Engineers Pulse lasers - Rapid Fire vs Overcharged?

[NeilF]

Grade 5 rapid fire seems almost too good to be true given about the same damaged as (grade 5) overcharged, but with 30% less draw and armour piercing? But there is a bit of jitter?

Anyone compared the two to give advice/insight?

On a side note. If you give rapid fire "Scramble Spectrum" does that mean it stands a greater change of causing malfunctions than overdrive? ie: It's hitting far more often?

Ta

 

[Frenotx]

The jitter will be fairly noticeable outside of close range, using fixed weapon. With gimballed weapons, or when fighting close, the jitter isn't bad at all.

Scramble spectrum has an invulnerability period after triggering, so the rapid fire changes nothing here.

 

[Shanaeri]

I use rapid fire with scramble spectrum as it has more chances to proc, even though once it does theres a 10s cooldown

 

[NeilF]

The jitter will be fairly noticeable outside of close range, using fixed weapon. With gimballed weapons, or when fighting close, the jitter isn't bad at all.

Scramble spectrum has an invulnerability period after triggering, so the rapid fire changes nothing here.

We're talking gimbals... So the Scramble Spectrum is ignorable (same on both), so it's 30% more power draw vs a bit of jitter + armour piercing

Hmmm...

 

[Crimson Kaim]

I'd go for overcharged. Pulse Laser has a low distributor draw so it benefits from less punishment/cost of the tardeoffs, giving it a huge advantage over nearly everything that has a good amount of distributor draw and the OC blueprint.
Plus it doesn't really makes the spectrum less effective (atleast not by that much, still increased RoF).

 

[biohazard15]

Assuming we're talking about PVE, go with Rapid-fire.

Even 0.5 degrees jitter is hardly noticeable on short-to-medium ranges (up to 1.5 km). Beyond that mark, lasers start to suffer from damage reduction, overcharged or rapid-firing (only long-range mod can alleviate that). But the sweetest part is, of course, reduced distributor draw, which allows you to put less pips in WEP, or use powerful guns efficiently, or just fire indefinitely.

 

[goemon]

i'd say: depends on hardpoint placement, and manouverability of your ship. if you hit every time, if you have power distributor problems, etc.

and yes, jitter. bad to shoot out small/medium trading ships powerplant ... if that is your thing.

from my yesterday upgrades i went overcharged 90% of all cases...

 

[Mnemoch]

Thought long range was the mod to have for lasers?

 

[NeilF]

Thought long range was the mod to have for lasers?

News to me if that's the case?

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i'd say: depends on hardpoint placement, and manouverability of your ship. if you hit every time, if you have power distributor problems, etc.

and yes, jitter. bad to shoot out small/medium trading ships powerplant ... if that is your thing.

from my yesterday upgrades i went overcharged 90% of all cases...

Well this is three large lasers on a Python.

I'm heading for the two top ones (the most usable) having Efficient with Thermal, and then under the nose an Overcharged with Scramble Spectrum. This should allow me to take down shields even with just 2 pips to WEP.

That's the plan...

 

[goemon]

News to me if that's the case?

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Well this is three large lasers on a Python.

I'm heading for the two top ones (the most usable) having Efficient with Thermal, and then under the nose an Overcharged with Scramble Spectrum. This should allow me to take down shields even with just 2 pips to WEP.

That's the plan...

personally i'm running 1 large pulse (under the nose), 2 large mcs, and two medium pulses.

from my way of thinking i would mod your 3 lasers with

- rapid fire under nose (less constantly on target).

- overcharged on top.

i think the pythons PD could make it.

 

[NeilF]

personally i'm running 1 large pulse (under the nose), 2 large mcs, and two medium pulses.

from my way of thinking i would mod your 3 lasers with

- rapid fire under nose (less constantly on target).

- overcharged on top.

i think the pythons PD could make it.

Can you run those two class 3 multi-cannons non-stop on 2 pips of energy?


As regards overcharged lasers vs efficient, my take is DPS per Mjoule the efficient win (I believe) so on long drawn out fights against shields (eg: An elite anaconda chield), the efficients win... But I am tempted to swap to your config TBH! Just means me having to grind grader 5 mods again... Grrr!

 

[Frenotx]

Thought long range was the mod to have for lasers?

"Focused" (not long range) is a great option for fixed lasers, when fighting at slightly longer (1.5km+) range.

 

[Josh Zinsser]

"Focused" (not long range) is a great option for fixed lasers, when fighting at slightly longer (1.5km+) range.

Long range isn't bad either...they offer different trade-offs is all.

- Both extend range while reducing damage/DPS, and both actually have higher damage and DPS since their damage falloff range gets longer too. Even down to 1k range, you'll notice the damage increase.
- Focused get the added bonus of increased armor penetration, but they also fire slower and generate a lot more heat.
- Long Range are heavier, draw more power, and use more distributor per shot, but they maintain the same fire rate and they don't run any hotter.

