Anybody remember how phasers were before they changed how the procs stack? With multiple targets firing at you can recall getting shut down and enjoying my ship's explosion graphics pretty fast.
I do. Exactly the same as today, go figure.
If they changed things how could they be the same as they are today unless they changed them back again?
What I was referring to was a change in (roughly speaking) how many phaser procs can stack on a target. From what I can recall it was done to avoid the rapid subsystem shutdowns possible when taking phaser fire from multiple sources. I'm not referring to a recent change. The challenge is finding the references to said changes as the years go by. I used to make more of an effort to stay on top of things. Then S13 happened.
It was some time around F2P. So only the real die-hard vets remember.
As much as Anti Proton has fallen out of favor with the rise of Disruptors, it's still my favorite and performs best for me overall. I still haven't found anything better then CrtDx3 or CrtDx4 Anti Proton Beams on a Romulan Captain.
You open fire and the screen just fills with explosions.. quite satisfying.
Still, Phaser remains my favorite. I don't have a real reason why, I just like it. It's always performed well for me and still does. It just feels the most.. 'trek' to me. The only reason my main uses Tetryon is because they're blue.. and I just like Blue.
This discussion brought up, at least for me, the issue of stacking consoles, especially Tac consoles.
I mean cryptic can release one console after the other, with ships or missions, but unless stacking tac consoles is still best in slot, who cares?
In my opinion, "unique equipped" should be something that could really refresh ship building and bring new validity to certain unappreciated console types.
Anybody remember how phasers were before they changed how the procs stack? With multiple targets firing at you can recall getting shut down and enjoying my ship's explosion graphics pretty fast.
I do. Exactly the same as today, go figure.
If they changed things how could they be the same as they are today unless they changed them back again?
What I was referring to was a change in (roughly speaking) how many phaser procs can stack on a target. From what I can recall it was done to avoid the rapid subsystem shutdowns possible when taking phaser fire from multiple sources. I'm not referring to a recent change. The challenge is finding the references to said changes as the years go by. I used to make more of an effort to stay on top of things. Then S13 happened.
It was some time around F2P. So only the real die-hard vets remember.
Thanks, almost thought I was imagining things. Found reference to the change in the July 19, 2012 Patch Notes.
Updated Phaser Procs:
Multiple system offline procs to a single subsystem no longer stack.
For example, if your Weapons are offline and you get hit with another Weapons offline proc, it is disregarded.
After a phaser proc's duration has ended, targets will receive a 10-second immunity to additional phaser procs.
During this time, no additional systems can be taken offline by Phasers.
Other effects that cause subsystem offline, such as Boarding Parties, can still take effect during this immunity.
I'm wondering how to properly state a reasonable interpretation of what was done to the phaser proc a long time ago and perhaps how it relates to it's performance today?
The phaser proc was so good (over-performing) in some situations that it was adjusted? Since this was ship vs ship was there a PvP element involved in the change? Do other energy types have immunities built into their procs? I can see additional procs of the same sub-system being disregarded but a full 10 second immunity to other procs... doesn't this seem a bit much, more so given that we do have some built in and available sub-system offline resists?
Anybody care to chime in?
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,449Community Moderator
Its possible that PvP was part of it, as I think we hadn't gone after the Terrans big time yet at the time of this change. Chain disables from phasers were probably shutting players down to the point it wasn't even worth fighting.
It was an issue in PVP from what I'd heard. Fed teams would often FaW phasers simply to see how often they could trigger procs. But it could also be an issue when fighting Fed, Mirror, or Cardassian NPCs. Ironically it made Frigate and fighter swarms more dangerous than battle ships.
It was an issue in PVP from what I'd heard. Fed teams would often FaW phasers simply to see how often they could trigger procs. But it could also be an issue when fighting Fed, Mirror, or Cardassian NPCs. Ironically it made Frigate and fighter swarms more dangerous than battle ships.
Thanks. This is my recollection as well. Having my ship shut down so fast there wasn't much you could do whether versus other players or NPC swarms. Seems the phaser proc ain't so bad after all. Am assuming even with the changes in 2012 it's at par with the other proc's, as devs always know how to balance things just right.
As much as Anti Proton has fallen out of favor with the rise of Disruptors, it's still my favorite and performs best for me overall.
