Shield Strippers - A Thread About Weapons

CMDR Corlas

CMDR Corlas
It seems like (talking PvE here) we have a bunch of excellent options for pulverizing hulls: Cannons (especially overcharged), Railguns, Shock Cannons, Frag Cannons, and Plasma Accelerators just shred hulls at an alarming pace, not to mention the Power Play versions of some of those (I love my Pacifiers). Even a gaggle of Multicannons is nothing to sneeze at (Woohoo, Corrosive mod!).

When it comes to shields though... Plasma Accelerators (amazing, love 'em) and Beams Lasers (pretty darn good) seems to be about it. Admittedly I've not tried Incendiary Rounds on my Pacifiers, but I remember being underwhelmed at Incendiary Multis. I'd love to see a bit more variety on my ships. Railguns are hugely underwhelming vs shields, and other laser types never seem to come close to Beams (Usually Efficient modded). Do I need to give Incendiary another try? (And why isn't there an incendiary mod for Cannons? I love Cannons!)

What do you prefer to use to take down shields?

Am I missing some hidden gems?

Are there just fundamental problems in this game from all the shield-love we get combined with all the tools to just wreck the often-neglected, non-regenerative hulls?

It kind of seems backwards to me. Given all advantages shields have - in regenerating and in outfitting - there should be tools galore to take down shields, and hulls should be where the real work kicks in. But now I'm getting off-topic in my own thread...
 

StiTch

StiTch
PAs are awesome and probably the most satisfying to use IMO, but talking PvE offer few benefits due to an ammo limitation and the NPCs' lacklustre shield engineering. No point ignoring resistances that aren't there.

Your real options for PvE are lazors and incendiary MCs or frags. That said a group of pulse lazors, or a good distributor and good beam lazor or two, are fairly good at hammering shields. Just be careful where you use efficient and/or long range.

But yes, you are correct that it's far easier to cause serious damage to hull than shield, which sucks given how naturally precarious it is to take hull shots.

Just remember a cascade rail, because "good" shield damage is still frustratingly low in the face of SCBs.
 

Ted Striker

Ted Striker
My corvette has two huge efficient beams, two medium efficient beams, one large long range pulse and two small long range pulse. No experimentals yet. It shreds shields in seconds. The huge beams do a decent job vs hull too. I add MC Condor fighter to the mix and it's just a blast to fly.

Are there better, more optimal loadouts? Sure. But this loadout requires no ammo :)
 

Ser_Slack

Ser_Slack
Out of the two ships i'm using :

Conda: Efficient c4 beam w/vent - 2 efficient c2 beams w/vent - 3 focused PA c3's w/various - multi's with corrosive in the c1's - weapon focused distributor

Gunship: Efficient c3 beam w/vent - 4 short range c2 Railguns w/various - multi's with corrosive in the c1's - weapon focused distributor

They're both slugs but I fly them like weapon platforms so it's not a big deal
 

Frenotx

Frenotx
Short range modded cytoscramblers. For extra brutality (and somewhat questionable practicality) go for the inertial impact special effect. The damage boosts stack multiplicativly, and leave you with an absurdly powerful small weapon that rivals a huge fixed beam laser.
 

Aashenfox

Aashenfox
Railguns do more damage to shields than hulls in pve. For two reasons. 1) Their damage is primarily thermal (just about), and 2) they have an annoying habit of hitting modules and therefore not doing hull damage. These factors combined with the slow rate of fire, make them poor hull strippers. Best used to snipe modules (with super pen) and cancel shield cells (with feedback cascade). Additional bonus, the hitbox is bigger when shields are up and therefore easier to hit with them too! ;)
 

NecasekO

N
Fixed cannons deal a surprising amount of shield damage to NPCs - even if they are kinetic, it's a lot of raw damage and shield envelope around ships makes them easier to hit with fixed weapons.

Railguns are good (and can also reduce SCB effects) but run out of ammo quickly. I usually combine them with other weapon types to conserve ammo.

