Seriously what is FDs reasoning behind the absolute rubbish PP new weapons

[Richard Bentley]

Seems a good a thread as any to ask: Which of the PP weapons are actual worth having as sidegrade options?

Prismatic Shield
Imperial Hammer
Pack Hound Missiles
???

Anything else? Or is that it?

Also, do you lose access to them once you change teams? If I defect from Aisling today and want to buy a Prismatic Shield for my Courier tomorrow, am I screwed? Do I need to buy a mule ship to fit those items to for backup?

If you defect from Aisling today then no, you will not be able to buy Prismatic Shields tomorrow. A mule ship won't be much help either because when you sell the module off the mule ship you won't be able to buy it back for the intended destination ship.
If you think you might want a PSG on another type of ship, then if you can afford it, buy the ship you'll want it on (in its basic state), and the PSG for it, before you leave Aisling's group. I have a couple of ships with PSGs on them awaiting final outfitting in case I decide to leave the group.

The Prismatic shield generator's main benefit is that it effectively allows you to fit an A-grade shield in a module slot one lower than the size for the normal shield of this strength. i.e. a Class 3A PSG can fit in a Class 3 module bay but effectively gives a Class 4A shield (give or take a bit). Weight, power and cost are not in their favour but for a trading ship it can free up a larger module for cargo or fuel etc.

 

[Time Streamer]

The Donutator. Its counter is the highly devastating Cappuccino Field.

Made me remember some crazy secret weapons of Tyrian, like the Hot dog launcher.

About the thread, just because PP weapons dont allow the OP to blast star destroyers with one hit doesn't mean they are (all) rubbish. Small weapons are a nice addition just because they allow you to upgrade most of the fighter ships in the game that use small hardpoints. Eagle for example is a wonderful ship and fitted with cytoscrambler and enforcer cannons might do an extra punch.

 

[lonewarrior]

Made me remember some crazy secret weapons of Tyrian, like the Hot dog launcher.

About the thread, just because PP weapons dont allow the OP to blast star destroyers with one hit doesn't mean they are (all) rubbish. Small weapons are a nice addition just because they allow you to upgrade most of the fighter ships in the game that use small hardpoints. Eagle for example is a wonderful ship and fitted with cytoscrambler and enforcer cannons might do an extra punch.

Maybe read my replies before making your own, I already stated the only thing I wanted was all sizes and class's, gimballed, turreted and fixed so that they are actually useful
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For your information the Cytoscrambler does exactly the same shield damage as burst laser of the same class, is far more inaccurate and had more power draw, and does no damage to hull and is more expensive than the burst
laser
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Your effectively buying a more expensive weapon that is worse than the cheaper version and requires you to be at blank range, name a situation where that is more useful than taking the burst laser of the same class?
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And name one time I mentioned I wanted GOD weapons or go somewhere else and troll

 

[Perseus]

. . .A mule ship won't be much help either because when you sell the module off the mule ship you won't be able to buy it back for the intended destination ship. . .

Are you sure about this? I'm not challenging you, I'm genuinely interested.
My understanding was that we had 10 mins in outfitting to rebuy equipment. I read a post a while back that said we'd be able to swap equipment (from a poster, not a dev). I really need to know if it's not currently possible!

 

[Time Streamer]

Maybe read my replies before making your own, I already stated the only thing I wanted was all sizes and class's, gimballed, turreted and fixed so that they are actually useful
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For your information the Cytoscrambler does exactly the same shield damage as burst laser of the same class, is far more inaccurate and had more power draw, and does no damage to hull and is more expensive than the burst
laser
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Your effectively buying a more expensive weapon that is worse than the cheaper version and requires you to be at blank range, name a situation where that is more useful than taking the burst laser of the same class?
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And name one time I mentioned I wanted GOD weapons or go somewhere else and troll

First, while you -want- all types of sizes and classes it was also already stated here that idea is not OK. For example, check post #4. Second, you mention GOD weapons in your last post. If not, tell me what is an Huge Advanced Plasma Accelerator at current game state, since you want all weapons at all sizes. Third, you might want to check what i wrote. I carefully used the word 'might'. So, you can easily understand that i don't exactly have accurate knowledge about those weapons stats. It seems that the laziness I have for reading is the same as yours. No big deal. Fourth, I didn't troll in a pejorative way against your post. I decided to use some humour but if that annoys you i'm sorry.

