Firebomb or Ion Bomb?

[Thward]

I'm flying an Engi B with the Ion Blast II (LOVE that thing!), a burst laser I, and I just picked up an Ionbomb launcher. The current store has a Firebomb launcher. Should I sell the Ion and get the Fire? (I already picked up the achievement for ionizing four ship systems.) A relevant factor may be that I'm using boarding parties, and lots of fire may be a problem to them. (I only have one rockman and three mantises.) Whaddya think? Flame on?

[New Moon On Monday]

I would probably go with the Ion Bomb. It's powerful and straightforward.

The Fire Bomb gives you interesting possibilities, though. You can use fires to manipulate the position of the crew in enemy ships. You can complicate their responses to your boarding by giving them some busy work. In the process of putting out the fire, they take damage and get softened up for you to eventually shred them. I haven't actually played with the Fire Bomb much; the possibilities sound intriguing but I haven't put them into practice.

[Thward]

One advantage keeping the ionbomb is not having to spend to upgrade the weapon system capacity. Perhaps another day ...

[New Moon On Monday]

That shows how much I actually use Fire Bombs, I was not even considering the power difference. Yeah, I think sticking with the effective 1-power weapon is a good call.

[Valrynn the Dragoness]

Ion. Even though fire has the potential to do a lot more, Ion is instant 4 damage and is better against Rock ships.

[Thward]

Yeah the deep lockdown is good against weapons sytems.

[Swordmouse]

Firebomb for fun, ion for consistent usefulness. Firebomb's not gonna be too useful against airless scouts/Lanius,, though it is pretty handy when used on the isolated weapon systems of normal/easy flagship. One and done usually, even if they're manned.

[David]

Ion bomb- although if you get another rockman boarder, fire bomb can be pretty good.

[gambit]

I used both together against flagship, huehue.

[Biohazard063]

Well, firebombs can make it so crew abandons rooms. If a fire is raging (all tiles of the room on fire) and the system is completely destroyed, the crew stops to try to get it working again. At least thats how it worked pre-AE. This was especially usefull to get the crew of the flagship dead. If you don't plan on boarding, you're probably indeed better of with ion-bomb, 4 ion for a long time is great, esp. if you can keep the timer up with your other ion weapon.

[Zyos]

Ion bomb is the better of the two overall although the fire bomb is incredibly useful with rock boarders.

[Mazey]

If you can, get both. They're both awesome.
That said, I agree with the others, the ion is the cheapest and the most consistently useful.

[Drain]

I'd go with the Fire. In the gun rooms for the final boss, it will kill the crew then torch the gun until it's destroyed. Once the trapped crew are dead, 1 fire will burn the gun down to nothing. The Ion will only jam a system, delaying and doing nothing if it misses. Fire however will torch the system after a few casts. It can be spammed in the shield room, drowning that in fire, and they will be unable to deal with it. They'll have to keep making round trips to heal and the system will torch, opening the ship up for other guns. Once other guns start hitting the ship and the shield hits 0 while on fire, they're done.

But that's not to say the Ion is bad. Before reaching the final boss, it might be the better choice due to saving power and having enemy crew that could include a Rockman. If you run into a Rockman, your fire bomb is nearly worthless, he'll just sit there immune putting it out. The final boss has no Rockman, but ships before sector 8 can include them, and they are very common in rock sectors. Unless you want to slot both then select one per fight, you may want to slot the Ion then just hock it before sector 9.

[LordGandhii]

I've tried both weapons several times, and here is what I need to say about them.

I kinda disliked the Ion Bomb early on, because I have had bad luck using it. That is where I'd prefer the Fire Bomb.

The Fire Bomb, however, was useful for me early on because it made boarding ships much easier for me. To add on to that, it is extremely useful during the Flagship battle, but Ion Bombs are also very effective.


I'm going with Fire Bombs, for their overall uses.

[thebisonxrc]

I like the Fire Bomb. Spreading fires make for the right kind of chaos on the enemy ship.

[Jersee]

Ion bomb has more purposes, it also almost kill the Flagship super shield at stage 3 in one hit, and effectively remove 2 shield bubbles on shield system.