Poll on how many weapons you use in game.
Why would anyone, nowadays, use anything BUT RFR & Hail/Heavy Plasma? Maybe the occasional Stabilized Railgun, but weapons do rarely veer away from the current RFR/Plasma meta… And those that haven’t found this out, soon do because they get shot into oblivion by weapons that were relatively underused prior to “recent times”.
I use pulse lasers, assault lasers, heavy railguns, hail plasma as my weapons, heavy plasma is usually too slow for me.
I never change my guns unless a need a specific weapon for a contract, or I’m flying a ship that isn’t packing Mk III gear yet.
Frankly, there is no reason to change weapons. In Tier 2 in particular Assault weapons are pointless - too weak and too short ranged. The only ship in T2 that shouldn’t be packing Stab-rails or Hail Plasma are Interceptors.
Top choice "I change them every day - ‘a lot of interesting options!’ " makes this poll kinda of a leading question.
I change them every day; I switch between say 2-3 guns per ship, whenever I get bored. The guns differ between roles.
I wouldn’t say there’s ‘a lot of interesting options’, though. There’s three types of each; short range, medium range, long range, heavy. 12 guns.
Their inconsistencies make them more interesting, but that also leaves room for more guns!
p.s JasanQuinn that depends on your perspective, if your play style is being at the top of the leaderboard and raising/keeping your stats then there is no reason. However, if a person is more interested in having fun n keeping it interesting then there is plenty of reason. I’m 50/50, I’ve gotta stay on par for the game to be fun, but I won’t keep using a cookie cutter build if I get bored of it. 
I never change my guns unless a need a specific weapon for a contract, or I’m flying a ship that isn’t packing Mk III gear yet.
Frankly, there is no reason to change weapons. In Tier 2 in particular Assault weapons are pointless - too weak and too short ranged. The only ship in T2 that shouldn’t be packing Stab-rails or Hail Plasma are Interceptors.
I hate stab. rails…way too bad accuracy.
hail plasma is good, but i prefer my assault plasma/assault railguns on my fighters, not enough range? maybe, but atleast they can actually break tanks…
I hate stab. rails…way too bad accuracy.
Stab Rails are inaccurate? I think the problem is somewhere between the keyboard and chair myself…
Rapid-Fire-Rails are actually less accurate than Stab Rails. However, both weapons have a shared ability; their accuracy increases if you reduce your rate of fire. If you don’t fire your Stab Rail for about 2-3 seconds the spread drops massively. How much does it drop? to 0%! Yes, really; your first shot with Stab Rails hits exactly where you aimed it!
Compare that to RFR and if you’re firing on full auto you can miss a lot. During one battle I was firing on full-auto at an Interceptor 2km away and I had him dead centre of my gunsights and I missed. Not because he dodged, but because my weapon spread was so big and he was presenting such a narrow profile that all the bullets flew right past him.
This is why Stab Rails make such good anti-Inty weapons, and RFRs make good anti-Frig guns. The former, even on full-auto, never has too large a spread. You’ll lose accuracy, but providing you fire from short-to-mid range your shots should all be more or less on target, and each hit has a lot of stopping power. The RFR’s massive spread is likewise less important when you’re firing at something the size of a frigate. Doubly fun are the likes of the Neuron Zealot - attack that from above and it’s impossible to miss unless you actively try to.
Both ends of the scale offer something to the player. The middle road… not so much. Assault plasma and assault rails have the same problem that the entire laser series has - they try to be a compromise of both, and the result is a weapon that isn’t as good as either. Assault Rails and Assault Plasma are weapons for people who don’t know what role they are meant to be filling and so decide to bumble along doing everything.
Compare that to RFR and if you’re firing on full auto you can miss a lot. During one battle I was firing on full-auto at an Interceptor 2km away and I had him dead centre of my gunsights and I missed. Not because he dodged, but because my weapon spread was so big and he was presenting such a narrow profile that all the bullets flew right past him.
This is why Stab Rails make such good anti-Inty weapons, and RFRs make good anti-Frig guns. The former, even on full-auto, never has too large a spread. You’ll lose accuracy, but providing you fire from short-to-mid range your shots should all be more or less on target, and each hit has a lot of stopping power. The RFR’s massive spread is likewise less important when you’re firing at something the size of a frigate. Doubly fun are the likes of the Neuron Zealot - attack that from above and it’s impossible to miss unless you actively try to.
In truth, Stab Rails and RFR are awesome anti-Ceptor weapons. Because, despite their speed, they can’t fully dodge the damage and will suffer from it. Their recent boost was just…
Yes, the first shot with stab. rails is nice and aimy, but after the 3rd shot you miss about 75%… I like to be able to keep shooting instead of reducing my DPS from 180 per gun to 100 and become utterly useless to anything but inty’s…I’d rather use long range laser than stab. railguns.
Yes, the first shot with stab. rails is nice and aimy, but after the 3rd shot you miss about 75%… I like to be able to keep shooting instead of reducing my DPS from 180 per gun to 100 and become utterly useless to anything but inty’s…I’d rather use long range laser than stab. railguns.
Ever heard of spread reduction modules/implants?
Assault Rails and Assault Plasma are weapons for people who don’t know what role they are meant to be filling and so decide to bumble along doing everything.
kinda harsh. assaults are good for multi-role playstyle. i for eg. fit the assault rails on my command. ROF has it’s non-damage uses.
I mainly use heavy lasers on frigates, with RFR or RFP on fighters and interceptors. Heavy rails and heavy plasma just feel like the actual aim lags too far behind the desired aim, even considering the slow barrels. I have had some fun messing around with RFP on a Guard frigate, although the short range was mildly problematic. (I should try it again on the Crusader…)
I’ve built each of my ships to fulfil specific roles beyond the specialization of classes. Weapons, more than modules, change how you engage enemies in a firefight. Depending on what will complement my role and playstyle, I will find the guns that are optimal for the result I want to achieve and stick with them.
On the point about assaults, even they have their place. Sustained damage is great for helping a team crack tougher opponents and for laying on suppressive fire.
I am starting to grow on Heavy Lasers. A big part of how they work seems to be the reliance upon teamwork; you take a gun that you can’t really use vs an Interceptor, or even an agile Fighter and you point it at the big, slow targets, trusting your team to drive off the little guys on your behalf.
Why the hate on lasers? I run Pulse Lasers on my engi frigs and I do pretty damn well with them…
Because lasers do less damage than their rail / plasma equivalents… and because everyone stacks thermal so they do even less damage than they should.
This is especially true at higher tier. The only reason lasers are good at T3 is because you can bring heavies and have someone else blitzing with rail or plas.
Jasan, not really true.
I use T3 mk3 assault lasers on my frig(while I farm more loyalty for mk3 hail) and im doing good with them. They do enough damage to make people run away or kill them.
Sure, other weapons do more actual damage, but this one is an always hit(If you aim is good enough)
The main advantage of lasers is that they have instant hit, but their damage is usually a little bit lower than their counter parts.
Yeah, I like the instant hit that lasers give you. Especially handy against those pesky inties…
Btw, anyone know how resistance works? Because pulse lasers have the highest DPS in T2 weapons and I’m wondering how much resist someone needs to make that DPS fall below Rapid Fire Plasmas or such.