I still dont get why people keep saying that lol. AP is not the best, not for you not for anyone. Not a single energy weapon is the best. Depends on your build, AP will be better or worst for you. But AP is not universally the "best", nor disruptor. Nor any other. Sometimes i wonder if some of you actually understand how to play this game lol. If you cant make any other energy type as good as ap or disruptor in terms of performance, you are doing something terribly wrong lol. Maybe you still need a lot of things to learn in this game.
Did you even read my statement? I clearly said it 'performs best for me,' I never said it was universally the best.
In fact, I have several posts in this very thread saying basically the same thing you're saying only far less obnoxiously.
I see you have some serious hostility built up.. not sure what exactly your problem is, but I don't really care. Your childish antics are beneath me.
With the 2 mission universal consoles that add phaser damage they helped out phaser a lot. I would like to see the tac consoles in the previous missions that have disruptor and plasma that i know of off hand turned from tac consoles to universal. Im talking about the ones like in the iconian arc give +20% disruptor/plasma + other stats very similar to what the newer phaser universal consoles do. Would be nice to have a level playing field with all damage types, or at the very least the big 3.
Since this was ship vs ship was there a PvP element involved in the change?
It was a long time ago, and my memory is hazy. But I think that nerf to PC phasers came before the nerf to NPC phasers. In fact i think there was either months or maybe even years between the two nerfs.
Also back when when the nerf happened PVP was widely regarded as STOs end game. The DPS monkeys took over end game only after quite a while.
Conventional wisdom used to be; 'A good pvp build is good for pve, but a good pve build is not always good for pvp'. I haven't heard any one saying that in years. But there was a time young ones.... oh yes there was a time... Speaking of time, its time for my nap.
As much as Anti Proton has fallen out of favor with the rise of Disruptors, it's still my favorite and performs best for me overall. I still haven't found anything better then CrtDx3 or CrtDx4 Anti Proton Beams on a Romulan Captain.
You open fire and the screen just fills with explosions.. quite satisfying.
Still, Phaser remains my favorite. I don't have a real reason why, I just like it. It's always performed well for me and still does. It just feels the most.. 'trek' to me. The only reason my main uses Tetryon is because they're blue.. and I just like Blue.
Math and I are not good friends (and it's probably safe to say we're likely not even on speaking terms). :P Still, I did grasp the concept of CrtH x CrtD. In that sense, it's hard to beat AP. If one had to choose between a regular Phaser [CrtD]x4 or an Anti-Proton [CrtD]x4, ceteris paribus, the AP beam wins out, as the 2.5% Phaser proc can never outperform the innate extra CrtD of the AP beam.
Phaser, however, has gotten a lot of 'indirect' support, of late. There's that synergistic energy set, which does wonders for Phaser (and Disruptors, and Plasma), but does not include an AP boost. And the Quantum set. AP is boosted several other things, of course. Coalition disruptors, naturally, have no built-in surplus CrtD, but come with a -20 dmg resistence against Disruptor dmg (the effectiveness of which, to complicate matters, is also dependent upon what weapons your team is using). And Phaser now comes in many specialized flavors (sensor-linked, for instance, for your Amp = also CtrD). And I've recently taken a shine to Pulse Phasers, which (among the regular proc), now have an extra proc for a -10 dmg debuff too.
So, tl;dr, one cannot just compare a regular phaser against a regular AP beam, and then conclude, for the whole, that AP is better (not that I'm suggesting you're doing that, btw). But AP is still very, very good. On my Miradorn, for instance, with the full Delphic set, it's absolutely King. So, for someone to say Phaser is now King, is as simplistic, really, as someone claiming AP is always King. Context and build are everything.
The best user of AP beams, and the way I use them.. is on Romulan Characters.
The flaw of the AP Proc is that if you don't score a lot of criticals then the proc essentially does nothing. Using AP beams on a Romulan that stacks SRO BoFFs as well as other consoles and abilities to increase Critical Chance is essential for really making AP beams shine. Putting a full set of AP beams on a Federation Engineer or Science officer without a whole lot of method of increasing Critical Chance would be a sub-optimal choice. Of course, it would still perform well enough, you just wouldn't be getting the most out of it.
Most of my characters use different energy types depending on build, but my personal preference for characters that can reliably score critical hits is AP. Is it the only good option? No.. but it's one of the better ones for sure.
The best user of AP beams, and the way I use them.. is on Romulan Characters.
