Spidey
Posts: 411
Joined: 12/8/2013
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quote:
Size is not everything, you may want to consider actually doing something yourself before suggesting someone else do it as part of an argument. While i did not test T2 Epsilon, i did test T3 Epsilon vs T6 Shatter. I put 5O Shatters on a frigate, then removed them all and began adding Torpedoes until the damage matched up. It took 3O. It takes just 3O torpedo launchers to do what 5O lasers can do, plus better range and considerably less research points. Sure if you plan on going titan beams, it may be justified as a temporary loss in efficiency. But this is a comparison that assumes you are not going to research Titan Beams any time soon. If your also struggling with power, the shatter can be useful there but who doesn't invest in good reactors?
I'm not saying Torpedos are not over powered. They are, but the Shatterforce laser is just underwhelming despite it's size. Especially for a T6 weapon. If i were banking on using long range weapons in the early game, with the intention of eventually going for the Titan Beam i would invest in at least T2 Torpedoes before heading across the tiers of beam weapons. That isn't to say i wouldn't equip a small number of lasers, their small size makes them excellent fillers for extra space
I'm sorry to say that this is probably the single most clueless post I've seen on this forum in my half year here. And I've seen some really questionable people make really questionable claims.
Let's do some basic math instead of talking crazy talk.
Weapon Rank Size DMG RNG ENRG SPD Pen Refire E/S DPS #0 DPS #0
per S per S
Shatterforce Laser 2 4 4 9 390 20 370 1 2.2 2.3 4.1 1.02
Epsilon Torpedo 3 3 15 21 550 30 86 3 2.9 0.7 7.2 0.48
I'm comparing Shatter 2 against Eps 3, which isn't fair since Shatter 2 is a tier above, but it's the weakest Shatter version at point blank range and Eps 3 is the best Eps version, so it's about as fair as it gets. There's no way to make Eps 3 look better than point blank vs Shatter 2, which isn't to say that Eps torps look good at point blank or are meaningfully used at point blank, but merely that this is when they look the least bad against Shatters.
Notice that the Eps torps are size 15. Fif. Teen. That's 3.75 more than the size of a Shatter laser. Now look at the damage. The damage is 21 vs the 9 of the Shatter. That's just 2.33 times more. Can you begin to see the problem? Size isn't everything but it is damned important when it's a hugely scarce resource and unless you're talking about extremely late game size 1000+ ships, size is a very scarce resource.
You throw 50 Shatters on a ship. Great. 50 Shatter 2s means a DPS of 50 * 4.1, adding up to 205. At point blank range, those 50 Shatters will do 205 damage per second at point blank range. Or put differently, if you spend 200 units of size on Shatter 2s, you'll get about 1 point of damage per second per unit size spent.
Now let's throw 200 units of size worth of Eps 3 torps onto a ship. 200/15 = 13.33. We can't add a third Eps torp, so let's round up, just to be nice. Eps 3 torps have a DPS of 7.2, so 14 of them will have a DPS of 14 * 7.2 = 100.8 at point blank range. That's less than half the DPS. Or put differently, if you spend 200 units of size on Eps torps, you will at very best case get just under 0.5 points of damage per second per unit size spent.
And why is it important to consider things in terms of per unit size? It's because you don't have infinite space. If you increase damage by throwing on another Eps torp, you're also adding another 15 units of size to the design. Two shatters do almost as much damage and take up merely half the space. Are you thinking that 10 Eps torps make for a good loadout? That's 210 alpha strike damage and 74 DPS at a cost of 150 units of size before reactors. Doing the same with shatters takes 24 Shatter 2s (alpha 216, DPS 98.4), adding up to just 96 units of space, leaving more than enough room to throw on an extra reactor to feed that many guns and still be lighter. You want to scale up? Fine. The further you scale up, the more decisive the Shatter size advantage is going to get. And that's why they're later in the tech tree.
You then, rather amusingly, said that it "takes just 3O torpedo launchers to do what 5O lasers can do". Yeah, 30 launchers at size 15. 30 launchers means spending four hundred and freaking fifty units of space. Just to build a legal ship with that much weaponry on it, you need tier 5 construction (size 650) and then we're still talking about a sitting duck of a ship. To get it armored and able to move, you need a lot more than 200 units of size worth armor plates, shields, engines, and reactors. Don't forget the life support that also adds up to quite a bit at this point. Saying "just" about 30 freaking Eps torps on one ship is hilarious.
Next you're talking about how torpedos are overpowered when in fact they're really not. Their DPS per unit size are consistently below that of most other weapons. What balances it out is that torps have an advantage in range and armor piercing capabilities, things you haven't even begun to consider the value of. AP qualities are of course nice but it only really matter against upgraded armor. Range isn't bad but it would mean a lot more if DW ship AI was better at skirmishing in and out of max range instead of drifting into range of the enemy regardless of settings. I like torps, don't get me wrong, but that's mostly because they're damn useful for base assaults whereas lasers mean that I have to get within range of everything the base has to throw at me.
And why would you research multiple weapon branches anyway instead of getting to the ultimates as fast as freaking possible? Why would you bother with Shatter 6 or Eps 3? What purpose is served by researching those instead of the weapons they unlock? I'd take Velo Shard 1 or Shockwave 1 over Eps 3 any day of the week without a second thought and I'd go through Impact Assault Blasters and get Titan Beam 1 before I'd even think about Shatter 6. There's just no point in going into a deadend tech instead of unlocking what is clearly a better weapon that even can be improved later on.
I'm sorry for bluntly piling on the criticism, by the way, but you can't say I didn't warn you, and you can't say you're not asking for it either.
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Who designed the Shatterforce laser? - 
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