What energy weapons type do you use, and why

fedman70

I have all disruptors right now at someone's recommendation to my Chimera. I think it depends who you are fighting, what wil best work against them. Do any of you use a rainbow of different kinds of beams at the same time, say 1 Phaser, 1 Polaron, 1 Disruptor, 1 Anti-Proton?

papertoasty

it seems that some of it depends on your build and play style

disruptors have a pretty good proc and shreds most things

anti-proton (which is what i run) has a good proc as well and shreds as well if not a touch better than disruptors

kamiyama317

I believe the phaser lotus can be buffed with phaser relays, can't it? If so, I would only use phasers on the Chimera.

I personally like polaron, but I'm a sci captain and fly sci ships. The subsystem drain on polaron weapons can be increased with points in flow capacitors.

robdmc

I use plasma, they are cheap. Npc's don't have the same resists as other players so it don't matter. In the long run as we have more and more end game enemies like the borg the standard plasma resist of everyone should change. At least I hope it will.

twg042370

I use whatever is cheapest at the time. Well, whatever is cheapest that also has cheap consoles to go with it.

I also use the blue TOS phasers up until the character can afford to buy better.

warpangel

With embassy consoles + romulan 2-set bonus, plasma offers higher DPS than anything else. Using plasma also boosts the plasma burn DoT of the Romulan plasma torpedo, so that's further bonus.

loverofwars

well..anti proton beams reason got them from the old stf store 7 xii some xis and x ones laying around too kinda wish i had dual heavys for my mirror escort reason higher crit severity chance and slightly more damage to hull at least thats what i found while fighting the um demons they anti proton turrets and has always hurt my hull slightly more then anything else even with shields fully up the small bleed from ap does a nice bit of damage to my hull. tryed them on my kdf dual heavy xiis and turrets from stf store too worked great as for kdf currently deleted old one was not so good on ground lol he uses plasma beams for carrier reason its cheap but also polaron dual heavys for raptor. fed uses tetryon for escort been thinking of using blue phasers for fun on a science ship and anti proton beams for cruiser science ship and carrier.


as for rainbows well kinda mostly one weapon type with cutting beam added kinda looks like anti proton just less not sure how to explain but to some using plasma with the cutting beam may look like a rainbow:P

mustafatennick

The phaser lotus is buffed by only one type of console phaser therefore really it's a no brainer

A proc has a 2.5%chance to hit yea disruptor and anti proton have the superior damage but you would be losing out on damage through not using phaser

dareau

fedman70 wrote: »

I have all disruptors right now at someone's recommendation to my Chimera. I think it depends who you are fighting, what wil best work against them. Do any of you use a rainbow of different kinds of beams at the same time, say 1 Phaser, 1 Polaron, 1 Disruptor, 1 Anti-Proton?

The "problem" with rainbow cruisers are two-fold:

1. While a rainbow gives the same theoretical number of raw procs that a specialized ship does, there is no ability to determine what you're gonna get - a pure disruptor boat could have 100% uptime on it's debuff, but a rainbow boat might be swapping between a shield down, an energy drain, etc. when you're hoping for the disruptor proc...

2. "Universal" energy tactical consoles don't give the same damage boosts that the specialized ones do - and we all know the goal of most current end-game content is DPS...

On that note, I run energy types somewhat based on goal/need - Vesta is phaser to work with the aux DHCs and the deflector-phaser, my tholian recluse runs tetryon with Omega Glider to synergize with the widow's tetryons, my "normal" sciences and Chel-Brett like Polarons...

questerius

fedman70 wrote: »

I have all disruptors right now at someone's recommendation to my Chimera. I think it depends who you are fighting, what wil best work against them. Do any of you use a rainbow of different kinds of beams at the same time, say 1 Phaser, 1 Polaron, 1 Disruptor, 1 Anti-Proton?

Rainbow is generally a bad idea since you'll never achieve the same DPS as with one type sets.

I have ships with Plasma set, disruptor set and antiproton. Polaron is very poor in STE (which i play the majority of times) and although phasers can work i never got around to building a phaser set.

arlem72

I run anti proton om my cruiser and phasers on my tac retrofit. I like these setups.

heresincebeta

As long as you stick to any one type of damage you'll be tons of DPS ahead of any rainbow clownship.

xigbarg

Dominion phasers because of it's procs. It also has a nice phaser look to it compared to the normal weird looking squiggly lines with red specs polarons.

futurepastnow

I use phasers on Fed ships because Starfleet uses phasers, and disruptors (or polarized disruptors) on KDF ships because that's what Klingons use.