The flaw of the AP Proc is that if you don't score a lot of criticals then the proc essentially does nothing. Using AP beams on a Romulan that stacks SRO BoFFs as well as other consoles and abilities to increase Critical Chance is essential for really making AP beams shine. Putting a full set of AP beams on a Federation Engineer or Science officer without a whole lot of method of increasing Critical Chance would be a sub-optimal choice. Of course, it would still perform well enough, you just wouldn't be getting the most out of it.
Most of my characters use different energy types depending on build, but my personal preference for characters that can reliably score critical hits is AP. Is it the only good option? No.. but it's one of the better ones for sure.
On science with science ultimate? Should also work on engineers actually, but haven't made that combo yet.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
Anybody remember how phasers were before they changed how the procs stack? With multiple targets firing at you can recall getting shut down and enjoying my ship's explosion graphics pretty fast.
I do. Exactly the same as today, go figure.
If they changed things how could they be the same as they are today unless they changed them back again?
What I was referring to was a change in (roughly speaking) how many phaser procs can stack on a target. From what I can recall it was done to avoid the rapid subsystem shutdowns possible when taking phaser fire from multiple sources. I'm not referring to a recent change. The challenge is finding the references to said changes as the years go by. I used to make more of an effort to stay on top of things. Then S13 happened.
It was some time around F2P. So only the real die-hard vets remember.
Thanks, almost thought I was imagining things. Found reference to the change in the July 19, 2012 Patch Notes.
Updated Phaser Procs:
Multiple system offline procs to a single subsystem no longer stack.
For example, if your Weapons are offline and you get hit with another Weapons offline proc, it is disregarded.
After a phaser proc's duration has ended, targets will receive a 10-second immunity to additional phaser procs.
During this time, no additional systems can be taken offline by Phasers.
Other effects that cause subsystem offline, such as Boarding Parties, can still take effect during this immunity.
I'm wondering how to properly state a reasonable interpretation of what was done to the phaser proc a long time ago and perhaps how it relates to it's performance today?
The phaser proc was so good (over-performing) in some situations that it was adjusted? Since this was ship vs ship was there a PvP element involved in the change? Do other energy types have immunities built into their procs? I can see additional procs of the same sub-system being disregarded but a full 10 second immunity to other procs... doesn't this seem a bit much, more so given that we do have some built in and available sub-system offline resists?
Anybody care to chime in?
It was cause proc used to be per fire, not fire cycle. A beam weapon fires 4 times per cycle, and they used to proc like that.
"..and like children playing after sunset, we were surrounded by darkness." -Ruri Hoshino
Anybody remember how phasers were before they changed how the procs stack? With multiple targets firing at you can recall getting shut down and enjoying my ship's explosion graphics pretty fast.
I do. Exactly the same as today, go figure.
If they changed things how could they be the same as they are today unless they changed them back again?
What I was referring to was a change in (roughly speaking) how many phaser procs can stack on a target. From what I can recall it was done to avoid the rapid subsystem shutdowns possible when taking phaser fire from multiple sources. I'm not referring to a recent change. The challenge is finding the references to said changes as the years go by. I used to make more of an effort to stay on top of things. Then S13 happened.
It was some time around F2P. So only the real die-hard vets remember.
Thanks, almost thought I was imagining things. Found reference to the change in the July 19, 2012 Patch Notes.
Updated Phaser Procs:
Multiple system offline procs to a single subsystem no longer stack.
For example, if your Weapons are offline and you get hit with another Weapons offline proc, it is disregarded.
After a phaser proc's duration has ended, targets will receive a 10-second immunity to additional phaser procs.
During this time, no additional systems can be taken offline by Phasers.
Other effects that cause subsystem offline, such as Boarding Parties, can still take effect during this immunity.
I'm wondering how to properly state a reasonable interpretation of what was done to the phaser proc a long time ago and perhaps how it relates to it's performance today?
The phaser proc was so good (over-performing) in some situations that it was adjusted? Since this was ship vs ship was there a PvP element involved in the change? Do other energy types have immunities built into their procs? I can see additional procs of the same sub-system being disregarded but a full 10 second immunity to other procs... doesn't this seem a bit much, more so given that we do have some built in and available sub-system offline resists?
Anybody care to chime in?
It was cause proc used to be per fire, not fire cycle. A beam weapon fires 4 times per cycle, and they used to proc like that.
So now that weapons proc per cycle as of the Season 13 adjustments would phasers now proc per cycle like any other type of energy weapon and no longer have a disregard or immunity period to additional procs?
