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beam cruiser questions
howiebabey82
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
all be am arras or dual beams too? also does the turn rate matter?
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Is Beam arrays, 8 of them
Mainly because you can maintain constant fire from 8 weapons at once, and the turn rate you have even in a slow vessel should be fine to keep on target, and beam fire at will will give you multi targeting capability for a duration, plus an extra fire per cycle i have heard ( can't confrim this)
Duel beams do more damage, even more so with beam overload, But you will find it hard to keep them on target when fighting anything with even a basic turn rate of 12 much less some of the faster escorts
simply put you end up with a lot of downtime where they aren't useful
Potentially using turrets on the rear and duels on the front will grant high forward damage by comparison, but you will be unable to dictate where your enemy will be most of the time, your opponent, if a player, is likely to avoid a frontal attack on a duel beam opponent
Also viable is the Wide Angle Quantum torpedo at 180 degree firing arc you can still have all broadside
Same with kinetic cutting beam at 360 degrees arc
with regards to dueal beams, they are much heavier hitting, and the temptattion to use is high, but you'll be unable to use them in conjunction with any beams on the rear, making them useless in side on fights, and you'll be wasting the rear beams in front on fights
( note i am not saying this is a complete no no, i myself use torps and duel beams on my cruisers, but i sacrifice much to do this)
As long as your shields hold and you can handle the power drain , broadsiding is probably your best bet, all your weapons can be brought to bare on your target, and as a cruiser captain you should have a wide array of shield boosting powers to keep your defences up
Though i know thats easier said than done with fast enemies
Of course not everyone does well with every tactic, if my advise proves to be counter productive to you, ignore it
Above all its best to fly in a way you find manegable and above all FUN, if you would rather blow you enemy into pieces with say a Transphasic cluster torp ( a favorite of mine as it blows frigate in one go sometimes) then go for it, as long as you are enjoying it, don't let anyone tell you otherwise
8 Arrays isn't preferable unless you have some way of keeping your power levels up. Between 6 and 8 arrays, the power drain outpaces the increase in total firepower.
However, if you were going for a plasma build, then the Experimental Romulan Plasma Array is basically a free beam. The 2-piece Omega Weapons set also adds a weapon drain resist proc to all your weapons, which means that the Borg console combined with the Kinetic Cutting Beam will allow you to keep up the damage a little better.
Regardless, you should NEVER sit still. It kills your evasion chance, which means that you'll be taking a lot more damage. A better idea is to try to match the opponent's speed so you don't have to circle at all.
as far as multi targets and ones moving I ussally slow down to 1/4 to 1/2 and I start going in circles, I usually get agro from more then one at a time and it seems to help with shield so i can keep them all off one shield facing and I can distribute the damage better.
not really...either you will not fire the DBB while broadsiding, or you do not fire all your rear beam arrays while doing frontal attacks...
so either frontal attack with 4 DBB and turretsin the back, or 8 beam arrays for broadsiding, which is a little smarter, since circleing means you move and have a high defense bonus.
i personaly use the 180 degree quantum torp and a KCB for increased kinetic dmg...the quantum launcher however is really questionable.
ofcourse it is perfectly fine for PVE...but playing the game with a T1 ship is also perfectly fine.
I did clarify that in my second post, besides i manage the power drain fine, There are some great cores out there, and i can maintain max wep and shield power, still keeping aux at 2 thirds of the bar
Power isn't exactly hard to come by with the right equipment on your ship
Certain targets in the Special Task Force missions will not move, and thus you don't need to move either
So, the question may really be: what weapon arc do you want to use? Then figure out how to keep a target within that arc.
I have a core that adds 7.5% of the power put into weapons to my shields, Starship EPS skill at 6, Starship Batteries at 6 (plus a bump from my core), a Red Matter Capacitor, I run two copies each of EPTS and EPTW, and took the EPS Manifold Efficiency Engineer trait.
