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STO Debate Club: Energy Weapon Types
torvinecho25
Member Posts: 49 Arc User
Alrighty guys!
What do you all think is the absolute overall BEST core energy weapon type for space combat?
Phaser, Disruptor, Plasma, Tetryon, Polaron, or Antiproton?
Lets get some opinions, both for newer players to reference and older players to consider. PLEASE give reasons for your choices, don't post something like "antiproton is the because I say so" or "phaser is the best because it looks the nicest and its what I use so.."Give reasons, use your words. Be innovative
Personally, after much thought and testing, I have found Polaron to be the best damage type, for a variety of reasons. Off the bat, it has one of the nastiest procs in game, essentially crippling any target it procs against. In addition, its proc is *very* easily upgraded (by improving the Flow Capacitors skill). A fully spec'd Polaron proc can essentially shutdown 3 or even 4 of a targets subsystems at once (essentially making Polaron better then Phaser in every single way, as Phaser can only shut down a single subsystem at a time). In addition to its formidable proc, Polaron is one of the few damage types to work in perfect synergy with a space set (the Jem'Hadar set, which has a 2 piece bonus that improves Polaron damage). Finally, Polaron possesses two of the most effective hybrid variants available; Phased Polaron (or "subfrackers" as many in my fleet call them) and Protonic Polaron (which, with proper specing, is arguably the highest-DPS damage type in game currently). Its proc also appears on a third highly effective weapon type, Polarized Disruptors.
Thats my opinion. Got your own? Post it! I'm pretty curious to see who likes what form of damage type.
What do you all think is the absolute overall BEST core energy weapon type for space combat?
Phaser, Disruptor, Plasma, Tetryon, Polaron, or Antiproton?
Lets get some opinions, both for newer players to reference and older players to consider. PLEASE give reasons for your choices, don't post something like "antiproton is the because I say so" or "phaser is the best because it looks the nicest and its what I use so.."Give reasons, use your words. Be innovative
Personally, after much thought and testing, I have found Polaron to be the best damage type, for a variety of reasons. Off the bat, it has one of the nastiest procs in game, essentially crippling any target it procs against. In addition, its proc is *very* easily upgraded (by improving the Flow Capacitors skill). A fully spec'd Polaron proc can essentially shutdown 3 or even 4 of a targets subsystems at once (essentially making Polaron better then Phaser in every single way, as Phaser can only shut down a single subsystem at a time). In addition to its formidable proc, Polaron is one of the few damage types to work in perfect synergy with a space set (the Jem'Hadar set, which has a 2 piece bonus that improves Polaron damage). Finally, Polaron possesses two of the most effective hybrid variants available; Phased Polaron (or "subfrackers" as many in my fleet call them) and Protonic Polaron (which, with proper specing, is arguably the highest-DPS damage type in game currently). Its proc also appears on a third highly effective weapon type, Polarized Disruptors.
Thats my opinion. Got your own? Post it! I'm pretty curious to see who likes what form of damage type.
Post edited by torvinecho25 on
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You simply cannot beat out +20critD with a 20+ percent chance vs a 2.5 percent chance for "something" to happen.
The only exceptions are super procs like an Elachi DBB for the overload crits that punch right through shields.
But as a damage type in and of itself, AP is now boss tier. (and oh can i remember the hecklers six months ago when i was championing AP when disruptor was the boss tier weapon, suck on that, ah haha, but i digress)
Polaron would be tied with plasma as the runner up
Tets/Disruptors as third rate
Phasers suck (at least from a proc standpoint, and only outside of PvP, they are bossmode in PvP)
Voth AP are somewhere down here.
Oh yeah, one last thought. I am well aware any weapon type with one critD mod has the same bonus as an AP weapon, but its now a three mod vs a four mod (in the case of fleet APs), so you lose a whole mod to gain the CritD bonus.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
In defense of AP, there is the omni-directional beam array. This is an all-in-one tool for subsystem targeting. You can drain/disable a target from any direction. There is no way to avoid its arc besides getting out of range. In general, AP is the best escort/BFAW cruiser energy type due to their high crit potential.
Though there is an ideal energy type for DPS, there are ideal energy types for specific ships. The Vesta class has the Aux DHC. Arguably the best weapon for that ship. It draws power from aux rather than weapons so you can focus your power levels there, which removes the dichotomy of weapons versus science powers. Outside of the Vesta, phasers aren't reliable for their proc.
2. polaron/polarized. best general debuff. with leech console its around -60 in total, which enough to shutdown most pve targets.
Its not a percent, just fyi.
Its - 10 resist, which is actually closer to 1.5%
Even if its stacked all the way up it doesnt reach 10%
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Plasma. Due to Borg (E)Stfs, everyone has access to shields with plasma resist. Even consoles can't jack the damage up high enough to be useful anymore. The dot is easily cleaned.
Polaron. Terrible damage type. Easily mitigated by a few well placed skill points.
Tetryon, Phaser. Weak to the point of general uselessness. They have very small areas where they have the opportunity to be powerful, but limited function yields limited usefulness.
Disruptor. With the over kill of beta and other resistance lowering skills Disruptor loses power fast. Lowering resistances has dimishing returns (small), but overall slowly lowers the function of the proc.
Antiproton. The only damage type which places majority control in the players hands. You want the critical damage? Stack critical hit.
Choosing any damage type with a 2.5% chance on hit, doesn't make any sense. Especially when a damage type is available that is always on, and its chance is dependant on player choice.
Antiproton is the best damage type. Choice is the best for fun.
We have a tie.
Antiproton vs. Choice.
You know what the irony is? The kind of noobs that take stf shields instead of elite fleet shields into pvp are easily dispatched with anything, including plasma.