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,449Community Moderator
I believe when the phasers proc it does give the target ship a temporary immunity to a second phaser proc to prevent chain disables. It doesn't lock out other damage type procs.
But in all honesty... the standard Phaser proc is semi useless anyways with the subsystem repair rate most NPCs have. And you can forget disabling a player as they will either have an even higher repair rate, giving you at best two seconds of a disable, or abilities to instantly repair them. And if they happen to have the full Iconian set... well... insta repairs on automatic. And even if you could... there's a chance it could knockout a subsytem that that target doesn't even use (IE Aux on an Escort) or you're not in a position to capitalize on it (IE Shields down and no torp ready to hit the hull before it repairs).
Luckilly we have other flavors of Phaser, like Pulse, Biomatter, Discovery Linked, and Kelvin.
The best user of AP beams, and the way I use them.. is on Romulan Characters.
The flaw of the AP Proc is that if you don't score a lot of criticals then the proc essentially does nothing. Using AP beams on a Romulan that stacks SRO BoFFs as well as other consoles and abilities to increase Critical Chance is essential for really making AP beams shine. Putting a full set of AP beams on a Federation Engineer or Science officer without a whole lot of method of increasing Critical Chance would be a sub-optimal choice. Of course, it would still perform well enough, you just wouldn't be getting the most out of it.
Most of my characters use different energy types depending on build, but my personal preference for characters that can reliably score critical hits is AP. Is it the only good option? No.. but it's one of the better ones for sure.
Yeah, AP shines most on builds that stack crit. [Dmg]x4 though? not as much of a benefit.
The best user of AP beams, and the way I use them.. is on Romulan Characters.
Your not wrong, but you might be surprised by how little difference there will really be when you get to the high end of gear.
I spent a couple of hours running some controlled tests a few weeks ago. I wasn't specifically testing anti-proton, but the data is relevant to a phaser/antiproton comparison.
I took an exploration cruiser with a phaser array build and compared a full set of universal consoles boosting crit, to a full set of universal consoles boosting phaser damage.
To keep it a controlled test I used a foundry mission designed for DPS testing, and tried to mimic my ability rotation and piloting exactly, and didnt use captain abilities or rep powers. Repeated it three times with each outfit and had a dps variance per run of less then 1k.
Surprisingly the variance of 1k was across all three six runs. There really was no significant difference between running running with the crit consoles and the damage consoles. This is very significant considering that all the phaser boosting consoles you would need to buy on the exchange would set one back fo maybe 10mill ec on a bad day, while a couple of lobi consoles to flesh out a set of crit boosting consoles will set you back more then 350mill ec worth of lobi (5 lobi per key).
Conclusions:
1) Crit consoles v damage consoles are neck and neck with phasers, which means your better off going with damage and saving a lot of EC
2) Point one above is probably only true because i was using mk XIV everything at ultra rare or epic, along with expensive starship traits, full specializations and rep, so even though I am a Fed captain with a generalist build and not a romulan, my crit was still decently high. I suspect that if the tests with no crit consoles didnt still have 15% crit chance then the crit consoles would have pulled ahead, like wise with romulan operatives they would have and with anti-proton instead of phaser they would have.
3) Seaofsorrows is not wrong, romulans will always squeeze more out of anti-proton. but once you have the best gear available, and your captain rep and specs built up, it will allow even a fed scientist to pull ahead of phasers.
So final point. Shoot what ever friggin colour makes your smile the widest, because you can do a lot of damage with anything and making an anti-proton build all it can be will cost you a lockbox ship, its that friggin expensive.
Also some of you people who like me, have been around long enough to accumulate just about everything, try running without any consoles at all some time. I wont post those results on the forums, i don't want to start a war.
The best user of AP beams, and the way I use them.. is on Romulan Characters.
Your not wrong, but you might be surprised by how little difference there will really be when you get to the high end of gear.
I spent a couple of hours running some controlled tests a few weeks ago. I wasn't specifically testing anti-proton, but the data is relevant to a phaser/antiproton comparison.
I took an exploration cruiser with a phaser array build and compared a full set of universal consoles boosting crit, to a full set of universal consoles boosting phaser damage.
To keep it a controlled test I used a foundry mission designed for DPS testing, and tried to mimic my ability rotation and piloting exactly, and didnt use captain abilities or rep powers. Repeated it three times with each outfit and had a dps variance per run of less then 1k.
