720cm Ultra V. Phaser Cannon Vs 720cm Infra Phase Cannon

[tigersclaw11]

So brains trust I'm having trouble splitting the difference between these two weapons:
The Infrared look better on paper but when you mounting the Ultra V on the same ship hull you get a fleet combat power score of +78 over the infra.

720 Ultra Phase Cannon ............720cm Infra Phase Cannon
W: 555t.............................................350t
Dmg: 15............................................15
100: 4%............................................6%
200: 16%........................................24%
500: 101%......................................148%
Drain: 1GJ.........................................0.67GJ
Cool.D 10sec..................................10sec
+78

So the infra is lighters has slightly higher if not similar damage in my testing and does not require exotics. And used less battery per shot, Yet as i stated the game scores the ultra as more combat effective. What am i missing??

[gimmethegepgun]

The UV is more effective at burning through armor at longer ranges. At 500 km, 101% armor effectiveness means it deals 14.85 damage to armor, while the IR at 500 km deals 10.14.

[Fwiffo]

How does infrared look better, combat-wise? All I see is that the armor is more effective against infrared than ultraviolet at all ranges, making it strictly worse.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Fwiffo:

How does infrared look better, combat-wise? All I see is that the armor is more effective against infrared than ultraviolet at all ranges, making it strictly worse.

It has less mass and uses less energy per shot, so there are some advantages.
That mass isn't really a whole lot compared to the rest of the ship though, and the energy usage is irrelevant unless you're running your drive at maximum and thus actually need to use the battery.

[Fwiffo]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

It has less mass and uses less energy per shot, so there are some advantages.
That mass isn't really a whole lot compared to the rest of the ship though, and the energy usage is irrelevant unless you're running your drive at maximum and thus actually need to use the battery.

That's why I said combat-wise, only taking the combat stats into account.

Mass difference is negligible compared to the rest of the ship (big ships were what, 8000 tons AT LEAST fully kitted?), and so is energy usage unless you run VERY barebones ships, whereas UV laser shots are more effective, so you'll need fewer of them. Therefore I didn't see the need to mention them originally.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Fwiffo:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

It has less mass and uses less energy per shot, so there are some advantages.
That mass isn't really a whole lot compared to the rest of the ship though, and the energy usage is irrelevant unless you're running your drive at maximum and thus actually need to use the battery.

That's why I said combat-wise, only taking the combat stats into account.

Those are combat stats. Mass affects acceleration and turn rate, and energy usage could theoretically run out your battery.

and so is energy usage unless you run VERY barebones ships, whereas UV laser shots are more effective, so you'll need fewer of them.

If you're firing from close range it doesn't make nearly as much difference as it does for the long-range shots. 4% or 6%, either way it's probably punching straight through your armor.

[Morti]

running out of battery occurs only if you use heat sinks ( i don't like them : with tin dropplet you only have 1% chance/hit to loose your radiator, and ships are mostly destroyed after 20 hitsso the heat sink saves you 18.2% chance to loose radiator )

[Fwiffo]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Those are combat stats. Mass affects acceleration and turn rate, and energy usage could theoretically run out your battery.

Or they could not, also theoretically of course, depending on what ship you have built. Is there a point to this?
They're not combat stats, as they're not directly tied to the weapon's performance in battle, like effectiveness vs armor or fire rate. But sure, I'll answer your nitpicking one more time.
Those are mainly logistics stats, and minor ones at that. Like I said, a fully kitted battleship has mass upwards of 8000 tons, so a 200kg difference in the main cannon is too small to be noticeable in battle, the only noticeable effect might be on cruise acceleration, if you're using some insane fit like ion drives on battleships.
And the energy difference is also a logistical stat, because it is covered by other ship systems, and it is also negligibly small considering what type of power equipment you get at that point unless you actively avoid it.

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

If you're firing from close range it doesn't make nearly as much difference as it does for the long-range shots. 4% or 6%, either way it's probably punching straight through your armor.

