Beamboat and turn rate

mordan8504

I'm a SCI captain and I fly SCI ships. I've got my pick of ship right now and I'm wanting to do a beam boat build on an SCI ship so I can just fly in, start doing support stuff and just hit autofire on some beams. My big question is about turn rate. Is there a turn rate that's ideal for a beam boat? Is there a maximum for a turn rate that makes a beam boat ineffective?

My understanding of a beam boat is full beam arrays in all slots and broadsiding for maximum damage. I really want to give this a try as I can simply use evasives or deutirium surpluses to execute my SCI abilities when needed.

Also, I'm a PvE kind of player and I'd like to stay in a SCI ship if possible. Thanks in advance!

reginamala78

Turn isn't such a problem with beam boats really, due to the wide firing arcs (why they were originally considered cruiser weapons). Any sci ship's base turn alone will be more than enough. Which sci ship you looking to use anyways?

Energy is the problem you're going to run into. If you load 5-6 beams on your ship and start blasting away, that much drain will leave them little more than tickle beams hitting for a few hundred each. The ability to counter all that drain is what makes the difference between an impressive light show and an OMFG DPS monster. Emergency Power To Weapons and the Omega Weapon Amplifier are the easiest to get. Plasmonic Leech is really nice but really expensive. Certain warp cores can help, particularly the Elite Fleet Plasma Integrated from the Fleet Spire. There's also Auxiliary To Battery energy overcapping, but that drains the auxiliary power the rest of your science ship abilities probably need. But if you're going to run a lot of beams, you'll want to pick up AT LEAST two drain control abilities, preferably more. That'll make a much bigger difference than turn rate.

robanske

reginamala78 wrote: »

Turn isn't such a problem with beam boats really, due to the wide firing arcs (why they were originally considered cruiser weapons). Any sci ship's base turn alone will be more than enough. Which sci ship you looking to use anyways?

Energy is the problem you're going to run into. If you load 5-6 beams on your ship and start blasting away, that much drain will leave them little more than tickle beams hitting for a few hundred each. The ability to counter all that drain is what makes the difference between an impressive light show and an OMFG DPS monster. Emergency Power To Weapons and the Omega Weapon Amplifier are the easiest to get. Plasmonic Leech is really nice but really expensive. Certain warp cores can help, particularly the Elite Fleet Plasma Integrated from the Fleet Spire. There's also Auxiliary To Battery energy overcapping, but that drains the auxiliary power the rest of your science ship abilities probably need. But if you're going to run a lot of beams, you'll want to pick up AT LEAST two drain control abilities, preferably more. That'll make a much bigger difference than turn rate.

Yes make sure not to use aux2bat on a sci cruiser as, by the way you describe how you play a sci ship, you will be using auxilliary power quite a bit. It is ideal to use power draining abilities as a sci since they come very naturally in the abilities that sci ships use commonly.

baudl

if you choose a sci captain on a sci ship, you most certainly will need all sort of drain powers...energy syphon, plasmonic leech console, ... to cope with weapon power drain, since there are no sci powers in game that could compare with your weapons. That's also why carriers and sci heavy destroyers are the better sci ships currently. Atleast for PVE.

as an engi captain you are a little more flexible in that category, since you already have more energy via traits, captain ability and you could sacrifice a heal or two for more firepower and or a CC ability.

I'm not a fan of sci captains flying sci ships in PVE, since this combo tends to be overspecialized in the support and CC field, which isn't needed in any PVE mission, or is sufficently covered by carriers and sci destroyers.
And cryptics effort in designing more and more missions "sci friendly" kind of supports this notion. They artificialy give sci ships a place in PVE, because they used to be inferior to basically any ship class to this day.

aux2batt is naturaly a bad choice for sci ships...BUT, with really good timing this disadvantage can be ignored. So aux2batt sci vessels can work, but they certainly don't make the already very hard gameplay of sci ships any easier.

imho, engi captains have a better synergy with sci vessels than sci captains. easier power management, huge survivability boost (just think about the additional shield heal alone)

sci captain abilities aren't even buffed sufficently by the sci skilltree. only aux power elvels have an impact on most sci captain abilities...

coffeemike

What's your current setup? I fly the tac Vesta but use also the Gravimetric Torp just for fun.

Turn rate is going to be the least of your problems: power drain will be. Depending on your setup, I'd make sure that you have enough power all around for the weapons you choose to load.

For example, I'm an engineer flying a tac Vesta. I have 2 beam arrays, a torp, the Omni Dir AP beam, the KCB, and the Experimental Proton weapon.

So I keep the following power levels: 100 to AUX, 60 to Weapons, 20 to shields and engines.

But my space trait on my captain, I have the EPS Manifold Efficiency trait that helps when I hit Emergency Power to Shields. I'm also wanting to get the Inspirational Leader trait just for the fun.

I use the 6 DOFF slots for:
1 purple Conn Officer for TT cooldown
1 purple Damage Control Engineers for Emergency Power to X cooldown
2 purple Warp Core Engineer for additional subsystem power by +25
1 purple Deflector Officer for deflector abilities cooldown
1 purple Gravimetric Scientist for exotic damage cooldown

I also slot 2 efficient BOFFs, 2 Rom tac BOFFs, 1 human BOFF for extra power/crit chance & sev/hull heal.

And then there are the consoles: Zero Point Energy/Nukara Particle Converter/Plasmonic Leech/Assimilated Module/Proton Particle Stabilizer/Tachyokinetic Coverter. All helping my AP beam build be epic.

Plus throw in your rep system powers with the allocated skill traits and BAM.

noroblad

I have not yet met the ship for PVE that could not support dual beam banks up front. You may LIKE to use beam arrays and broadside, but I have tried it every which way and I get the best damage from using antiproton dual beam banks. The reason for ap is to avoid a turret; the omni beam in back and a cutting beam give you 2 hard hitting weapons that add to the frontal assault.

And I am not talking fast ships. One of mine is the DD and I tried it with 180 cannons and turrets, full beam arrays, and a variety of other configurations. The best damage always came back to 3 dbb & torp up front, 2 beams in the back, the other 2 rear weapons can be whatever I have turrets and sometimes a mine or torp. The other is a 6 gun carrier, with one turret rounding out the beams.

If you do broadside, and if you do go AP, I would say put one 360 in front and the other in the back. That way forward or rear you have 4 weapons bearing, sideways, all 6.

There is nothing wrong with the beam array setups, I am just offering an alternative that has worked really well for me. Which does more dps will depend on your ship and gear and all somewhat too, I am not even saying my setup is always higher. But it has always been higher for ME, whether that is how I was flying or gear or whatever variables.

coffeemike

Dual Beam Banks are viable in ships... either a Galaxy or Oddy stops and starts shooting or a Vesta is at 1/2 impulse and starts shooting.

I ran 2 AP DBB before on mine but 1) I didn't need the Chroniton damage from the 2 pc. Temporal set and 2) I slotted the Omni Dir. AP array along with the experimental Protonic weapon.

I might add the Adv. Fleet AP DBB again for Season 9 when I get the Undine rep console