 

[lonewarrior]

First, while you -want- all types of sizes and classes it was also already stated here that idea is not OK. For example, check post #4. Second, you mention GOD weapons in your last post. If not, tell me what is an Huge Advanced Plasma Accelerator at current game state, since you want all weapons at all sizes. Third, you might want to check what i wrote. I carefully used the word 'might'. So, you can easily understand that i don't exactly have accurate knowledge about those weapons stats. It seems that the laziness I have for reading is the same as yours. No big deal. Fourth, I didn't troll in a pejorative way against your post. I decided to use some humour but if that annoys you i'm sorry.

Are you on crack?
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My last post was this:

Yes the shields emit a green glow on impact and the advanced accelarator at least is green, if you go to my youtube and look at Episode 7 that I uploaded a few days ago I am using the advanced accelarator against prismatic at one point
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The effects are pretty cool, I'll give FD that, also pretty sure when I fought against a player with the imperial hammer it was also green

No mention of god weapons, I said nothing about the Huge plasma accelarator, so that's irrelevant and it's not even that powerful anyway, advanced plasma is large and isn't a GOD weapon

Go ahead and highlight the part I said in that post that "I wanted god weapons"
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Post 4
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The reasoning was that there aren't any hard-to-obtain god-weapons that make you instantly dominate everyone. This is not, apparently, that kind of game.


Edit: and, if there were then we'd have endless threads of "I spent 2 weeks grinding for the invicible weapon of power so I could kill everyone and I'm bored because I'm grinding."

Time streamer ,Making them turreted, fixed, gimballed and of different classes doesn't make them GOD weapons any more than the current weapons are, so how does this have anything to do with it being ok or not
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You know what don't answer, all your posts have no backing and nothing to go on, your just making things up now

 

[Nonya]

Someone once reported that the official dev answer to why the cytoscrambler was such crap was that it was working perfectly and was designed to operate like it does and that it's fine.
I call complete on that kind of answer because ti proves to me the designer never, ever, ever bothered to even play with it in open or solo.
I did. It doesn't do jack all to shields because it's range is only 500m (useless range) and it eats up all the capacitor in 1-2 shots (much more useless) and is a scattershot, not fixed or gimbaled (even more useless).

I truly do not think FDEV is even bothering to test things that much anymore. They just release it and wait for feedback they want to hear. If it's not what they want to hear, they ignore it (separate BGS for open and solo/private group) or pronounce it "working as designed" and ignore it (cytoscrambler, separate BGS).
They never stop to think that perhaps whomever designed it just isn't that good at designing things or does not understand that it isn't about what FDEV wants anymore, it's what the players want. And if it's not what the players want, they complain about it, write bad reviews, and generally slag the game off in every form of media. That has a cumulative effect on sales and bad PR. Lack of sales growth indicates company going in the wrong direction, which forces a gradual but increasing stock sell off which indicates a loss of shareholder confidence in the company which signals the overall market to avoid it. Then the downward spiral begins until it's eventually acquired by another software company which quickly locks up the IP and tosses it in the landfill.

So yes, please do continue to ignore your players and look less to everyone else.

 

[Temple604]

FD was worried about people whining so they preemptively nerfed everything that is not imperial, cause well u know
I just hope that someday we get properly tested and balanced weapons added to the game at some point...

 

[lonewarrior]

First, having both the Cytoscrambler and Enforcer cannons would require you to pledge to either Pranav Antal(sp?) or Archon Delaine for 4 weeks, buy the first one, then defect to the other for 4 weeks. Doable, but not worth the effort. Second, while I can see the Enforcer cannons being worthwhile, I've read from people who have used it that the Cytoscrambler actually does much less shield damage compared to standard weapons in its class, which means that you'd be better off using a regular old laser instead.