If you're firing from close range, that probably means you got into said range from the starting positions, so you were firing before that, and the damage you have dealt up to that point will be different, easily on a scale of one or more destroyed ships.
Trying to construct an argument by only comparing the two weapons at 100 meters is disingenuous.

[Fwiffo]

Originally posted by Morti:

running out of battery occurs only if you use heat sinks ( i don't like them : with tin dropplet you only have 1% chance/hit to loose your radiator, and ships are mostly destroyed after 20 hitsso the heat sink saves you 18.2% chance to loose radiator )

It depends. If you have capital ships with 100+ front armor and a bunch of side plates, they can take tremendous punishment before going down, way more than 20 hits even from heavier weapons like plasma, while you can intercept high-damage coilgun projectiles.

The problem with radiators is that they're not protected, so a stray laser shot from long range or a sneaky missile can take them out, crippling your ship way before it could be taken out otherwise, so it's still useful to hide them for initial salvos at least.

[tigersclaw11]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

The UV is more effective at burning through armor at longer ranges. At 500 km, 101% armor effectiveness means it deals 14.85 damage to armor, while the IR at 500 km deals 10.14.

720cm Infra Phase Cannon has higher % at all ranges. ( I improved my formatting of the question to make it easier to read.) So why are you saying the UV is better?

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Fwiffo:

They're not combat stats, as they're not directly tied to the weapon's performance in battle, like effectiveness vs armor or fire rate.

They are directly tied to the ship's performance in combat. Which makes it a combat stat, because the entire ship is in combat.

Like I said, a fully kitted battleship has mass upwards of 8000 tons, so a 200kg difference in the main cannon is too small to be noticeable in battle

Yes, I said that already.
Also, the 720cm is a 3-slot nose mount, which a Battleship can't use. A Battlecruiser only has 2 Hull mounts, which becomes important for the next point.

If you're firing from close range, that probably means you got into said range from the starting positions, so you were firing before that, and the damage you have dealt up to that point will be different, easily on a scale of one or more destroyed ships.

And you could just as well have been using it defensively up until that point to help shoot down a storm of missiles.
And, once they fix the AI ship designer to actually equip armor, you aren't going to do a whole lot with 15 damage at long range. Whereas 6% armor effectiveness makes for 250 armor damage, which nothing is going to stand against for very long.

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

Originally posted by tigersclaw11:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

The UV is more effective at burning through armor at longer ranges. At 500 km, 101% armor effectiveness means it deals 14.85 damage to armor, while the IR at 500 km deals 10.14.

720cm Infra Phase Cannon has higher % at all ranges. ( I improved my formatting of the question to make it easier to read.) So why are you saying the UV is better?

The percentage is the effective value of enemy armour, 148% is worse than 101%.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by tigersclaw11:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

The UV is more effective at burning through armor at longer ranges. At 500 km, 101% armor effectiveness means it deals 14.85 damage to armor, while the IR at 500 km deals 10.14.

720cm Infra Phase Cannon has higher % at all ranges. ( I improved my formatting of the question to make it easier to read.) So why are you saying the UV is better?

Higher % is bad. It's how effective the armor is against the weapon, not how effective the weapon is against armor. Why would it get stronger as it got farther away, and why would the numbers get worse for the weapon when you use larger, more powerful weapons?

[tigersclaw11]

wait!!!! I See my mistake I Have it back all back the front! HAHAHA! ignore my post I thought that it was Damage effectiveness not armour effectiveness.

[ulzgoroth]

That said, I do tend to think that going to UV is dubious for large-caliber lasers.

It would be less so if lasers didn't have that totally arbitrary max range that doesn't improve with anything but size...

[cswiger]

Even the best laser becomes diffraction limited, and high power lasers suitable for weapons also deal with thermal blooming which further limits their ability to be precisely focused. So this game is entirely correct that larger primary optics and higher frequency light results in better effective range.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffraction-limited_system#Laser_beams
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M_squared