In any case, both dps log and stf time records are set using Romulan Plasma. Google it if you want to know why. There's talk, and then there's what happens.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=611371
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=377081
Now if only they came in orange so they didn't look so wrong on a Fed ship.
Andorian Phasers. They have all the firepower of regular phasers, but are blue. So they look cool.
Spiral Wave Disruptors... Yellow
But you have to get a Lockbox ship.
Please enable us to buy a token with Zen to faction change a 25th Century FED to a TOS FED.
Worst is a tie between Phaser, Polaron, and Tetryon. They're all awful. Polaron becomes "ok" when you use the Jem'Hadar set.
Odan Brota (Science Officer): Captain of a 28k DPS Scryer Intel Science Vessel, U.S.S. Kepler
Patiently waiting for a Romulan Science Vessel
They are indeed. And I do run them on Rear Admiral cruisers I have levelled up. But for Vice Admiral and for Mk XII's the Andorians just rock out so freakin much. They've got solid ancillary bonuses.
And are Mk XII.
And BLUE.
Absolutely been in love with them since they first put out the Kumari.
Antiproton take the cake IF you have the resources to make them work. You HAVE to HAVE crit to make them get anything out of em that can match or surpass other energy types. If you ain't got the crit, you ain't got that much of anything.
And this is why I go for Disruptor. The fact I use Spiral Wave makes it even better
Spiral waves don't get an extra tac console for every 3 science consoles. It's the wrong disruptor derivative.
(although seriously the proc is bit meh, I'd rather phasers had an innate accuracy bonus like how AP has an innate CrtD bonus)
Ap weapons can only come with 2 CrtD mods if you use the Mk XI dil store version, or only 1 if you use the fleet DMG x3 version or no CrtD mods if you take the Acc x2 Dmg x2 version, so CrtD x2 Romulan plasma can get the same CrtD as fleet AP weapons and give up only 3 useless Dmg mods and get 2 excellent procs in return. Then when you add bonus damage from embassy consoles and 2 piece romulan set its no contest.
I really wish people would stop this hatefest on the DMG mod. Its actually very good, a full set of DMG modded weapons is about worth a full tactical console of damage
DMGx2 on a five console ship would come out to about a 7 tac console ship in the math, if you follow.
Romplas accx2 does way less damage than Fleet AP Accx2DMGx2
Embassy consoles only raise overall DPS by about 1 percent per console. Not worth the investment really.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Also, Romulan Plasma is very good. Not my favorite but I acknowledge its usefulness in combining the best of two worlds, Plasma and Disruptor procs. There's more ways of boosting Plasma Damage than anything else right now.
Antiproton, specifically non-Voth Antiproton (Voth AP, I consider quite useless) - Even before recent changes, I always had a respected place for Antiproton. It does not rely on a lousy 2.5% chance to occur. There is no "proc" to AP. It is simply, raw extra Critical Dmg Bonus. As someone earlier in the thread mentioned, there are very high crit builds out there, most esp. with the Romulans/Remans. And the extra crit severity is a magnificent companion to that.
off to the inquisition with you
Yeah but it's a nicer shade of green mixed with the teal
Which is totally worth the 25k dilth I paid :V
You don't really need acc x2 in pve, there is enough acc from spec, traits, nukara console and a deflector if you need more, I use CrtDx2 Rom Plasma DHC or beams for pve and hardly miss. I was comparing CrtD x2 Rom Plasma weapons to AP in PVE, and I get samr CrtD then Dmg x3 CrtD AP fleet weapons or more CrtD then Acc x2 Dmg x2 AP fleet weapons.
So I will have no problem giving up a couple Acc or Dmg mods for the 2 Rom plasma procs and for it being plasma damage type so the romulan 2 piece set and embassy consoles can buff the base damage and the proc damage and more then make up for losing some Acc or Dmg. I normally am using 3 and the set, so is like another tac console.
Ap weapons are still good, especially if the person isn't using an embassy console and 2 piece romulan set with the beam and zero point console, but just not as good for pve.
Really, its the best of many worlds - drain, cheapness (if you get very lucky - otherwise its dil to ec cost is comparable to a decent standard XII energy type off the exchange, if not less) and a very nasty proc built off crit
..and what do Rommies have lots of?
Exactly
...and once you add in buffs (yes, the proc damage is buffable via boff/captain skills), you have a proc that is doing direct hull damage , ignoring the shields which may be buffed to the extremes - whilst at the same time your good old polaron proc is mitigating your damage and slowing your target down
(although with faw as it is, I do regret not getting acc/crth instead of accx2...)
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Heh, if you haven't already guessed by now, my energy weapon decisions are made from the same mindset.
You need work on your math. That dmgx2 mod doesn't do nearly as much dmg as you think. Cryptic still haven't fixed scaling problem of the dmg modifier. The bigger issue is, AP doesn't get the extra tac console for every 3 science consoles. It adds up to far more dmg than a dozen modifer of any flavor, much less just 2 dmg modifiers. All that is before the awesome disruptor proc, that helps everyone in your team. It translates to far more dmg for the entire team than a bit more crit severity for yourself.
1. Elachi Disruptor
2. Romulan Plasma
3. Antiproton
4. Disruptor
5. Nanite Disruptor
6. Polarized Disruptor
7. Plasma
8. Phaser (tie)
8. Andorian Phaser (tie)
10. Protonic Polaron
11. Phased Polaron
12. Polaron
13. Voth Antiproton
14. Phased Tetryon
15. Destabilizing Tetryon
16. Refracting Tetryon
17. Tetryon
However, Spiral Wave Disruptors are probably the best single beam arrays out there, beacuse they receive four modifiers and combine two relatively useful procs (the only better combinations are Plasma-Disruptor and Anti-Proton-Disruptor), but unfortunately they aren't fully realized and only come in that single weapon type.