All energy weapons have a damage drop off at a distance, getting close will always do more damage, however bolt weapons (cannons and turrets) have a much greater damage drop off then beams, so at maximum range beams will do more damage than bolt weapons, though still less damage then if they were close range. Projectile weapons do not have this drop off, nor are they effected by weapon power settings.
Cannons: 180' arc, medium sustained damage
Dual Cannons: 45' arc, high sustained damage
Dual Heavy Cannons, 45' arc, high burst/sustained damage (same overall damage as dual cannon but in 2 big bursts rather than 4 little hits)
Projectile Weapons:
Torpedoes: 90' arc, very high burst damage (75% less against shields)
Mines: no arc... they're mines you put them down, things come near they go boom... Medium burst damage (75% less against shields)
Damage Types
Ships can have different resistances to different damage types. There also seems to be some other subtle side-effects to the different types:
Space energy types:
Phaser: Chance to disable a random subsystem
Disruptor: Chance to debuff damage resistance
Plasma: Chance to proc a fire based DoT
Tetryon: Chance to proc Shield damage
Polaron: Chance to drain power from all subsystems
Anti-Proton: Bonus Crit damage
Also Ground based damage types:
Phaser: Chance to stun
Disruptor: Chance to debuff damage resistances
Plasma: Chance to proc fire based DoT
Tetryon: Chance to proc Shield damage
Polaron: Chance to proc weapon disable
Anti-Proton: Bonus Crit damage
Projectile:
Photon: Less damage but faster fire rate. Regular boff effect.
Quantum: More damage but slow fire rate. Regular boff effect.
Plasma: medium damage with a chance to apply a DoT that ignores shields (decent against both unshielded and shielded targets). Plasma's version of High Yield fires a Plasma Ball that can be targetted and shot down.
Transphasic - low damage, but chance for more of it to penetrate shields (very good against shielded targets, mediocre against unshielded targets). Comes with standard Boff powers.
Chroniton - can slow down enemies. (nice for making enemies' weakened shields harder to protect, or as a rear launcher to use when running away). Comes with standard Boff powers.
Tricobalt - very high damage, and a short disable effect (stops target from using any powers for a moment). has a very long cooldown and doesn't get modified by Boff powers.
Shields:
Shield power: 25 setting gives 0 regen, 50 is 1x regen, 75 is 2x regen, 100 is 3x regen, 125 is 4x regen
Basic - Medium Amount/Regen
Resilient - Medium Amount/Regen
Reduced Bleedthrough, which means your hull is taking less damage while your shields hold.
Regenerative - Low amount, high regen
*PRO reduced downtime, and if you turn fast enough many mobs wont ever penetrate any of your shields specially if you use allocation.
*CON high burst damage such as heavy cannons or torp volleys quickly destroy your shield and begin damaging your hull.
- High amount, low regen
*PRO burst damage such as heavy cannon fire and torps will be absorbed by your shields without touching your hull (bar bleedthrough) allowing you enough time to take counter measures such as sensor scramble, evasive maneuvers or blowing them up before they shoot again.
*CON long downtime for shields to regen, making you vulnerable to sustained DPS
Last edited by Dasorine : Today at 08:05 AM.
01-29-2010, 12:51 PM #2
Dasorine
Senior Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
And mechanics on cooldown based weapons:
Cannons:
Cannons have a 1 second global cooldown, this means no you cannot fire them all together for one big alpha and see that flag ship die in a second. It means you have to fire them alternately every one second, for high sustained DPS. If you want the flexibility of being able to do big burst damage, go beams, or use turrets as they are cannon beam hybrids (cannon style bolts with cannon skill boosts and boffs, but with beam firing mechanics so can be fired together with higher power consumption)
Every Cannon (turret is not classed as cannon for this part) goes onto a 1 second global cooldown if any cannon is shot. This global cooldown coincides with the firing animation of the weapon, so when it stops firing the global cooldown is up (or in case of heavies just about to be up)
Dual and single cannons now have a 3 second personal cooldown.
Heavy dual cannons have a 3 second personal cooldown.
(Disclaimer, personal cooldowns are calculated from the moment you press the fire button to the moment you can fire the weapon again. The one stated in the info screen is the time it takes AFTER the cannon has finished firing which is not the total time it takes for you to be able to press it again after you pressed it the first time)
This means that certain types of cannons have a max amount you can fit before they cease adding bonus.
Since beta things have changed slightly, cannons cooldowns and toggles seem to have been fixed to what is stated in the tool tip. As it is, 3 cannons of any sort is the maximum.
Depending on reaction time and or lag the third cannon may be less effective then the second (to the point where it may no longer be usable).