Just use your favorite color, and make all of your energy weapons that color. They're all good in their own way.

srspells

I use polarons accx3, cause in pvp on a jemmy these hurt players bad cause thier power levers go to 40 and also accx3 turns extra acc to crit damage.
-Spells

fedman70

futurepastnow wrote: »

I use phasers on Fed ships because Starfleet uses phasers, and disruptors (or polarized disruptors) on KDF ships because that's what Klingons use.

Just use your favorite color, and make all of your energy weapons that color. They're all good in their own way.

So, you don't care about DPS? I never heard of any plasma ship weapons in the Star Trek shows, but I'd use Plasma here.

eradicator84

I like power drains and am specced heavily into it. This is why I like polarised disruptors. Drains + hull debuff all in one.

starlanced

AntiProton because I have all the crit enhancing consoles, but if the ship has a innate ability like the Chimera's Lotus that is phaser, I try to match since the tac consoles will boost the damage also.

thissler

fedman70 wrote: »

So, you don't care about DPS? I never heard of any plasma ship weapons in the Star Trek shows, but I'd use Plasma here.

What was this? Was this a post of some sort? Anything relevant or just trolling? Do you understand that tossing out "DPS" is like carrying a sign around saying "If you see me put me on the shortest bus available"? At least try to support your statements. If not, preface them with "LOL ignore this drivel". Pick one.

Anyways PVP I typically use AP as I only shoot about once per encounter and the crit is nice.

On ships that have innate weapons I'll also match the wep type like some of the other posters do, or I'll stick to canon weps just for flavor.

Cheers!

stardestroyer001

It depends on the ship's consoles and abilities - for example, my Vesta uses the Aux Phaser DC and the Spinal Lance, so it would make sense to equip the rest of the weapons as Phaser.

Otherwise, it's up to what you want. I use tetryon due to its shield drain abilities, and Polaron for the power drain. I tend to stay away from Phaser or Disruptors if possible.

pokersmith1

Tetryon, phasers, disruptor, polaron and polarized disruptor across my 6 toons

marc8219

On my Fed ships I use phaser, on my KDF I use disruptors. Energy type doesn't matter nearly as much as the weapon mods on it, and my ships just look better when they fire the proper energy type. Also helps if I switch to a ship or console that does damage like point defense, disruptor autocannon, or the quantum focus console on Vesta as I am using the same damage type so my consoles boost it. If I decide to try elite fleet weapons I already have the right consoles for it too since they are only phaser and disruptor.

joshmaaaaaaans

PLASMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

I like teal.

Plus the embassy plasma console gives a nice damage boost, plus the romulan weapons use plasma which have the disruptor proc, which i plan to use after getting t4 romulan rep.

I use polaron on my KDF Qin Raptor, just because i like the purple.

Will probably change to disruptor though, eventually. Or maybe a disruptor dual cannon, a phaser dual cannon, a tetryon dual cannon and a polaron dual cannon on the forward bank, and 3 plasma turrets on the aft.

ericphail

Depends on build, char, etc

I'll agree with most (all?) of the above that if the ship has a special ability of one type then match that type.

Phaser, Disruptor and Plasma seem unaffected by skills and so are effective regardless of build.

Antiproton is probably the type of choice if you're specced for crits (high crit chance)

Polaron and Tetryon both need investment in the flow capacitors skill (so therefore good for drain build ships most sci captains, etc. bad if you have no skill points there)

Note: Polaron is 150% at 100 skill, 200% at 200 etc. and Tetryon is about the same.

As for me:
Fed Sci 50: Polaron and Dominion Polaron, (I'll try tetryon at some point)
KDF Tac 50: Disruptor (might go for antiproton at some point not very likely though)
FED ENG <10 Phaser Obiviously (too new to have switched yet - might go plasma later)

shar487a

I usually match ships with any special energy beam attacks to the rest of the weapons on the ship, so Guramaba's get disruptor class weapons, Chimera + Galaxy-x + Vesta get phasers, etc...

