What's the deal with Railguns?

[Brieus]

Even with 4 pips in weapons, they seem to fire some random amount of time after I press the trigger. I thought it might be when I released the trigger, but that doesn't seem to be it either. There's no "overheated" message or anything like I get when I go laser-happy, so what's up?

Also the multi-cannons, sometimes they'll fire, sometimes they don't.

 

[Lavo]

Railguns have a 5 second charge up time, have to press and hold before they fire iirc.

 

[Morbad]

5 second? Fire delay is about 1 second for medium and a fraction of a second less for small.

It's not random though, it's exactly the same every shot for a particular class of railgun.

Mutli-cannon have a spool up time, and both weapons need to reload when their local magazine (1 round for the rail, 90 for the multi-cannon) is empty.

 

[S-Kargo]

That sound like a system. Why couldn't it spend the time charging before you need to fire it, ie store a charge?

 

[DidierDrbois]

Railguns have a 5 second charge up time, have to press and hold before they fire iirc.

The trigger delay is definitiely not fixed. I can't work out the dependencies either but sometimes they fire in a second, other times they take so long the target's hanging on your six, confused probably what the hell was that all about.
_
Nevertheless, I like railguns, like them a lot.

 

[Jerakeen]

The rail gun is an obscenely powerful weapon. A class 2 rail gun is almost as powerful as a class 3 plasma accelerator as shown in a recent post detailing different types of weapon damage. The massive speed of the projectile and the large amount of damage it does would make it the only thing people loaded with as a secondary weapon if it also fired immediately. A well aimed shot with twin class 2 rails can take 10% or more out of an Anaconda's power plant.

As it is there's a balance. The PA fires the moment you pull the trigger but the projectile ambles over to the target at a walking pace by which time it's usually got out of the way.

The fact that you have to anticipate the shot (and conserve your ammo with only 30 rounds per gun) with the rail gun means that it's best used at close range against large ships.

I do wish they'd give us a class 3 though. Finally there would be something worth putting on the FdL huge hardpoint.

 

[Hell Razor5543]

Think of it in the same way a microwave oven works. There is a large capacitor, and a powerful transformer. At full power the transformer charges the capacitor half of the time, and for the other half of the time the transformer and the capacitor work together to fire the cavity magnetron. If the capacitor and the transformer can only manage 1000 volts on their own, together they produce 2000 volts.

 

[Morbad]

The trigger delay is definitiely not fixed.

I'm almost completely positive that it is fixed.

Are you sure you haven't overheated them? No weapon will fire till the coolant system powered by WEP can remove the heat from the weapon.

That sound like a system. Why couldn't it spend the time charging before you need to fire it, ie store a charge?

It's to balance the power of railguns.

It's also plausible, as real railguns need to charge banks of capacitors to fire as no continuous power source they would plausibly be connected to could provide the requisite pulse.

The alternative to the charge delay would be leaving the capacitors constantly charged, which could present a hazard, as well as require continuous cooling.

 

[bladebss]

W8.. take 10% off anaconda power plant or take 90 and leave 10?

I have put large and huge PA on my fdl and the projectile isnt that slow (dont take pot shots at eagles and sideys). I can put clipper and drop ship power plants to 1% or 0 with one clean shot to there power plant! The large is 2 shots.. and 15 to 25% off anaconda hulls with each shot.

This was not my experiance with rails at all, they seemed prety weak, but at class 2 I guess its better than a class 2 PA

If I could have say 50 ammo for a rail gun I would consider using them for a range increase and near instant projectile speed

 

[Aewarin Jameson]

That sound like a system. Why couldn't it spend the time charging before you need to fire it, ie store a charge?

Sounds more like a system that requires some skill to use.

 

[excalibus]

indeed twin rails on a viper or quad when you learn heat management pack awesome damage... yes they are delayed firing by design... it takes skill to use them effectively, and can cause some serious damage to a ship if you hit them with it, its projectile speed is instantaneous hit same as lasers... absolutely fantastic agains elite 'conda's when you are in a nimble craft...

