Is there any reason to use small/medium hardpoints?

[LittleMikey]

So I'm fairly new to Stellaris and I'm wondering why I would ever want to use small or medium hardpoints in my ships. One large weapon seems to do more damage than two medium weapons combined, so is there any reason to use smaller mounts?

[Elitewrecker PT]

Larger weapons have more difficulty hitting smaller targets.

[Prometheus]

The bigger weapons do more damage but have much less accuracy and tracking. So while their raw dps number is higher they miss a lot. Especially against corvettes which have high baseline evade. Evade subtracts directly from hit chance. So that 70% chance to hit with no tracking becomes something like 20% against a vette. Small weapons have both higher base hit chance and higher tracking. Tracking negates evade. So the raw numbers difference is made up in the weapon's reliability.

The end effect is big weapons are better against big ships, small weapons against small ships.

[Crim]

It's honestly the opposite

There is no need to ever use Large Weapons...

Medium Weapons can be okay if you're spamming Tracking bonuses

[Kitten Food]

Originally posted by Talamare:

It's honestly the opposite

There is no need to ever use Large Weapons...

Medium Weapons can be okay if you're spamming Tracking bonuses

This is pretty much true in all battles. Large weapons are great on a Titan or Battleship for artillery shots on large targets like a starbase or another Titan/Guardian.

Either than that, just stick to medium/small combos for your Cruisers and send them in for close combat.

[Sabaithal]

Heres a few general guidelines_

- Small weapons are good against corvettes, and okay against destroyers. Similar size craft like crystallines and amoebas too. Garbage against cruisers and above.
- Medium weapons okay against corvettes, good against destroyers, okay against cruisers and battleships.
- Large weapons are poor vs corvettes, okay vs destroyers, good against cruisers and larger.
- XL weapons are poor vs corvettes and destroyers, good against cruisers, and superb against anything bigger than cruisers.

Torpedos and missiles have good tracking so they are a general exception, they are countered primarily by PD and strike craft, secondary by Flak and sometimes shields (missiles only).

[LittleMikey]

Awesome, thanks for the info guys!

[galadon3]

There's one thing that should be noted in favor of big weapons though, also all of the above is true.
A ship gets a disengage-chance with every hit it takes after it is damaged to a certain degree, so hitting it repeatedly with smaller weapons gives it a lot more chances to get away then killing it with a small number of big weapon-hits.

[Crim]

Originally posted by Sabaithal:

Heres a few general guidelines_

- Small weapons are good against corvettes, and okay against destroyers. Similar size craft like crystallines and amoebas too. Garbage against cruisers and above.
- Medium weapons okay against corvettes, good against destroyers, okay against cruisers and battleships.
- Large weapons are poor vs corvettes, okay vs destroyers, good against cruisers and larger.
- XL weapons are poor vs corvettes and destroyers, good against cruisers, and superb against anything bigger than cruisers.

Torpedos and missiles have good tracking so they are a general exception, they are countered primarily by PD and strike craft, secondary by Flak and sometimes shields (missiles only).

More like

-Small Weapons are best against Corvs, great against everything else
-Medium Weapons are generally the best option against everything
-Large Weapons are a liability
-XL Weapon is called Tachyon Lance

-G are SPAM or none
-H are Space Amoeba or none

[corisai]

Originally posted by Talamare:

It's honestly the opposite

There is no need to ever use Large Weapons...

Medium Weapons can be okay if you're spamming Tracking bonuses

Medium Weapons have targetting AI issues since... well, since ever.

Also they're also mostly useless one by design. Because of their platforms.

Destroyers*? Cruisers? Meh...

Placing them on BB? Insanity.

*Don't tried psionic evasion heavy ones yet.

Originally posted by Talamare:

More like

-Small Weapons are best against Corvs, great against everything else
-Medium Weapons are generally the best option against everything
-Large Weapons are a liability
-XL Weapon is called Tachyon Lance

Phew... Electrocutting BB are strong as ever (actually maybe even stronger). All you need is to catch one of that damned clouds.

[Random]

Small weapons have a range of 30 for the vast majority with lasers being 40 and void beams being 60 (anti-shield). Small weapons have better tracking but lower damage.

Lasers however WILL obliterate corvettes like a joke regardless of size. So large laser battleships will utterly shred covettes.

Ship computers have set ranges now so if you set a destroyer up with small weapons but set it to line computer it will sit at 50 range and wont fire a shot unless the enemy closes in on it (corvettes), making this utterly useless against starbases.

Medium weapons have decent tracking and do more damage then 2 small weapon slots combined, their range is also 60 allowing for line computers that increase tracking meaning they are actually superior in practice.

The thing about corvettes is that they have bugger all hull and low defensive armor in the first place so even if you miss a couple of times against them with larget weapons the second you hit them you 1 shot them, and considering you start firing alot earlier due to range you will generally win with no or low losses over a knife fight corvette.