You're right that they don't have to be super-OP weapons to be usable. But they DO have to be usable. They have to at least offer some actual advantage, rather than being a complete waste of a hardpoint. Take the mining lance. It would allow you to use a Hauler for mining, and still do some combat damage... but exactly what good would that do? The Hauler is such an inadequate combat ship that even with the best battle-rig you can put on one, you're going to wind up running away or dying to just about anything else, so there is absolutely no point in tolerating an inferior mining laser for the sake of also having it be an absurdly inferior combat weapon. Plus, by the time you get access to the Mining Lance from Lady Torval, you should be flying, at the very least, a Cobra; maybe even an Asp... and either of those ships can sacrifice a single small hardpoint for a standard mining laser and use the others for a combat setup that would laugh at the best the Mining Lance could ever do.

So that's only two examples of how pointless some of these PP "weapons" are, and I haven't heard great things about most of the rest. Now if they were all as practical in their niche as the Imperial Hammer burst-railgun I wound up keeping on my Imperial Courier, I would just nod.

(sigh) I think I may have to spend four stinking weeks with that pig Patreus and get advanced accelerators for my big ships though... I joined the faction I believe in, but she's not the one with the best hardware for me!

The advanced accelarator is nice, probably not as good as the imperial hammer but it has other advantages such as high rate of fire and does half the damage of a large Normal PA of the large class, but because of the rate of fire you can afford to miss one or two shots and still deal some nice damage but with the normal PA missing a shot can cause issues as it wastes a lot of energy
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I like it, but it takes some time to master compare to other weapons

 

[Surly_Badger]

Im not asking for GOD weapons, I just thought they might actually be of some use instead of being downgrades

My impression is they're more or less par with other weapons for their size. So it sounds like what you wanted was weapons that had an edge over other weapons; call that a GOD weapon or not, that's pretty much the issue.

If I had pink laser beams I'd probably be happy with a gimballed 1A pulse if it was pink. But if I were complaining because my pink laser beams weren't an A4 ship-slicer then I'd be complaining about god weapons.

 

[lonewarrior]

My impression is they're more or less par with other weapons for their size. So it sounds like what you wanted was weapons that had an edge over other weapons; call that a GOD weapon or not, that's pretty much the issue.

If I had pink laser beams I'd probably be happy with a gimballed 1A pulse if it was pink. But if I were complaining because my pink laser beams weren't an A4 ship-slicer then I'd be complaining about god weapons.

But they arnt "on par" they are weaker or a waste of time
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So what you got from me saying "I'm happy with the weapon I have" and that " I was hoping to see more tactical combat with the new weapons" against other CMDRs
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So from the fact I said I was happy and I wanted tactical combat with other CMDRs using new weapons, you got "I WANT GOD WEAPONS"
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Yeah logic fail

 

[Heavenly-Hammer]

If you defect from Aisling today then no, you will not be able to buy Prismatic Shields tomorrow. A mule ship won't be much help either because when you sell the module off the mule ship you won't be able to buy it back for the intended destination ship.
If you think you might want a PSG on another type of ship, then if you can afford it, buy the ship you'll want it on (in its basic state), and the PSG for it, before you leave Aisling's group. I have a couple of ships with PSGs on them awaiting final outfitting in case I decide to leave the group.

The Prismatic shield generator's main benefit is that it effectively allows you to fit an A-grade shield in a module slot one lower than the size for the normal shield of this strength. i.e. a Class 3A PSG can fit in a Class 3 module bay but effectively gives a Class 4A shield (give or take a bit). Weight, power and cost are not in their favour but for a trading ship it can free up a larger module for cargo or fuel etc.

Understood and ty for the reply. I think of all my ships, the only one that I put a PSG on is my Courier, and only then because it opens up a utility slot allowing me to fit 2x chaff...but I'm not sure if it's really worth the loss in speed and agility, however slight. I think I also slapped one in my Python because those have almost too much available power.

If I converted my Conda to a dedicated trading vessel, I'd definitely have a PSG on it. I definitely liked it for that. Not sure if there's a purpose for it on any of my combat vessels, though.

Anyway, are there any PP weapons worth having outside of the Imperial Hammer and Missiles? I heard that disruptor pulse laser is pretty cool if you knock the shields down, no?

