Plasma vs Lasers

[RedMarth]

I seem to see a big preference for Plasma over lasers in guides I've read. I have 2 questions about this:

1) Lasers have higher DPS and accuracy. Are the Armor/Hull boosts of Plasma really enough to justify using them instead?

2) if so, when do you switch? Right now I'm at T4 lasers and T1 plasma, so the DPS differential is pretty extreme.

Thanks for any tips!

[Kitten Food]

Personally I go for Plasma over lasers as soon as I have exotic gases production. Lasers are great if you don't have resources as they only require crystals for the last 2 tiers.

Lasers are more acurate, which is why DPS is usually higher; however, damage from Plasma is higher per hit and the accuracy can easily be fixed with sensor upgrades. So lasers tend to be weaker in the end.

Armor and Hull strength is much higher towards endgame, so anything that does more damage to those areas is a bonus. Shields can generally be wiped out easily with a few null void ships or kinetics. Not that big of an issue. This is why I go for Plasma, since most guardians, threats and fallen empires are tanky as F.

[Sabaithal]

If we're talking max tier lasers and plasma (T5 lasers T3 plasma), the in RAW dps, plasma is superior both in damage and in hull/armor bonuses.

Plasma however gets a 75% damage reduction vs shields whereas lasers only get 50% reduction. Plasma also has lower accuracy and I think a slightly longer cooldown per shot.

In essence, lasers are a more balanced weapon capable of taking on multiple roles, whereas plasma is more specialized at one role, being anti armor/hull. Combining plasma weapons with anti-shield weaponry will almost always yield more DPS than just using lasers, which is why they are considered better to have.

[JODEGAFUN]

Originally posted by Sabaithal:

If we're talking max tier lasers and plasma (T5 lasers T3 plasma), the in RAW dps, plasma is superior both in damage and in hull/armor bonuses.

Plasma however gets a 75% damage reduction vs shields whereas lasers only get 50% reduction. Plasma also has lower accuracy and I think a slightly longer cooldown per shot.

In essence, lasers are a more balanced weapon capable of taking on multiple roles, whereas plasma is more specialized at one role, being anti armor/hull. Combining plasma weapons with anti-shield weaponry will almost always yield more DPS than just using lasers, which is why they are considered better to have.

A laser battery is usefull if you face corvettes, had once a game in old setting (nearly two years ago where a 400K battleshipfleet was stopped for 20 min from 5 corvettes because they were all with large kinetic artillery, this was aigans those swarm engame crisis usefull but those corvettes drive me mad). The leader of the small fleet was a psyonic with bonus in evasion, the artillery did not hit the small ships. And i had advantage tech with 10+ on all. M - laser kill corvettes as they got hit, aigans larger plasma should be better.

[Sabaithal]

Yeah, forgot to mention that, lasers in general are superior compared to almost any other weapon (besides autocannons) at targetting corvettes.

[eldiabs]

Lasers are better. Why you may ask? They look cool. Especially with the alt laser mod. Plasma looks lame. Little dots flying through space.

[Shahadem]

Originally posted by JODEGAFUN:

Originally posted by Sabaithal:

If we're talking max tier lasers and plasma (T5 lasers T3 plasma), the in RAW dps, plasma is superior both in damage and in hull/armor bonuses.

Plasma however gets a 75% damage reduction vs shields whereas lasers only get 50% reduction. Plasma also has lower accuracy and I think a slightly longer cooldown per shot.

In essence, lasers are a more balanced weapon capable of taking on multiple roles, whereas plasma is more specialized at one role, being anti armor/hull. Combining plasma weapons with anti-shield weaponry will almost always yield more DPS than just using lasers, which is why they are considered better to have.

A laser battery is usefull if you face corvettes, had once a game in old setting (nearly two years ago where a 400K battleshipfleet was stopped for 20 min from 5 corvettes because they were all with large kinetic artillery, this was aigans those swarm engame crisis usefull but those corvettes drive me mad). The leader of the small fleet was a psyonic with bonus in evasion, the artillery did not hit the small ships. And i had advantage tech with 10+ on all. M - laser kill corvettes as they got hit, aigans larger plasma should be better.

Reminds me of Eve Online after the huge nerf to large weapons which let corvettes tank and beat battleships just because some players were upset that they couldn't beat a battleship with a corvette before the nerf...