From the POV of being attacked by players in high end ships, frags at close range are the thing I fear the most, more so than plasma guns. Definitely worth a shot if you want to strip shields on big ships quickly.
 

Kenneth McGrew

Kenneth McGrew
CMDR Corlas said:
It seems like (talking PvE here) we have a bunch of excellent options for pulverizing hulls: Cannons (especially overcharged), Railguns, Shock Cannons, Frag Cannons, and Plasma Accelerators just shred hulls at an alarming pace, not to mention the Power Play versions of some of those (I love my Pacifiers). Even a gaggle of Multicannons is nothing to sneeze at (Woohoo, Corrosive mod!).

When it comes to shields though... Plasma Accelerators (amazing, love 'em) and Beams Lasers (pretty darn good) seems to be about it. Admittedly I've not tried Incendiary Rounds on my Pacifiers, but I remember being underwhelmed at Incendiary Multis. I'd love to see a bit more variety on my ships. Railguns are hugely underwhelming vs shields, and other laser types never seem to come close to Beams (Usually Efficient modded). Do I need to give Incendiary another try? (And why isn't there an incendiary mod for Cannons? I love Cannons!)

What do you prefer to use to take down shields?

Am I missing some hidden gems?

Are there just fundamental problems in this game from all the shield-love we get combined with all the tools to just wreck the often-neglected, non-regenerative hulls?

It kind of seems backwards to me. Given all advantages shields have - in regenerating and in outfitting - there should be tools galore to take down shields, and hulls should be where the real work kicks in. But now I'm getting off-topic in my own thread...
Click to expand...

PAs are not available in small so i have to stick to rails.

Dear Santa Braben

All i want for Christmas is some C1 PAs please and if you have time some C1 Seismic charges too!

oh and C1 AX weapons... theme developing here!
 
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Ashnak

Ashnak
Are we doing a Santa wishlist thread?

Add a Huge Railgun for the Mamba.

And I want engineerable weapons that affect Thargoids. AX MCs and Guardian Shards are all nice and well, but not if I can't have a lightweight version for my Courier.
 

Screemonster

Screemonster
Frenotx said:
Short range modded cytoscramblers. For extra brutality (and somewhat questionable practicality) go for the inertial impact special effect. The damage boosts stack multiplicativly, and leave you with an absurdly powerful small weapon that rivals a huge fixed beam laser.
Click to expand...

Do they still get an absurdly hilarious damage buff if you stack them with a corrosive weapon?
 

CMDR Corlas

CMDR Corlas
Frenotx said:
Short range modded cytoscramblers. For extra brutality (and somewhat questionable practicality) go for the inertial impact special effect. The damage boosts stack multiplicativly, and leave you with an absurdly powerful small weapon that rivals a huge fixed beam laser.
Click to expand...

Hm, I might have to look into Cytos for some of my ships. Thanks!

Aashenfox said:
Railguns do more damage to shields than hulls in pve. For two reasons. 1) Their damage is primarily thermal (just about), and 2) they have an annoying habit of hitting modules and therefore not doing hull damage. These factors combined with the slow rate of fire, make them poor hull strippers. Best used to snipe modules (with super pen) and cancel shield cells (with feedback cascade). Additional bonus, the hitbox is bigger when shields are up and therefore easier to hit with them too! ;)
Click to expand...

I know this is the common understanding, but that's not been my experience - regarding shield damage at least. For the module vs hull damage issue, I just consciously aim for not-modules. It's a litter counter-intuitive, but it works mostly, and the hull damage is pretty great.

Maybe I'm just expecting too much from them vs shields, but they always seems very underwhelming compared to plasma or beams. It could well be that the engineering comes into a play a lot here too, and I'm judging long-range rails doing essentially stock damage vs efficient or overcharged other weapons. But even when it's long-range rails vs long-range beams, both of the same size, beams always seem to do better vs shields, regardless of what the numbers claim.
 
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