But they arnt "on par" they are weaker or a waste of time
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So what you got from me saying "I'm happy with the weapon I have" and that " I was hoping to see more tactical combat with the new weapons" against other CMDRs
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So from the fact I said I was happy and I wanted tactical combat with other CMDRs using new weapons, you got "I WANT GOD WEAPONS"
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Yeah logic fail

so the question, then, is which of these weapons cannot be fairly considered a "sidegrade"?

Missiles: different. perhaps slightly better against point defense since it launches several? but generates more heat. sidegrade.
Shields: very heavy and consume a ton of power. but can make you much tankier if you can squeeze it in at the expense of stronger weapons or other modules. sidegrade.
Disruptor Pulse: Similar damage to regular pulse lasers, maybe slightly less. Generates more heat and shoots slower. I think it also requires more power? Get access to an RNG chance to make an enemy ship's subsystems malfunction for a few seconds. sidegrade.
Imperial Hammer: The "burst laser" variant to rail guns. Does marginally more damage if you land all 3 burst shots. The more you miss, the more ammo is wasted and damage missed. generates more heat. sidegrade.
Mining Laser: Shorter range for mining in exchange for something that can double as a light weapon for ships that would otherwise not run any weapons. seems like an upgrade from stock mining laser.
Scrambler: Cool concept but seems pretty bad at the moment; needs a buff. It's fine if it's useless against hulls, but then it needs to be very good at dropping shields. Has to be a tradeoff that makes it make sense in niche builds.

dunno what else there is. Of these, I only see 1 that's a downgrade (Scrambler). Everything else is a sidegrade with marginal benefits and drawbacks to give you new things to consider.

 

[Iskariot]

I'd like to suggest that if you are joining a faction purely because what "you" can get out of it, then that's the wrong reason?

Getting something out of it is the only reason people do anything in life.

 

[PotatoOverdose]

Imperial Hammer: The "burst laser" variant to rail guns. Does marginally more damage if you land all 3 burst shots. The more you miss, the more ammo is wasted and damage missed. generates more heat. sidegrade.

Rail gun starts with 30 rounds and gets 30 shots. Imperial hammer starts with 90 rounds and gets 30 shots. So ammo considerations for both weapons are the same. Missing is less of a problem with the hammer because you get three chances to hit instead of one. Honestly, I'd call this one an upgrade.

Seems a good a thread as any to ask: Which of the PP weapons are actual worth having as sidegrade options?

Prismatic Shield
Imperial Hammer
Pack Hound Missiles
???

I'd add the advanced plasma accelerator to the list - three times the rate of fire, three times the ammo (300), same dps and thermal load as a class 3 plasma accelerator - from all accounts the increased RoF makes it much easier to land hits consistently, and it has the same thermal and kinetic damage type as rails, so good against both shields and hulls.

Also Pack hound missiles, while amazingly pretty, are about as useful as seeker missiles - which is to say not at all.

 

[InMemoriamSirocco]

This game came out in 2014 and we still have to see any weapon that is more efficient than a gimballed pulse laser.

 

[Frenotx]

Mining Laser: Shorter range for mining in exchange for something that can double as a light weapon for ships that would otherwise not run any weapons. seems like an upgrade from stock mining laser.

From what I understand, the lance needs more power, and uses more capacitor than either a mining laser or beam laser, mines slower than a mining laser, and does dramatically less damage than a beam laser. It is significantly worse at everything, and considered to objectively be a downgrade.

 

[Bacalao]

Are you sure about this? I'm not challenging you, I'm genuinely interested.
My understanding was that we had 10 mins in outfitting to rebuy equipment. I read a post a while back that said we'd be able to swap equipment (from a poster, not a dev). I really need to know if it's not currently possible!

The modules stay in the buyback section of the outfitting panel as long as you don't leave the station. I have not tried to log out and back in but I would assume that counts as leaving.

 

[Frenotx]

The modules stay in the buyback section of the outfitting panel as long as you don't leave the station. I have not tried to log out and back in but I would assume that counts as leaving.

They will also vanish on their own after some number of minutes. Most say it's about 10 or so.