Surprisingly the variance of 1k was across all three six runs. There really was no significant difference between running running with the crit consoles and the damage consoles. This is very significant considering that all the phaser boosting consoles you would need to buy on the exchange would set one back fo maybe 10mill ec on a bad day, while a couple of lobi consoles to flesh out a set of crit boosting consoles will set you back more then 350mill ec worth of lobi (5 lobi per key).
Conclusions:
1) Crit consoles v damage consoles are neck and neck with phasers, which means your better off going with damage and saving a lot of EC
2) Point one above is probably only true because i was using mk XIV everything at ultra rare or epic, along with expensive starship traits, full specializations and rep, so even though I am a Fed captain with a generalist build and not a romulan, my crit was still decently high. I suspect that if the tests with no crit consoles didnt still have 15% crit chance then the crit consoles would have pulled ahead, like wise with romulan operatives they would have and with anti-proton instead of phaser they would have.
3) Seaofsorrows is not wrong, romulans will always squeeze more out of anti-proton. but once you have the best gear available, and your captain rep and specs built up, it will allow even a fed scientist to pull ahead of phasers.
So final point. Shoot what ever friggin colour makes your smile the widest, because you can do a lot of damage with anything and making an anti-proton build all it can be will cost you a lockbox ship, its that friggin expensive.
Also some of you people who like me, have been around long enough to accumulate just about everything, try running without any consoles at all some time. I wont post those results on the forums, i don't want to start a war.
That is some great info.. thank you very much for posting it!
The results actually don't surprise me, but are still interesting. The advice to save money by going damage is definitely good advice.
In my experience, there is a point on the damage scale that once you break that plane the differences in damage types and procs are only discernible using synthetic tests and really show no difference in 'real world' experience. Once you get to a certain point, you're already melting things so fast that piling more damage on top of that gives no real noticeable difference unless you're measuring DPS and trying to squeeze every last percent out of the build. Once you're past that point, changing up damage types or adding a few points here and there really won't make any noticeable difference anymore.
Of course, piloting will always be a big variable as well.. I have a friend in my fleet that generally builds ships in a very similar fashion to me but still gets consistently higher results due to just better piloting overall.
In the end though, it's all just a long winded way of saying you're 100% right when you say just pick a color you like and go. Especially when we start talking about the procs associated with the type of energy, these differences are not even going to be noticed by 90%+ of the player base. The only way to see it is doing extensive tests like what you have done and then charting synthetic results.
Thanks again for passing on the information though, that's definitely good to know. People can save a good amount of money by going with the less expensive options.
with the quantum console, the CC 2 pc and now the DOMINO console I think phasers now hwve the most non tac console boosts. yes Ap has the inherent crit, but at what pint does flat DPS have parity with crit?
What makes phasers shine a bit more as of late is the Trilithium-Laced Weaponry set and the fact that with sensor linked phasers we now have phaser weapons around which have a useful proc… wait, that’s not right, the sensor linked feature is not a proc as we know it its rather a feature that always works and adds additional crit d on all your weapons via the respective skill tree attribute.
As far as the domino console is concerned it’s a very powerful one but not because of the minor phaser boost but rather because of the active ability (which is useful for all energy types).
Since the new sensor linked weapons are also available as disruptors and in consideration of the multiple other set pieces and special weapons available for this energy type id still place that one on top of usefulness list.
Nevertheless phasers get really hot, who knows what cryptic has in power creep store for us next.
Looking for a fun PvE fleet? Join us at Omega Combat Division today.
Comments
My character Tsin'xing
You can get [Pen] from the 'Experimental _____ upgrade' doff missions too. Not sure if people count them as 'crafting'.
You open fire and the screen just fills with explosions.. quite satisfying.
Still, Phaser remains my favorite. I don't have a real reason why, I just like it. It's always performed well for me and still does. It just feels the most.. 'trek' to me. The only reason my main uses Tetryon is because they're blue.. and I just like Blue.
My character Tsin'xing
I mean cryptic can release one console after the other, with ships or missions, but unless stacking tac consoles is still best in slot, who cares?
In my opinion, "unique equipped" should be something that could really refresh ship building and bring new validity to certain unappreciated console types.
Thanks, almost thought I was imagining things. Found reference to the change in the July 19, 2012 Patch Notes.
Updated Phaser Procs:
Multiple system offline procs to a single subsystem no longer stack.
For example, if your Weapons are offline and you get hit with another Weapons offline proc, it is disregarded.
