test content
Logo
What is the Arc Client?
Install Arc
Options
Dual beam banks or cannons?
narxes081206
Member Posts: 84 Arc User
Been running dual beam banks (as my fore weapons, omnis on the rear) lately on my arbiter battle cruiser. Was thinking of maybe switching to cannons. Trying to up my dps, currently hitting around 35-40k. Running an engineering toon atm. Thoughts?
0
Comments
U.S.S. Buteo Regalis - Brigid Multi-Mission Surveillance Explorer build
R.R.W. Ri Maajon - Khopesh Tactical Dreadnought Warbird build
My Youtube channel containing STO videos.
You might post in the academy for a more technical discussion of the variants
Top results for full DC/DHC build ~150k DPS, DBB nets 200k+. Make your conclusions.
And for the purpose of curbstomping this game, at that level of DPS, does it matter? Even "only" a 20k or 30k build of anything is enough to crush this game.
The only thing that matters is crushing things, and after a certain point, it just doesn't matter how hard you do that other than continuously refining the build.
Are you annihilating content with a DHC/DC build? Are you annihilating content with a Torp build? Are you annihilating content with a Space Magic build? Are you annihilating content with a BA or DBB BFAW build?
It doesn't matter, as long as the NPCs are being swept away and the objectives are being met.
Sound reasoning that I generally stick to, but if one doesn't use overload, fire at will, rapid fire, or scatter volley then you loose nothing.
Not to be mean, but that sort of suggests you're either deliberately misleading the OP or have no idea what 'effective' actually looks like in this game. you can clear content with a ship equipped with nothing but rubber bands and paperclips, but having your weapons spread out so none of your abilities boosts all (or even the majority) of them is painfully inefficient. By focusing either all beams or cannons/turrets, your abilities become much more effective. Also, your traits can be selected with a clearer purpose. and you have better cohesion of firing arcs which makes it easier to put damage where you want it.
Even mixing energy with torpedoes is a bit of a loss unless you know exactly what you're doing and have access to the ship traits that give hybrid builds some synergy and know precisely how your weapon power rating management works.
I shudder even asking, but if you're not using those what are you putting in your tac slots?
In short most DPS figures should not be taken as indicative of general performance.
Generally if you want damage to a large group beam fire at will is better than cannon scatter volley. If you want good damage to a single target cannon rapid fire is better than beam overload. (Please mind the "general case" language.
Overall you can expect roughly equivalent performance out of both. A bit more damage out of beams, due to better time on target; but more frequent procs out of cannons.
For PvP I prefer cannons with a single DBB for spike damage in BO.
That's not necessarily true.
There are Doffs that add a chance for an x percentage (30 for blue doffs) shield ignore when you use overload. So what I generally do is putting one overload on my tray to use with either a dual beam bank or omni-beam in the rear, and then let the cannons benefit from that shield-ignore effect.
Good habits are good habits. And building for performance is as --probably more-- important when you don't have Gold XIVs in every slot. There's no percentage in teaching people to be sloppy. You might pug with them one day
Also, "anhilating things" isn't a binary state. 200k DPS anhilation is very different from 30k anihialtion.
Surgical Strikes?
First, mixing beams and cannons is generally a bad idea and will lower DPS for the reasons already stated. It can however, be viable if you're running a build using Surgical Strikes (Intel Ability) because SS does not differentiate between Beams and Cannons, it effects all Energy Weapons. These builds however, are single target builds and while effective do not put out the raw DPS of 'Meta' builds that do not mix Beams and Cannons.
Second, if you're flying the Arbiter the best way to increase your DPS is actually to move to Single Beams. Yeah, everyone is going to pile on and tell me that DBB's do more damage then Single Beams (like I don't know that) but Single Beams have WAY more time on target and as a general rule just require less effort on the part of the pilot. With your 'front facing' builds that use DBB's or Cannons, positioning is everything. Any time spent without your target in front of you is time you're not doing optimal damage. Single Beams eliminate this problem completely and reduce your positioning responsibility to things like taking advantage of flanking (Intel Spec) and just keeping yourself out of situations where you would blow up.
If your only intent is to up your overall damage, switch to 8 single beams. Be sure you have Tac Team, at least one Attack Pattern, a couple BFAW and Override Sub System Safeties.. get into a cluster of enemies and just open fire. Personally, I use the Lt. Commander Uni for Tactical giving me 3 Tac Stations. Run 3 SRO DoFFs from your Fleet Store for extra crit chance. Gives you plenty of slots for Fire At Will, a couple attack patterns and either 2 Tac Teams or 1 TT and 1 Kemocite. Single Beam Arbiter is a massively powerful build.
LMAO the combo works fine if you have a clue how to use it. Yeah but the spam FAW crowd really doesn't know how to use a cannon/beam build. Beams soak up the sheilds then the cannons tear the target apart. But hey what do I know I hit things with BO3 then CRF3 and they go bye bye faster then the beam crowd can do the same thing.
Thanks for the info. I do have some mk xiv [critd]x3 beam arrays laying around. I'll try and do some experimental runs with those and remove the omni's from the rear and run a straight broadside flight pattern. I'm running an auxbat build atm and it's keeping my weapon's power up. As far as specializations go, I'm using intel and pilot.
I'll give a look and try it out. Thanks!
If you decide you want to move away from Aux2Bat, just let us know and we can provide help with that. Most people have moved on from Aux2Bat since there are better ways now to increase power and because running A2B limits what you can do build wise.
At the moment my pilot and intel tree are maxed, and therefore the ones I use. What alternative to aux2bat would you recommend?
https://www.youtube.com/shared?ci=LuFDPg_FF6c
It also includes a good build discussion, something that you might find useful OP.