My current weapon of choice is polarized disruptors -- the stacking debuffs from resist and power drains really make targets much easier to kill. Plasma is a close 2nd because of the new Romulan science consoles (our fleet is almost T2 Romulan).

For the Mobius, I went with Anti-Proton to complement the full Temporal Warfare set.

xcom43

questerius wrote: »

Rainbow is generally a bad idea since you'll never achieve the same DPS as with one type sets.

I have ships with Plasma set, disruptor set and antiproton. Polaron is very poor in STE (which i play the majority of times) and although phasers can work i never got around to building a phaser set.

Totaly agree keep it to one set not a rainbow boat that just does not make any sense and any body that i see use a rainbow boat is called a noob in progress.

xcom43

joshmaaaaaaans wrote: »

PLASMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

I like teal.

Plus the embassy plasma console gives a nice damage boost, plus the romulan weapons use plasma which have the disruptor proc, which i plan to use after getting t4 romulan rep.

I use polaron on my KDF Qin Raptor, just because i like the purple.

Will probably change to disruptor though, eventually. Or maybe a disruptor dual cannon, a phaser dual cannon, a tetryon dual cannon and a polaron dual cannon on the forward bank, and 3 plasma turrets on the aft.

I found that plasma weapons do less then every other weapon type out there and the plasma fire don't do TRIBBLE.The only plasma weapon that is worth any thing is the torpedo's.

xgorillapx

Please see my thread in this same section of the forums as it addresses this issue (and many others but mostly regarding STF's.).

http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=295581

There are no difference in energy weapon types, and no one energy weapon type will effect any enemy differently. The only difference in energy weapon types is their proc. Every energy weapon type has a 2.5% chance to proc for some type of bonus damage (except AntiProton which is a flat bonus). The biggest thing is to make sure to use the same energy type for all of your weapons, so all of your weapons benefit from the tactical energy type consoles that you use. Do not listen to those that state the following " Rainbow beam boat has pretty colors! Happy 'Tards for Life! FTW!"

They are as follows.

Phasers - 2.5% chance to knock random subsystem offline for 5 sec.
Disruptors - 2.5% chance to reduce damage resistance by 10%
Plasma - 2.5% chance to cause plasma fire on hull doing X damage per sec. for 10 sec.
Tetryon - 2.5% chance to Reduce all shields by X (i.e. 328 pts.)
Polaron - 2.5% chance to drain all current power levels by -25.
AntiProton - +20 CrtD bonus (increased damage on critical hits)

There are three of these that will effect EVERY target that you will shoot at. These are Disruptors, plasma and AntiProton. With these weapons, it doesn't matter if it is a ship, gate, asteroid, generator, transformer, etc. the proc can ALWAYS be applied.

However. with phasers, tetryon and polaron weapons, their proc can't be applied to non-ship targets. This is a big negative in STF's when you have to do a large amount of damage to Gates, Generators and transformers. Not to mention, the energy drain and knocking subsystem offline doesn't seem to effect the Borg much.

deathspeedmk

On my main toon (VA)
I used to use plasmas ( I don't do PVP) I find them quite nice, however for my tanker/healer I m changing over to dist/plasma hybirds.. I have stacked up general energy weapons consles, its pretty much a beam boat, as I don't quite have enough tac slots for 2 tts and a beam array fire at will, and torp spread well not on a assult cruiser anyways.

Last night I got a mirror adv escort, for my main toon and I love the thing.. I got all dist dual/heavy cannons and turrets on it as well as a quant luncher and wow..its not even finished yet

xgorillapx

You'll have fun with it. I prefer the patrol escort myself as far as the free escorts go, but it sounds like you have the right idea. Definitely check out the link to the thread I created in the post above yours. It explains how to setup your escort to do damage in STF's while maintaining survivability in an escort.

adm1ralblackbar

xgorillapx wrote: »

Please see my thread in this same section of the forums as it addresses this issue (and many others but mostly regarding STF's.).


However. with phasers, tetryon and polaron weapons, their proc can't be applied to non-ship targets. This is a big negative in STF's when you have to do a large amount of damage to Gates, Generators and transformers. Not to mention, the energy drain and knocking subsystem offline doesn't seem to effect the Borg much.

False. The phaser proc does affect the gate, such as the one in ISE, albeit I rarely see it - same for the Borg. It would seem there is some sort of artifice that reduces or eliminates the phaser proc. But I have seen it.