Cannons and dual cannons will fire 4 shots over a period of 2 seconds (this was changed since beta), the next cannon will fire its first shots a long with the first cannons last 2 shots, resulting in 2 sets of 2 shots at once during this time, a third cannon will fire as the second cannons 3rd and 4th shot is firing resulting in another double shot. You do not lose any shots with this. 2 cannons still give a constant barrage of fire but three cannons will result in an almost constant barrage of 2 cannons firing together, I cannot guarantee this is always the case (animation wise it seemed to vary between double shots or (with both weapons same damage type) twice as fast shooting (less of a gap between each shot)
Also I would like to state that I myself found the third cannon shot around a half second before the first was ready so its not going to be as much gain as the second (so diminishing return) at least until they allow multiple autofires.
Heavy cannons will fire 2 shots over 1 second with not double shots at any point. But as with the dual cannons the third was firing of around half a second later then technically possible due to delays, would be fixed with more autofire options but until then, unless you use macro and have a great connection the third will have diminishing returns.
So in short:
Maximum fire rate for cannons is 1 cannon firing every 1 seconds
3 dual/single cannons are needed to obtain that speed however 2 are sufficient to maintain constant damage to keep shields down and such.
3 heavy cannons are needed to obtain that speed. 2 will still have a big gap between damage being dealt again.
Rapid Fire does not effect cooldown at all, just how much damage is given per firing cycle.
Torpedo Launchers:
All torpedo launchers have a 3 second global recharge time, meaning you have to fire them alternately every 3 seconds.
Firing any torpedo launcher will put any other torpedo launcher equipped into the 3 second global cooldown (WARNING: I have not tested aft/fore torpedo cooldown lock, each side may be seperate but I suspect it would take around 3 seconds for most ships to turn that far, but I am happy to hear any personal experiences with fore/aft torpedo set ups)
Each torpedo has its own personal cooldowns (Unlike cannons, the times listed on the weapons info pages are the actual times it takes for the torpedos to be ready to be fired again).
Photon torpedos are 6 seconds, 2 of them will give you a fire rate of 1 every 3 seconds, these are the highest DPS for slots used torpedos.
Note: A third torpedo of a different type can be used with 2 photons, if you fire it off in the place of one of the photons when its personal charge is ready you can add it in for a bonus spike of damage/special while maintaining the fire rate of 1 every 3 seconds.
Quantum and Plasma torpedos have 8 second personal cooldowns, 3 of them will give you a 1 shot every 3 seconds, quantums will give you a higher dps then photons when 3 are equiped and plasma will do more hull damage then photons if enemy has lots of shield/shield regen.
NOTE: The third quantum and plasma torpedo will not give as much gain as the second as it only cuts off 2 seconds rather than a full 3 from the cycle.
Transphasic and Chroniton have 10 seconds personal cooldowns, that means 4 of them will give you a rate of 1 shot every 3 seconds, transphasic will give you the highest DPS out of all the torpedos at that point due to its shield piercing bonus, Chroniton will slow the enemys movement.
NOTE: The 4th transphasic or chroniton launcher will not be as effective as the 2nd or 3rd, cutting only 1 second off the cycle time compared to the 3 seconds the other two will give.
Tricobolt are special in the fact that they are not effected by BOff skills and have a shared cooldown of 30 seconds, this means the fastest you will ever fire a tricobolt device is 1 every 30 seconds but the total cooldown is apparently 1 minute. This should not effect the other launchers though (beyond putting them into a 3 second global).
So in short:
Max fire rate of torpedos is 1 every 3 seconds.
2 photons will give you the max rate
3 quantum or plasma will give you the max rate
4 transphasic or chroniton will give you the max rate
2 tricobolt is the maximum you can use.
Mines:
Ok I have to come clean, I have done very little actual tests beyond cooldown tests on these, I cannot offer any wisdom as to what the effects/damage the mines are like or really the activation time. I would go along with the same effects as the torpedo variants (although probably of lesser strength). I will just state the facts of cooldown.
Mines have a 9 second global cooldown.
Photons have a 12 second personal, making 2 give you a 9 second deploy rate but only cutting off 3 seconds.
Quantums and Plasma have a 16 second cooldown, 2 will give you a 9 second deploy rate, with the second cutting off 7 seconds (much better!)
Chroniton and Transphasic have a 20 second cooldown rate, 3 will give you a 9 second deploy rate, but the third will only cut 2 seconds off the cycle.
I am not aware of any tricobolt mines, I have not seen anything stated about their existance, I assume there is but they will work on the same 30 second shared cooldown for tricobolt weapons.
In short:
Mines max rate of fire is a deployment every 9 seconds
Photons take 2 to hit this max, but with a high diminishing return for the second.
Quantums and Plasmas take 2 to hit this max, with a reasonable diminishing return for the second.
Chroniton and Transphasic take 3 to hit this max, with an extreme diminishing return for the 3rd one.
2 Tricobolt should be the max you can use.