I hope that helps.
| USS Curiosity - Pathfinder | USS Rift - Eternal |
The Science Ship Build Thread - Share your Sci Ship builds here!
Thrue, but you can use BO and CRF when you have both weapons installed. I use builds with beams, cannons and torps. Not the most effective, but it is fun. There is always something going on.
When I read that advice, I was going to reply, but instead I just laughed it off. I knew you would be along soon to set it straight, and I'll admit.. you didn't disappoint.
Sorry, but this is nothing short of just letting others think for you. You're saying one thing is best for no reason other then the fact that other people use it so it must be good. Yes, that's a great combo, but there are other viable combos as well. If you think that going Intel/Pilot is going to make a huge difference over Intel/Strategist, then you're putting way too much focus on secondary specialization. I respectfully suggest you venture out and try some alterations instead of just going with what 'everyone else does.' One size does not fit all in this game, it's not as black and white as 'this is right, this is wrong.' If he likes Intel/Pilot then that's a perfectly acceptable option, I use it all the time.
First thing I would do when moving away from Aux2Bat is to grab a Plasmonic Leech console if you don't have one already. The biggest advantage you're getting from A2B is the incrase in power levels (with the obvious exception of Aux Power) and you'll need to replace that. The easiest way is to use a Leech console and run 2 Plasma Science Consoles with +Drain in your science slots.
This helps increase the amount of power that you leech and helps to keep power up. The Arbiter comes with a great trait that increases your fire rate when you use Emergency Power to Weapons. You can get a sizable boost in damage by being able to use EPTW as much as possible. There are a couple ways to do this, but the most simple is just duplication. You can run 2 copies of EPTW which would replace your 2 A2B and keep them at global. If you're looking for more balance, you could run one copy of EPTW with one copy of Emergency Power to Shields and alternate them. You could also roll with one and run Damage Control Engineers that reduce cooldown times on emergency power, but while this is common, I don't like it. Simply put, the mechanics on Damage Control Engineers are inconsistent and you can't always rely on a cooldown boost from them. To me, it's simply easier to just run 2 EP2W and free up my Space DoFFs.
I will tell you how I set up my Fleet Arbiter, but before I do, a quick disclaimer. The following is what works for ME. I'm not claiming that this is the 'best,' or the 'only' way to set up this ship, this is my preference. Please feel free to use as much or as little was you see fit depending on your style. I would link to STO Academy for the build, but that site totally sucks now and half the time when I link to saved builds they just come up blank so here is a quick run down of my set up.
Ship: Fleet Arbiter Class Battlecruiser [T6]
Specializations: Intel/Pilot (Intel/Strategist is also great.)
Boffs:
1. Lt. Commander Universal (Tactical) - Tac Team 1, Attack Pattern Beta 1, Attack Pattern Omega 1
2. Ensign Tactical - Kemocite Laced Weaponry 1
3. Lt. Commander Tactical/Intel - Beam Fire At Will 1, BFAW2, Override Sub System Safeties III
4. Commander Engineering - Engineering Team 1, Emergency Power to Weapons 2, EPTW3, Directed Energy Modulation 3
5. Lt Science - Hazard Emitters 1, Science Team 2
If you don't have Kemocite, then use this station for BFAW1 and replace the BFAW1 in the Lt. Commander Tac/Intel station with Override Subsystem Safeties 1 to double that up.
All 3 Tactical Stations are Superior Romulan Operatives purchased from Fleet Store.
The Engineering station is a Nausican Pirate Boff acquired from T4 Diplomacy.
Science Station is the Hierarchy Boff mission reward (Pirate.)
Pilot is beneficial in this set up because with 2 Attack Patterns you can take advantage of Attack Pattern Expertise which gives you a nice survival boost. You also get an easy escape with Rock and Roll. Strategist will give you a bit more damage at the cost of toughness. Your call here.
For traits I run All Hands On Deck for Science/captain cooldown, Reciprocity to help with the tac/intel skills I don't have doubled, Emergency Weapon Cycle since I'm keeping max up time on EPTW and then the other one or two are up to you. I like Improved Pedal to the Medal since I tend to stay at full throttle but you can play around here. I also use Battle Ready from the Eclipse becuase it's a nice boost to your tanking ability. Again, in this area it depends on taste and what traits you have access to.
When setting up your space traits, you can use the Nukara trait that improves damage based on Aux Power now that you will not be draining your Aux anymore. You'll also be able to get some half descent heals out of Science Team and Hazard Emitters even though they're both primarily used for cleanse. Having available Aux will also up your damage when using a Warp Core with the AMP Mod. With the Leech, some points in Drain Expertise and 2 copies of Emergency Power to Weapons you can keep pretty high power levels. The other thing I would do is use one of your Space Duty Officers for a Warp Core Engineer that gives a chance to boost all power levels when using an Emergency Power. You're going to have this at global and be firing it all the time to proc Emergency Weapon Cycle anyway, so might as well get a boost to all power levels while you're at it.
I know that's a lot to throw at you all at once, if you have questions I'll do my best to help. I don't have the game in front of me right now, so I don't remember my exact space and ground traits and stuff like that. I can post them later if you wish.
On an Arbeter, you're better off with beams. Cannons really need to be on VERY nimble ships that can turn in a hurry because of the very narrow arc of the cannons.
Cannons are better suited to very small and fast escorts like the Defiant, or BoP if you want to run weapons. Bigger ships, stick to DBB,
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/1145998/star-trek-battles-channel-got-canon/p1