Many people are claiming that focused is categorically better than long range, but the truth is more nuanced. Focused are better once shields are down, but they don't bring shields down as quickly due to their reduced fire rate, and their additional heat output could easily cause problems if you're already running hot mods (like dirty drives and/or overcharged plants, both of which are extremely popular). Long range technically drain power faster, but they also shoot faster and retain the high heat efficiency associated with pulse lasers.

Each has their uses. Pythons can run either, since you could pair focused with an A7 low emissions plant that will counter the added heat of the weapons fire, or you could pair long range with an A6 overcharged plant that will accomodate their increased draw while also increasing your agility (A6 is 20 tons lighter than A7, which yields a slight but noticeable bonus to ship handling). A Vulture, on the other hand, will probably need to run clean drives if you're going to also run focused, since it's almost certainly running an overcharged plant to mitigate its power management issues.

 

[Frenotx]

Long range isn't bad either...they offer different trade-offs is all.

- Both extend range while reducing damage/DPS, and both actually have higher damage and DPS since their damage falloff range gets longer too. Even down to 1k range, you'll notice the damage increase.
- Focused get the added bonus of increased armor penetration, but they also fire slower and generate a lot more heat.
- Long Range are heavier, draw more power, and use more distributor per shot, but they maintain the same fire rate and they don't run any hotter.

Many people are claiming that focused is categorically better than long range, but the truth is more nuanced. Focused are better once shields are down, but they don't bring shields down as quickly due to their reduced fire rate, and their additional heat output could easily cause problems if you're already running hot mods (like dirty drives and/or overcharged plants, both of which are extremely popular). Long range technically drain power faster, but they also shoot faster and retain the high heat efficiency associated with pulse lasers.

Each has their uses. Pythons can run either, since you could pair focused with an A7 low emissions plant that will counter the added heat of the weapons fire, or you could pair long range with an A6 overcharged plant that will accomodate their increased draw while also increasing your agility (A6 is 20 tons lighter than A7, which yields a slight but noticeable bonus to ship handling). A Vulture, on the other hand, will probably need to run clean drives if you're going to also run focused, since it's almost certainly running an overcharged plant to mitigate its power management issues.

You may want to double-check your facts. Focused and long range both get the same 100% range increase, and focused has the added benefit of (30% to 50%) increased armour penetration (important when fighting larger ships with smaller weapons). Now lets look at the drawbacks:

Focused:
- 1% to 5% DPS loss (in the form of a 1% to 5% RoF loss, so no effect on DPE)
- 1% to 10% increased thermal load per shot

Long Range:
- 15% to 25% DPS loss (in the form of a 15% to 25% damage loss, thus also impacting DPE)
- 20% to 50% more distributor draw (Further major hit to DPE)
- 20% to 50% more mass (not a big deal on larger ships, but potentially a problem on smaller ones)
- 14% to 20% more power draw (makes fitting potentially more awkward, and also raises your resting heat)

So yeah, focused takes waaay less of a hit to DPS (and in a way that doesn't affect DPE), and gets an extra positive effect. The only "advantage" long range has over focused is less heat per shot, but this is partially canceled by the higher power draw (and thus higher resting heat), and completely trivial when compared to the significant comparative DPS hit, and the MASSIVE DPE hit. There's no nuance about it- focused is just vastly superior to long range.

 

[Herbrand]

Grade 5 rapid fire seems almost too good to be true given about the same damaged as (grade 5) overcharged, but with 30% less draw and armour piercing? But there is a bit of jitter?

Anyone compared the two to give advice/insight?

On a side note. If you give rapid fire "Scramble Spectrum" does that mean it stands a greater change of causing malfunctions than overdrive? ie: It's hitting far more often?

Ta

You must consider that with your Rate of Fire increased, the Distributor will be draw from more often. Yes, there is a bonus to that, but rate of fire increase is pretty much a straight malus to distributor draw.

 

[NeilF]

You must consider that with your Rate of Fire increased, the Distributor will be draw from more often. Yes, there is a bonus to that, but rate of fire increase is pretty much a straight malus to distributor draw.

Why isn't the power draw per second? Per shot seems an odd way to measure?

 

[Herbrand]

Why isn't the power draw per second? Per shot seems an odd way to measure?

Well, I guess I may not be interested to be firing all the time. Especially for things such as cannons, etc.

 

[Poseidal]

You must consider that with your Rate of Fire increased, the Distributor will be draw from more often. Yes, there is a bonus to that, but rate of fire increase is pretty much a straight malus to distributor draw.

The DPE is far better than stock though, so for the same energy you do more damage in a shorter amount of time.

 

[Herbrand]

The DPE is far better than stock though, so for the same energy you do more damage in a shorter amount of time.

The same applies to Overcharged, although for a smaller margin.
Overcharged 5 has no jitter and slightly higher DPS, while Rapid Fire 5 has better energy efficiency. Still an open match.

 

[Poseidal]

The same applies to Overcharged, although for a smaller margin.
Overcharged 5 has no jitter and slightly higher DPS, while Rapid Fire 5 has better energy efficiency. Still an open match.

Of course! Overcharged 5 is pretty much strictly better than stock.

Rapid Fire, with better energy efficiency IMO will come into it's own when stacked en-masse, as the DPE becomes more relevant than the DPS.