After a phaser proc's duration has ended, targets will receive a 10-second immunity to additional phaser procs.
During this time, no additional systems can be taken offline by Phasers.
Other effects that cause subsystem offline, such as Boarding Parties, can still take effect during this immunity.
I'm wondering how to properly state a reasonable interpretation of what was done to the phaser proc a long time ago and perhaps how it relates to it's performance today?
The phaser proc was so good (over-performing) in some situations that it was adjusted? Since this was ship vs ship was there a PvP element involved in the change? Do other energy types have immunities built into their procs? I can see additional procs of the same sub-system being disregarded but a full 10 second immunity to other procs... doesn't this seem a bit much, more so given that we do have some built in and available sub-system offline resists?
Anybody care to chime in?
Just a guess.
My character Tsin'xing
Thanks. This is my recollection as well. Having my ship shut down so fast there wasn't much you could do whether versus other players or NPC swarms. Seems the phaser proc ain't so bad after all. Am assuming even with the changes in 2012 it's at par with the other proc's, as devs always know how to balance things just right.
No context is.
Did you even read my statement? I clearly said it 'performs best for me,' I never said it was universally the best.
In fact, I have several posts in this very thread saying basically the same thing you're saying only far less obnoxiously.
I see you have some serious hostility built up.. not sure what exactly your problem is, but I don't really care. Your childish antics are beneath me.
I see wut u did thar, and I enjoyed it.
It was a long time ago, and my memory is hazy. But I think that nerf to PC phasers came before the nerf to NPC phasers. In fact i think there was either months or maybe even years between the two nerfs.
Also back when when the nerf happened PVP was widely regarded as STOs end game. The DPS monkeys took over end game only after quite a while.
Conventional wisdom used to be; 'A good pvp build is good for pve, but a good pve build is not always good for pvp'. I haven't heard any one saying that in years. But there was a time young ones.... oh yes there was a time... Speaking of time, its time for my nap.
Math and I are not good friends (and it's probably safe to say we're likely not even on speaking terms). :P Still, I did grasp the concept of CrtH x CrtD. In that sense, it's hard to beat AP. If one had to choose between a regular Phaser [CrtD]x4 or an Anti-Proton [CrtD]x4, ceteris paribus, the AP beam wins out, as the 2.5% Phaser proc can never outperform the innate extra CrtD of the AP beam.
Phaser, however, has gotten a lot of 'indirect' support, of late. There's that synergistic energy set, which does wonders for Phaser (and Disruptors, and Plasma), but does not include an AP boost. And the Quantum set. AP is boosted several other things, of course. Coalition disruptors, naturally, have no built-in surplus CrtD, but come with a -20 dmg resistence against Disruptor dmg (the effectiveness of which, to complicate matters, is also dependent upon what weapons your team is using). And Phaser now comes in many specialized flavors (sensor-linked, for instance, for your Amp = also CtrD). And I've recently taken a shine to Pulse Phasers, which (among the regular proc), now have an extra proc for a -10 dmg debuff too.
So, tl;dr, one cannot just compare a regular phaser against a regular AP beam, and then conclude, for the whole, that AP is better (not that I'm suggesting you're doing that, btw). But AP is still very, very good. On my Miradorn, for instance, with the full Delphic set, it's absolutely King. So, for someone to say Phaser is now King, is as simplistic, really, as someone claiming AP is always King. Context and build are everything.
The flaw of the AP Proc is that if you don't score a lot of criticals then the proc essentially does nothing. Using AP beams on a Romulan that stacks SRO BoFFs as well as other consoles and abilities to increase Critical Chance is essential for really making AP beams shine. Putting a full set of AP beams on a Federation Engineer or Science officer without a whole lot of method of increasing Critical Chance would be a sub-optimal choice. Of course, it would still perform well enough, you just wouldn't be getting the most out of it.
Most of my characters use different energy types depending on build, but my personal preference for characters that can reliably score critical hits is AP. Is it the only good option? No.. but it's one of the better ones for sure.
On science with science ultimate? Should also work on engineers actually, but haven't made that combo yet.
It was cause proc used to be per fire, not fire cycle. A beam weapon fires 4 times per cycle, and they used to proc like that.
So now that weapons proc per cycle as of the Season 13 adjustments would phasers now proc per cycle like any other type of energy weapon and no longer have a disregard or immunity period to additional procs?