[Darkaiser]

Originally posted by eldiabs:

Lasers are better. Why you may ask? They look cool. Especially with the alt laser mod. Plasma looks lame. Little dots flying through space.

The single best reason for Lasers. I sometimes watch battles on Slow speed just so I get that 'Star Blazers' vibe during the battle

[Sabaithal]

Originally posted by Darkaiser:

Originally posted by eldiabs:

Lasers are better. Why you may ask? They look cool. Especially with the alt laser mod. Plasma looks lame. Little dots flying through space.

The single best reason for Lasers. I sometimes watch battles on Slow speed just so I get that 'Star Blazers' vibe during the battle

Turn all the other ships invisible. The you can roleplay that this is some nightmarish apocalypse where the glowsticks finally turned on us.

[RedMarth]

Thanks guys, this really helps. As I side note... The aesthetics argument is pretty convincing. I was totally expecting Plasma to look more like traditional sci-fi energy cannons than these weird spheres.

[corisai]

Originally posted by RedMarth:

1) Lasers have higher DPS and accuracy. Are the Armor/Hull boosts of Plasma really enough to justify using them instead?

You're underestimate how far bonuses to accuracy & tracking can go.

In best situation (psionic + able to get wonderful enigmatic decoder) you can, for example, raise battleship Kinetic Battery EFFECTIVE chance to hit 90% corvette to ... 55%. Isn't bad, huh?

Lasers mostly early game tools.

Also you underestimate that ship HP+armor almost always notably higher then just shield. Because of that plasma shine.

[Fracture]

I may be talking complete nonsense here, but I think plasma + disruptor is the best way to go. Enemy ships usually build countermeasures for missiles, and those are useless against energy attack.

important stuff: you need lasers maximised in order to get tachion lance, the X-sided weapon for cruisers.

[corisai]

Originally posted by Fracture:

I may be talking complete nonsense here, but I think plasma + disruptor is the best way to go.

Disruptor? It's ignore shields&armor. So you have one weapon that need to deal with shield&armor, while another - don't. Results will be ... meh.

Or you want to say "Null Void Beam"? Yean, it's a nice addition and interesting alternative for Kinetic Battery.

Originally posted by Fracture:

Enemy ships usually build countermeasures for missiles, and those are useless against energy attack.

Point defence still have quite high damage output, so it's unwise to fight it with something like mix of penetrating and non-penetrating weapons.

Originally posted by Fracture:

important stuff: you need lasers maximised in order to get tachion lance, the X-sided weapon for cruisers.

You're wrong here. Twicely :)

1) You need T4 lasers (x-ray) and never need gamma lasers for anything. And you need them both for NT and tachyons ;)

2) X-sized weapons are for battleships only.

[Dakota]

Plasmas are brutal, especially for starbase demolition. Starbases always have way more hull than shield or armor, and even then the armor and shield is split, so you're basically dealing double damage to starbases 90% of the time then 25% damage 10% of the time.

Generally you should have some shield breaking weapons thrown in the mix. Having some autocannons and PD on your picket ships is really nice for tracking corvettes, taking out missiles, and general purpose but they're bad against armor. The Plasma synergizes extremely well with them and I swap to them as soon as possible then move onto neutron launchers.

[Belhedler]

That's a tough question. Here goes: due to higher cooldown and lower tracking, accuracy and range, the plasma goes against destroyers/cruiser/starbase/platforms combined with kinetic/NVB that deals with the shield first. Laser does better against corvettes due to slighlty better aim and lower cooldown. Battleship is best suited with Kinetic artillery and Neutron Launchers against cruiser/battleship/titan/starbase. Neutron Launchers very high cooldown but long range is the deterent between this or plasma. Plasma/Laser will be the default on cruisers, could be found on destroyers and batteships until Lance/KA/NL appears. I don't recommend it on destroyers though as platforms and starbases are usually fit with S/M kinetic/plaser/plasma weapons which makes destroyer kind of a bad match against said opponents.

[corisai]

Originally posted by Belhedler:

That's a tough question.

It is not. Laser have use only in early game when you lack autocannons (they combined with plasma far supreme even in role of corvette-hunting).

In late game they're totaly obsolete.

And default on cruisers is small sign "do not use" :)