reason ive been expecting some sort of nerf to PAs for awhile since its highly doubtful they intentionally make the Rail better to compensate for its ridiculous heat generation and paltry ammo count.

piercehead · Mar 3, 2015

Don_Von_Hulio said:
I never understood why the PA gets 100 while the Rail gets 30.... because of that reason ive been expecting some sort of nerf to PAs for awhile since its highly doubtful they intentionally make the Rail better to compensate for its ridiculous heat generation and paltry ammo count.

Probably to balance the fact that the rail gun has no travel time, meaning each shot is MUCH more likely to hit. A nerf to Plasma? Who even uses them at the moment?

BishopC · Mar 3, 2015

Funnily enough, it looks like Class 3 Plasma Accs are both thermal and kinetic. Seems you need some mass on that superheated plasma to actually do kinetic damage.

Gully Foyle · Mar 3, 2015

Neofactor said:
Why does the plasma accelerator have ammo? Isn't it an energy weapon? And it's already so hard to hit anything with it, so why does it have Ammo at all? Just out of curiosity....

I believe its in a magnetic bubble, like a ping pong ball.

Don_Von_Hulio · Mar 3, 2015

piercehead said:
Probably to balance the fact that the rail gun has no travel time, meaning each shot is MUCH more likely to hit. A nerf to Plasma? Who even uses them at the moment?

I do. They are the best heavy weapon for protracted conflicts.

Darth Ender · Mar 3, 2015

I was thinking about using a plasma cannon in my asp. The main issue is cost of ammo (2k a shot). Since you have a good chance at missing a couple shots during a battle on top of what you use to actually kill the other ship, it easily starts digging heavily into profits. I just wouldn't consider it for attacking anything smaller than a type9 with bounties in the 100k area if you're a bounty hunter, which leaves the majority of the ships you come across out of the picture.

It would be nice if the plasma cannon had something more unique to offset it's weird "energy weapon that uses ammo" ways. Like maybe interfering with shields rather than just doing boss heat damage. So, instead of inflicting a lot of heat damage, it does minor heat damage but high shield interference allowing projectiles to penetrate the shields. So I would use the cannon as a one-two. Plasma then rail or cannons .... inflicting hull and sub-component damage without having to bring the shields down. The shield interference would be temporary depending on the class of plasma cannon and the strength of the shield. Pips to shield would not matter.

Then it might be useful.

BishopC · Mar 3, 2015

I might be totally wrong here, but I think the plasma and the rail gun don't get a damage malus when attacking bigger ships. Example, malus is 66% when a small ship with small hardpoints attacks an Anaconda, it will do less damage than against another small ship. So if you have 3 small ships with the same numerical hull and shield as one Anaconda, you still have to dish out 3 times the damage to the Anaconda. With rails and plasma, you would kill the 3 small ships and the Conda with the same number of attacks (incidentally, I think they also are the weapons with the highest damage in one hit?).

Or, in short: If you want to kill bigger ships, rails and plasmas are your weapons of choice.

Eagle Eye · Mar 3, 2015

piercehead said:
Probably to balance the fact that the rail gun has no travel time, meaning each shot is MUCH more likely to hit. A nerf to Plasma? Who even uses them at the moment?

I do. Got interdicted by an elite Anaconda 2 days ago while doing milk runs on my trading (but weaponized) Anaconda. For giggles I power up my C4 Plasma Accelerator but instead of shooting it on the 1st chance like the AI, I wait until he lost shield from my trio of C3 Pulses. Once he lost shield, I close in and aim for power plant and let loose a single shot. It doesn't hit power plant, but he got some explosion animation going. I thought nice, I wait for 2nd shot to be ready, let loose another shot. As I wait the 3rd shot while my turrets peppers him, he suddenly dies with almost intact power plant and 70% hull... Must have killed the FSD accidentally! I am liking plasma =b

Kandarus · Mar 3, 2015

It would be interesting if Plasma Accelerators used fuel instead of ammo. That would make things quite precarious.

krysohmyz · Mar 3, 2015

That would be awesome.
And Rail gun could use chunks of your hull.

OnePercent · Mar 3, 2015

Mohrgan said:
Plasma is just another state of matter. You need the initial matter (ammo) to get anything into a plasma state.

Could just use the abundant hydrogen fuel in our fuel tank and turn that into a plasma, More than enough for a plasma accelerator.