Quad-Cannon Bundle Giveaway (almost)

kjwashington

So, as you are all probably aware, today's giveaway is the Ar'kala, Puyjaq, and Sao Paulo ships. Or as everyone might know them better: the ships the phaser and plasma quad-cannons come in, and the Puyjaq.

First off, why the Puyjaq? Why not the Ning'tao, as to give everyone their faction's quad-cannons. (Yes, I'm aware that it's a lower tier ship than the other two, but its not like anyone uses these at end-game anyway.)

So let's talk about the quad-cannons. What are their advantages and disadvantages over using dual cannons or dual heavy cannons?

warmaker001b

For me, the ranking of the narrow arc Cannon-type weapons go like this: DHCs>Quads>DCs

The Quads with their [Dmg]x4 is more useful for the "average" STO player that has terrible Crit Hit capabilities. Personally, if you have decent to high Crit Hit rates, DHCs will be superior for the simple fact that they have an inherent +Crit Severity built into them. Even the most common DHC variant will have this advantage. Throw in a favorable mod set on the DHCs (CrtD) with a good build's Crit Hit rates, DHCs still reign supreme in the Cannons department. Also, DHCs drain Weapons Power, not Weapons AND Engine Power like Quads do. My Escorts tend to run high Engine Power (not the highest set, mind you) and I'm loathe for anything interfering with that and TRIBBLE with my Weapons Power at the same time.

Dual Cannons? Trash. They have the same, bad narrow arcs of DHCs but lack the built in Crit Severity of DHCs. They don't proc any better either, they are based on firing cycles. There is some bad misinformation floating out there about Dual Cannons proccing more. There are many reasons why Dual Cannons are the second worst valued Cannon-type weapons in the exchange. Only thing worse are Single Cannons.

Edit: I'll slot Quads for the novelty of how they sound, not because of how effective they are. I'll take DHCs any day of the week over them.

lordsteve1

I'm not a fan of the quads. Mainly because on an escort (most likely to run them) you're focusing on weapon power primarily and the last thing you want it something draining two subsystems, making your job harder. Especially when you need to keep an eye on shield power too (so that's 3 systems to manage all at once) unless you like being a pile of melted slag.

Now if you're got a leech console you're laughing but they are just too much of a pain to balance the energy use out with getting decent damage for me.

tom61sto

The Puyjaq is an odd choice. I'm wondering if it's the fact the KDF Quads are on a lower teir ship and they wanted that to match, or if It might be a hint that a set bonus for either the Puyjaq console or the Disruptor Quads, as both of the other Quads are in sets.

That, or they were confused as to which KDF ship had Quads, it certainly looks the part if you're not very familiar with the KDF ship lineup...

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asuran14

I like the quad cannons overall for how they feel and sound, seeing four pulse shots flying at a target from your ship can be quite nice to see among the dual shots of your other cannons. Honestly though I never understood why make it drain both weapon an engine power, and honestly feel that the weapon should get some kind of buff to it's performance based on how high each of these power systems are set power-wise, such as that it gets a buff to either it's damage output (Ie how weapon power buffs other weapon's performance, but maybe at a reduced amount.) or maybe a buff to the cool down between firing cycles. Though even making it have either a rapid mod or just fire as if under the effect of rapid fire would make it more interesting, and worth more since it is a one per ship unique weapon like the tempest tail gun on the tempest patrol escort.

I hope we might see a rework of the cannon type weapons to make each of them more distinct, and viable to use on ships, as right now dual cannons are largely in a void area where if you can equip them you are better off using dual heavies an singles are good if you want to use cannons on a non-dual using ship. I would love to see it that dual cannons had a wider arc maybe in the 90 degree arc range, as well as an increased firing cycle to make it actually have a better proccing rate, or even that it might have a native chance mod that buffs the proccing chance of effects triggered by weapon attacks. Dual heavies seem pretty good overall as they are pretty heavy hitting, and have that nice native crtd buff to them, but single cannons could use something maybe slightly higher damage to make them a viable choice on ships against beam arrays an banks maybe with their damage sitting between the two.