Missiles are still good even though the AI runs pdd enmasse early game they still cant kill all the missiles that go straight to armor and hull. A cruiser should be built with missiles and small guns all over it along with picket computers to fight fleets. just stick mostly to lasers with a small sprinkle of kinetic to clear minor shields.

For the XL slot using anything other then focus arc emitter is dumb. and tachyon lance is only good against shieldless targets and as its range is high it is likely the first thing to fire along with instant travel means its guaranteed to be going straight into shields meaning a wasted shot off the bat, focus arc goes straight to hull, instant death for most.

I haven't used tachylon lances since like version 1.3.

Oh and all strike craft are still 100% useless, so dont even waste your time with them, they still do less damage then PDD in picket ships even after the 75% hull and armor nerf... thats just embarassing.

[corisai]

Originally posted by Random:

A cruiser should be built with missiles and small guns all over it along with picket computers to fight fleets. just stick mostly to lasers with a small sprinkle of kinetic to clear minor shields.

Cruiser is 3 slots for missiles for 4 CP, while corvette is 1 missile per 1 CP. So it's obvious newbie trap to build them ever.

Originally posted by Random:

For the XL slot using anything other then focus arc emitter is dumb. and tachyon lance is only good against shieldless targets and as its range is high it is likely the first thing to fire along with instant travel means its guaranteed to be going straight into shields meaning a wasted shot off the bat, focus arc goes straight to hull, instant death for most.

Sigh. How often players look on guns stats and completely ignore targetting AI.

Tachyons targetting make them focus enemy ships that lack shield and destroy them, without trying to spread damage. Load BB with additional KA, so it will stripe shields later (plus a bit NT to damage enemies too) - and you're have strong combo.

This making them awesome as long as enemy shields aren't ridiculous (like FE or crisis events).

While Arcs are GREAT - they will became great ONLY when combined with Cloud Lighting. Alone (mixed with common guns) they're inferior to tachyons.

[HugsAndSnuggles]

Originally posted by corisai:

Destroyers*? Cruisers? Meh...

*Don't tried psionic evasion heavy ones yet.

IDK, destroyers seem pretty decent on their own, without psionic stuff.

(not that it makes medium/small guns any better)

[Sabaithal]

You have to take numbers into account. Yes, large weapons have difficulty hitting corvettes and destroyers, but 30 destroyers armed with kinetic batteries (long range L sized weapons), will still f#ck up anything they fire a salvo at, even if half of them miss, and they can fire sooner due to their increased range.

A good loadout for destroyers is one Kinetic battery, and two autocannons in the secondary S slots.

[corisai]

Originally posted by HugsAndSnuggles:

Originally posted by corisai:

Destroyers*? Cruisers? Meh...

*Don't tried psionic evasion heavy ones yet.

IDK, destroyers seem pretty decent on their own, without psionic stuff.

(not that it makes medium/small guns any better)

How? Gun Destroyers > gun Corvettes only as long as they have same hull techs (and it isn't clever idea to pick destroyer rare tech, while is a corvette oe), while missile corvettes will beat them both (if only AI don't pick so much PD >_<)...

While they're strong in corvette-destroyer phase of game - as soon as AI get cruisers, average amount of PD per CP in their fleets decrease. This mean - missile corvettes time has come :)

My only bet on destroyers that end-game evasion-maxed one will be able to do corvettes job with ~ efficiency, allowing us to skip missiles repeatables. But still don't test it yet.

Originally posted by Sabaithal:

You have to take numbers into account. Yes, large weapons have difficulty hitting corvettes and destroyers, but 30 destroyers armed with kinetic batteries (long range L sized weapons), will still f#ck up anything they fire a salvo at, even if half of them miss, and they can fire sooner due to their increased range.

A good loadout for destroyers is one Kinetic battery, and two autocannons in the secondary S slots.

And what a role for that ship? Killing corvettes? Ineffective (KB will have very few hit ratio + quite high tech for that task). Killing BB&cruisers? Very ineffective too. Killing FE?

Don't forget that we're speaking about mono-fleets. While you can have different fleets (ex - BB & corvettes, or BB & destroyers), not using mono-fleets is a stupid and inferior idea.

Mono-fleets boost your navy mobility AND efficiency via ability to use right admirals for right fleets (for example - using Gale-speed for vettes until end-game, while boosting BB with damage/range or retreat chance).

[Sabaithal]

Mono-fleets? Well there's the issue. Having a fleet of specialized ships that can counter and cover each others weaknessess will almost always win against a fleet full of ships whose role is jack-of-all-trades but master-of-none.

The destroyers I just gave can target corvettes with pretty good efficiency (autocannons) and their kinetic batteries are very good at taking down enemy shields. As soon as that happen, tachyon lances from the battleships ripe the enemy's larger ships apart, and they have M-sized null beams, to the corvettes aren't that big of an issue. Even if they are, several cruisers full of S-sized weapons and multi-missiles are there for targetting corvettes. This setup can beat a fleet nearly twice its size if the enemy fleet is not fine-tuned like this one.