early game: weapons for very hard difficulty. missiles any good?

[ec928]

Just got the game and doing my first playthrough.

Plasma weapons seem utterly useless past the first enemy ships. It takes forever to take anything down with them. In contrast, fixed guns kill everything very quickly without even trying. They even do a bit of auto-targeting, so killing incoming missiles is no problem. (Just an observation: the game difficulty with them is rather low...)

I just got missiles and am wondering if I should invest in that? After wasting so many research points on plasma, I'm being cautious. Are missiles better than fixed guns? And do plasma weapons become any better, because I'm a bit disappointed all the points I put in there are currently useless.

[Twistedsoul85]

You will get 1 research tree reset, so play with what you like and make sure you only use that reset when needed. IMO, so far the fixed guns are better than most anything else. Lasers are supposed to be good but from what I've seen I don't like em and I have them and fixed gun maxed out. And with 16 fixed guns on the front of my ship it doesn't take long to blow other ships apart

[veevoir]

Plasma are great point defense against fighters, missiles and also a great mining tool. Just research targeting speed and range, then just use them in auto-fire mode (default key G, as you will just keep it pressed might need rebinding).

I currently fly a setup of 4x Mk II fixed cannons (+6 MkI plasmas for point def) and they shred very very nicely.

From what I hear lasers are also very very nice if you invest a lot into research. Fixed cannon advantage is that you get them early and can upgrade as you progress.

Originally posted by Twistedsoul85:

You will get 1 research tree reset

Wait, what, when? :D

[Twistedsoul85]

Originally posted by veevoir:

Plasma are great point defense against fighters, missiles and also a great mining tool. Just research targeting speed and range, then just use them in auto-fire mode (default key G, as you will just keep it pressed might need rebinding).

I currently fly a setup of 4x Mk II fixed cannons (+6 MkI plasmas for point def) and they shred very very nicely.

From what I hear lasers are also very very nice if you invest a lot into research. Fixed cannon advantage is that you get them early and can upgrade as you progress.

Originally posted by Twistedsoul85:

You will get 1 research tree reset

Wait, what, when? :D

You'll know when you get to that point in the game, can't miss it. The Rama or whatever her name is back on our space station will tell you when you discover a certain item

[Huillam]

I restarted the game three times because I was not happy with the way I spent my research points. :(
At least there won't be a fourth.

[veevoir]

Originally posted by Twistedsoul85:

Originally posted by veevoir:

Plasma are great point defense against fighters, missiles and also a great mining tool. Just research targeting speed and range, then just use them in auto-fire mode (default key G, as you will just keep it pressed might need rebinding).

I currently fly a setup of 4x Mk II fixed cannons (+6 MkI plasmas for point def) and they shred very very nicely.

From what I hear lasers are also very very nice if you invest a lot into research. Fixed cannon advantage is that you get them early and can upgrade as you progress.



Wait, what, when? :D

You'll know when you get to that point in the game, can't miss it. The Rama or whatever her name is back on our space station will tell you when you discover a certain item

Good to know. I know there is a crew respec planet I found (seems respeces are unlimited though), but it required finding that planet and an artifact that I have no idea where I found.

[Twistedsoul85]

Originally posted by veevoir:

Originally posted by Twistedsoul85:

You'll know when you get to that point in the game, can't miss it. The Rama or whatever her name is back on our space station will tell you when you discover a certain item

Good to know. I know there is a crew respec planet I found (seems respeces are unlimited though), but it required finding that planet and an artifact that I have no idea where I found.

Wow I never found that yet... was it early on in the game, mid or late?

[Dark Thoughts]

Best "weapon" so far imo are fighters. There was a station that had a hangar early on, which gave me the first module part. Bought the other two as been wrecking everything ever since. They're also a very lazy weapon and they can clear out asteroid and salvage fields within seconds. The few downsides aren't too bad, they're quite heavy I think, the fighters AI is quite bad and often flies off, reloading saves while fighters are out sometimes abandons them and you have to rebuild them, smaller targets can be a bit of a struggle because of their inaccuracy.

Lasers can be okay, but they eat energy like crazy.

Havok is great for killing enemy missiles and fighters. Haven't found the offensive tech option yet but I heard it is supposedly good too, but mutually exclusive in function?

Never liked plasma.

Can't really aim reliably with fixed weapons.

Missiles I played with in an earlier build and they were ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ bad and just kept getting intercepted way too reliably. There's been some new tech for them since though but I haven't tested them and you have to find it first as well.

[ec928]

Finished the game.

Fixed guns stayed good throughout the very end. Best early and mid-game weapon IMO. But they trigger sequentially so they don't scale well, and a medium amount is just as good as lots. So they grow relatively weaker late game as my automatic turreted weapons got stronger. But end game, a small number is still good for burst damage.

Lasers are good, and fully automated, so if you can afford the research might as well have a few. These were my main damage dealers late mid game. But they don't scale well; takes a while for all your lasers to activate, and they often reset, so a medium number often do as much damage as a huge amount.

Plasma goes from utterly useless to reasonable as mid-game point defence against mass missiles/fighters, and then shine late game because they scale well so the more you have the better. Just ensure proper heat management. End-game, when you have huge amounts of energy, plenty of cooling and are fully researched, mass mark III plasma are very good.

[Derrilin]

I had the opposite experience with fixed guns.... on the very hard setting incoming fire kept on damaging my forward facing guns... and so plasma work out better for me because i could put them behind bulkheads.

[Murb]

I feel like fixed guns are really good early on and somewhat fall off as the game goes on.

Plasma becomes good mid game and then pats mid late game i feel like i'm turning up the difficulty by not specializing in plasma. It feels like an oversight that plasma has so many more technologies and scales so much better.

[ImHelping]

Originally posted by Murb:

I feel like fixed guns are really good early on and somewhat fall off as the game goes on.

Plasma becomes good mid game and then pats mid late game i feel like i'm turning up the difficulty by not specializing in plasma. It feels like an oversight that plasma has so many more technologies and scales so much better.

I get the feeling like a lot of games it is the opposite issue of "Too many drawbacks, costs, and gimmicks out of terror of """or it would be too easy"""" with other options that look better in a spreadsheet than reality. Which happens in so many games, then people blame the less fussy option for being 'too good'

Even the praises for say, lasers like above is admitting all the overly fussy drawbacks holding them back from their full potential.

bullet turret type weapons have the power of "And then I shot them. Sometimes it misses" being the gameplay mechanic, instead of "Feeling guilty for being so accurate, this weapon will regularly do a ♥♥♥♥ job on purpose out of pity for the enemy" as a gameplay mechanic.

for another overhyped plasma weapon when the reality is "No I'm just avoiding letdowns" The deadspace plasma cutter.
*flamethrower literally won't work in an airless gimmick area. Reaches for the plasma cutter*
"Oh I see you are switching to the plasma cutter, guess you hate a challenge and are not giving other weapons enough investment with a side of skill issues!"
*really wishing they could flamethrower the like, one enemy type weak to flamethrower right now*