But in all honesty... the standard Phaser proc is semi useless anyways with the subsystem repair rate most NPCs have. And you can forget disabling a player as they will either have an even higher repair rate, giving you at best two seconds of a disable, or abilities to instantly repair them. And if they happen to have the full Iconian set... well... insta repairs on automatic. And even if you could... there's a chance it could knockout a subsytem that that target doesn't even use (IE Aux on an Escort) or you're not in a position to capitalize on it (IE Shields down and no torp ready to hit the hull before it repairs).
Luckilly we have other flavors of Phaser, like Pulse, Biomatter, Discovery Linked, and Kelvin.
My character Tsin'xing
Your not wrong, but you might be surprised by how little difference there will really be when you get to the high end of gear.
I spent a couple of hours running some controlled tests a few weeks ago. I wasn't specifically testing anti-proton, but the data is relevant to a phaser/antiproton comparison.
I took an exploration cruiser with a phaser array build and compared a full set of universal consoles boosting crit, to a full set of universal consoles boosting phaser damage.
To keep it a controlled test I used a foundry mission designed for DPS testing, and tried to mimic my ability rotation and piloting exactly, and didnt use captain abilities or rep powers. Repeated it three times with each outfit and had a dps variance per run of less then 1k.
Surprisingly the variance of 1k was across all three six runs. There really was no significant difference between running running with the crit consoles and the damage consoles. This is very significant considering that all the phaser boosting consoles you would need to buy on the exchange would set one back fo maybe 10mill ec on a bad day, while a couple of lobi consoles to flesh out a set of crit boosting consoles will set you back more then 350mill ec worth of lobi (5 lobi per key).
Conclusions:
1) Crit consoles v damage consoles are neck and neck with phasers, which means your better off going with damage and saving a lot of EC
2) Point one above is probably only true because i was using mk XIV everything at ultra rare or epic, along with expensive starship traits, full specializations and rep, so even though I am a Fed captain with a generalist build and not a romulan, my crit was still decently high. I suspect that if the tests with no crit consoles didnt still have 15% crit chance then the crit consoles would have pulled ahead, like wise with romulan operatives they would have and with anti-proton instead of phaser they would have.
3) Seaofsorrows is not wrong, romulans will always squeeze more out of anti-proton. but once you have the best gear available, and your captain rep and specs built up, it will allow even a fed scientist to pull ahead of phasers.
So final point. Shoot what ever friggin colour makes your smile the widest, because you can do a lot of damage with anything and making an anti-proton build all it can be will cost you a lockbox ship, its that friggin expensive.
Also some of you people who like me, have been around long enough to accumulate just about everything, try running without any consoles at all some time. I wont post those results on the forums, i don't want to start a war.
That is some great info.. thank you very much for posting it!
The results actually don't surprise me, but are still interesting. The advice to save money by going damage is definitely good advice.
In my experience, there is a point on the damage scale that once you break that plane the differences in damage types and procs are only discernible using synthetic tests and really show no difference in 'real world' experience. Once you get to a certain point, you're already melting things so fast that piling more damage on top of that gives no real noticeable difference unless you're measuring DPS and trying to squeeze every last percent out of the build. Once you're past that point, changing up damage types or adding a few points here and there really won't make any noticeable difference anymore.
Of course, piloting will always be a big variable as well.. I have a friend in my fleet that generally builds ships in a very similar fashion to me but still gets consistently higher results due to just better piloting overall.
In the end though, it's all just a long winded way of saying you're 100% right when you say just pick a color you like and go. Especially when we start talking about the procs associated with the type of energy, these differences are not even going to be noticed by 90%+ of the player base. The only way to see it is doing extensive tests like what you have done and then charting synthetic results.
Thanks again for passing on the information though, that's definitely good to know. People can save a good amount of money by going with the less expensive options.
What makes phasers shine a bit more as of late is the Trilithium-Laced Weaponry set and the fact that with sensor linked phasers we now have phaser weapons around which have a useful proc… wait, that’s not right, the sensor linked feature is not a proc as we know it its rather a feature that always works and adds additional crit d on all your weapons via the respective skill tree attribute.
As far as the domino console is concerned it’s a very powerful one but not because of the minor phaser boost but rather because of the active ability (which is useful for all energy types).
Since the new sensor linked weapons are also available as disruptors and in consideration of the multiple other set pieces and special weapons available for this energy type id still place that one on top of usefulness list.
Nevertheless phasers get really hot, who knows what cryptic has in power creep store for us next.
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