I put my weapons power high, shield at medium, and engines and aux low (but bumped up by other skills). With two copies of the EP abilities, I'm hitting one of them every 15 seconds and because of that am getting the extra bump from the EPS Manifold trait for 40 out of 60 seconds. Hit my Red Matter Capacitor or other batteries and I get a bump there too. I generally end up running at full weapons, almost full shields, and two-thirds engine and aux most of the time.
So my advice is to basically figure out what you want to do (max DPS? some crowd control or burst?) and use some skill/equipment/trait strategy and you'll be just fine. And, most of all, have fun with what you're doing.
Over time as I mostly run cruisers with my Engineer, I have found that I prefer running with all Beam Arrays. Your energy weapons are your primary weapons, you want to pick weapons that are a balance of firing arc and high damage output... for cruisers that would be the Beam Arrays, anything else is either lower damage output or narrower firing arc.
Yes you can mix types (Beam arrays, Dual beams, cannons or turrets) all you want, but there is always a compromise.
Because Beam Arrays have a 2x degree firing arc, to get ALL beams firing on a target you'll want to "broadside" your target... fire at them from the side of your ship.
Other things that boost energy output and duration of energy levels: Abilities like Beam Overload, Fire At Will, Attack Patterns, etc. Power duration can be boosted using Weapon Batteries and Ability: Auxiliary to Battery (boosts all energy levels from Auxiliary power.)
Use www.stowiki.org to research any of these things. Also have a look at Hilbertguide.com about setting energy levels and other general guidelines.
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
Tried many different builds on many different ships.
My experience:
Forward: 2 Torpedo Launchers, 1 Dual Beam Bank, 1 Beam Array
Aft: 1 Torpedo Launcher, 3 Beam Array
Optionally replace any aft weapon with the cutting beam, but I noticed that my DPS actually lowered.
Next to that: get yourself one of the new Mine RCS accelerators. Pick one that increases HP, that way you are more tankier AND have the sufficient turn rate for the DBB and the Torps.
This build works on Cruiser damage in all directions, not just focussing on the broadsides.
This is my experience to have worked the best: even beating good-equipped Broadside Oddysey's in this build on my Excelsior.
Btw: people are gonna disagree with me. Their choice, but this works perfectly for me.
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4 plasma cannon, Borg Set, Field stab core, 4x plasma beam arrays (1 swapped to cutting) w/ Uni-transwarp computer (22.9 eff), PDS, 2x Fleet Science Emitter Array (-threat, +shield, 2.5% chance to regen 75.1), Borg console and 2 mk12 plasma weap upgrades.
Full power to weaps and anchor off broadside +10 deg. Allows cannons and beams to hit w/ no issue, and my weap power rarely drops below 100-95
Standing by for flaming....
@Namod out.
Basically, after I breached enemy shields, I fire one Quantum Spread and another normal Quantum directly to the hull. Spike damage is huge!
Yep, I run spike damage over DPS.
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Alkthrough the game does support Escort to be DD i like my ship to be something in between, and it works very well IMO.
Personally i use a Mirror Assault Cruiser on my current main Character.
It has 1 Lt and a Ensign tactical station. I use 3x single Cannons forward + 1 DBB and 3 turrets + 1 Beam Array rear. The BOFF powers are TacTeam1, Cannon:Scatter Volley, and Beam Overload 1.
You might think, oh aonther idiot using cannons on a Cruiser, and you may be right, lol.
But i prefer to use Scatter Volley instead of FAW, because CSV allowes me to hit several enemies at once, without getting the attention of EVERY ship around (as does FAW).
Not only that, the angle where all my energy weapons work together is much bigger (180 degrees forward) than the relatively small overlapping arc i get when boardsiding with Beam Arrays.
Beam overload delivers enough destruction to destroy an enemies shield. So even without using DHCs i can do good damage. the only problem is the lack of being able to use Torpedoes at all since there is just not enough weapon slots to use them, lol.
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