I will agree that it is a strange choice except that they might have been looking at tier four ships and wanted to keep with that fact. Still would have been nice to give out the plasma quad equipped ship for the Romulans.

farmallm

I use Quads all the time on my Defiant. They are nice and can chew up a target.

kayajay

I'll never understand why we can't have multiple of the same weapons on one ship...if I grind and want eight kinetic cutting beams or temporal disruptions devices, why shouldn't I?

mustrumridcully0

Oh, the Ar'kala.. That was missing in my collection, but didn't feel worth spending money on. Now I can have it!

I think the simple reason is that they wanted to give away ships of equal tier/value for each faction. The decision to give the Klingon Quad Cannons to a different tier than the Federation was made ages ago.

davefenestrator

Exactly, people who didn't want the quads would whine about getting a T3 ship instead of T4 like the Feds and Roms.

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chiyoumiku

Tbh not happy about this. Yes I have the ships for their cards, but my Feds don't use cannons, One's an AP build Beam boat and the other is a Phaser Build Beam Boat. I have no use for cannons on them because of what I use them for. My Rommie/Klingon can use them (Especially since I have the stuff I need to upgrade the cannons on my klink to Ultra Rare which adds critical severity procs into it) but no we got denied. You Dishonor my Klingon, Cryptic.

dracounguis

for me...Quads
Pro: I like the quad's graphic pew-pew-ness (on most ships)
Con: Suck 2x energy (10 engine & 10 weapon energy) for not 2x damage.

They don't really DO anything special in a positive way vs the other cannons for the 10 extra energy they use. Cryptic should increase the damage or give them a wee bit wider firing arc to make up for it.

As for KDF not getting a free quad cannon... make it tomorrow's free gift. Fed's don't have the be the only ones to get a faction exclusive day! (aka Open uniforms from yesterday)

johnsteward

The main part for me is that the quad cannons just look awesome

jade1280

Personally i am just happy they gave away ships i dident already own.

As for the cannons after investing in DHC with the wide arc you never need anything else.

kayajay

The only thing about giving away the Sao Paolo...does that mean if the Defiant pack were to ever become available, will you not be allowed to buy it? When they released the Pathfinder pack, I could claim it because I'd previously bought the Intrepid with the Ablative Console.

angrytarg

kayajay wrote: »

The only thing about giving away the Sao Paolo...does that mean if the Defiant pack were to ever become available, will you not be allowed to buy it? When they released the Pathfinder pack, I could claim it because I'd previously bought the Intrepid with the Ablative Console.

Those "packs" usually don't come at a big discount anyway. For instance, there is the "Galaxy pack" granting the Venture-type, Galaxy retrofit and Dreadnaught cruiser, in addition to the "galaxy bridges".

I already owned the Venture and Retrofit when the deal came around. Upon purchasing the Dreadnaught cruiser I was automatically given the bridges as well as the game registred me having the "pack". When you don't need all ships in said packs you are already paying less as you already have the "discount" of one ship and I think it then costs the same as if you would purchase all ships seperately.​​

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thunderfoot

The choice made for the Ship Giveaway were two of the three I did not already have. As to the Quad Cannons, I already had them for my Rommie and my Klinks. My attitude about free stuff? Always appreciated simply on the basis of price point alone. It's free. Doesn't get better than this.

I view the Quad cannons as something very specialized. I would have to spend some time and effort, along with Dilithium and EC, to get the maximum benefit from. My normal cannon set up is - 1 Wide Angle/1DHC/1DHC/1DC. This setup works very well for me. My CrtH on my cannon boats is normally around about 28% with CrtD usually being around 115%. I could do better I know but this is good enough for nearly every PvE content in the game. I tend to avoid the Elite level stuff. Mostly because I do not think my ships or skills are good enough and I abhor the thought of someone else having the carry me through a mission.