Beam: Target aux, shields, or weapons for PvE?

rodentmaster

For the sake of PvE, mostly interested in monolithic boss fights like donatra, TBE citadels, borg gateways or TAC cubes, and not as much the lesser ships:

If you had to prioritize ONE target subsystem mode, what is best to use? Mainly if you're using that useless ensign slot for Beam: Target.... boff skills.

I know it's not great, I know there are better options. I'm not too interested in them. I'm curious about what subsystem would most affect the enemy. Is the Unimatrix using aux power for its special attacks? Or is it using weapons power? How does that work? If I target aux, will I stop special attacks from some boss ships? Or are those hard-coded to work regardless of what aux it has? Should I go with weapons for breathing space? Or does that not work, either? I know Target: shields works to a small extent, but I'm honestly wondering if target: aux or weapons would have better results.

I assume sci ship subsystem targetting is also the same mechanic.

ursusmorologus

Weapons with some other drain (plasmonic or polaron) seems to work 100% reliably againt the gate

Otherwise its usually Shields just to soften them up

NPCs mostly ignore Aux offline (esp Donatra). Sometimes target Engines will work but most NPCs dont move around very much

dahminus

Urus got it on the head

shadowwraith77

The biggest should be a no brainer, weapons subsystem, they cannot attack you if it is shut down, and even if it isn't completely shut down, a little less WP causes them to do a tiny bit less damage.

After that I would say a toss up between shields, and engines.

rodentmaster

That's good to know. Thanks, folks!

shadowwraith77

rodentmaster wrote: »

That's good to know. Thanks, folks!

Of course if your CRTH is high, you could make good use of the romulan rep trait sensor targeting assault, and opt for shield, or engine subsystem targeting.

rodentmaster

I'm not sure it's worth losing a more useful rep to slot that. The rep slots are far too few as it is.

cmdrscarlet

I'd say weapons - if you are not taking damage then you don't have to worry about healing yourself.

lucho80

I usually don't target weapons because once I get a NPC drained with other stuff, it doesn't really matter. I go for shields usually. Makes NPCs squishy.

I have a tac ship that uses polarized disruptors with high flow caps for PvE and it's really good at softening and blowing up stuff.

shadowwraith77

Well in the situation of my drain build, even when I target some other subsystem, I am always after their weapons power at the same time.

Not to mention, 2 chances of a random subsystem being shutdown also at the same time.

Don't get me wrong, I am squishy to some degree, but not as bad as one might think.

I prefer constant subsystem power levels, always being pressured into draining, or simply shutdown.