 

[DidierDrbois]

Are you sure you haven't overheated them?

Honestly, not saying a definite yes, but let's call it a 90%. The pulses were firing (which I know doesn't mean much). I'll check it out again tonight with all variables clear. Thanks!

 

[Morbad]

Pulses need much less WEP available to fire, and it's perfectly possible to stall out the railgun's cooling if you are running low on WEP, even if your other weapons fire.

 

[LOTGS]

Are the weapons in question gimballed? If so hardpoint position could be to blame for non-firing. Depending on the position of the weapons on your ship, they might not fire at targets in specific positions relative to you. For example, underslung weapons might not fire at a ship a little above the horizontal plane of your ship because they would have to fire through the nose of your ship.

 

[HeavyGroovez]

I have been using triple rail builds on my Python and FdL to great effect recently.

They require a lot of patience to use (and be prepared to spend a lot of time at base re-arming) but the satisfaction of landing a good shot and seeing a large chunk of shield/hull/subsystem get pulverised is epic.

 

[Poseidal]

Are the weapons in question gimballed? If so hardpoint position could be to blame for non-firing. Depending on the position of the weapons on your ship, they might not fire at targets in specific positions relative to you. For example, underslung weapons might not fire at a ship a little above the horizontal plane of your ship because they would have to fire through the nose of your ship.

Railguns come in fixed flavour only. It's likely an energy/heat issue, as I remember that being the cause on my Cobra when I ran Railguns on it.

 

[LOTGS]

Railguns come in fixed flavour only. It's likely an energy/heat issue, as I remember that being the cause on my Cobra when I ran Railguns on it.

Yeah, it was more in reference to the multi-cannons issue. The railgun problem is obviously being dealt with by players with far more experience of the weapon than I! And if you're not familiar with hardpoint positioning it can feel like weapons such as multi-cannons are arbitrarily not firing sometimes.

 

[excalibus]

After a quick reread of the OP's post, it's very obvious (to me) that the problem is not enough power bars in WEPS... Power Bars not to be confused with PIPS...
If weapons recharge is low then rails guns will be showning as overheated and so will not even fire until there is enough power in weaps to fire them, if you have a multicannon too, that will fire when 1 bar gets recharges, so if you are holding down BOTH weapons or they are on the same fire group THEN your rails will seem to fire very intermittently and then the cannons will stop as well when you empty your capacitor bank...

I have the same problem on my cobra when I am firing both beams and pulse lasers continueously on a target and the capacitor drains, it will fire whichever one it wants to at the time, sometimes both pulse and sometimes one or both beams briefly but only if the pulses do not have a lock and the beams do

If you have not already, upgrade your power distributor to the highest you can, for maximum capacitor resevere
if you already have the best one for the ship A(whatever the max size of the slot is) then you need to plan your combat and power use differently... to ensure you can fire your rails when you want to etc... That might mean making time during combat for weps capacitor to recharge etc

 

[Brieus]

Yeah, it was more in reference to the multi-cannons issue. The railgun problem is obviously being dealt with by players with far more experience of the weapon than I! And if you're not familiar with hardpoint positioning it can feel like weapons such as multi-cannons are arbitrarily not firing sometimes.

I usually run gimbal mount MCs, and I can tell when they are tracking or not. I can tell when my lasers aren't firing because they are overheating, and I can see when the MCs aren't firing because they are reloading. I noticed the spooling up before the MC's fire, but sometimes it seems the spooling is just excessively long.

Having the railguns automatically fire after some random delay time seems, ennnh, "excessively balanced". If they don't want you blasting away with them, they should have them charge when you hold the trigger down, then only fire after you release the trigger again.

 

[Quineloe]

It's to balance the power of railguns.

It's also plausible, as real railguns need to charge banks of capacitors to fire as no continuous power source they would plausibly be connected to could provide the requisite pulse.

The alternative to the charge delay would be leaving the capacitors constantly charged, which could present a hazard, as well as require continuous cooling.

I'd prefer having that option, though, when fighting very nimble ships. Let me deal with the heat.