My Verdict on Plasma Accelerator ENG Upgrades & Future Buff

[fishbazooka]

Efficient is the best route for multiple PAs. Not only do you get a slight damage boost, but you get less thermal load, power draw, d& distrib draw. It's by far the best route to get upgrading PAs. Efficient will also allow you to use other utilities & hardpoints with a breeze.

Your potential upgrades using efficient: http://inara.cz/galaxy-blueprint/87



I have done tests with my Corvette utilizing 2 huge (grade 5) upgrades.

Overcharge leaves you with thermal, power draw, and distrib draw issues for a +40 damage boost around max but you won't be able to deal that damage if you can't fire.... Only carry one if so. Goodluck trying to fire off your other weapons. Heat is bad... especially on ships with armor builds. It can get costly to repair.

Rapid Fire leaves you with thermal issues. If you're going rapid, one is sufficient, if you're using 2, you need vent lasers to disipate heat.

Don't even bother with the other options.

As for experimental effects, they are all terrible. Phasing is useless because you'll get through shields quickly. It's probably only decent going against a prismatic cutter in pvp. As soon as you're on hull, you'll rip through armor with a bonus of high pierce. Modules will shred. No need for experimental effects. Go slugs if you want unlimited fuel ammo. Would be nice to spam without having to worry about ammo. Only downside is the damage reduction.

Lets not also forget that PAs are getting buffed in the future update. 10% damage boost and ignores resistance. This will make free fire PAs much more up to line with current builds. Dispersal is losing damage reduction? Maybe one with Dispersal isn't a bad idea. Doesn't hurt on efficient.

Also, never go off dps. Dps only matters if every shot hits (it's calculated in-game by rate of fire, reload, blah blah blah. Never trust it).

Hope this helps if anyone is curious about a PA build now that we have G5 with Bill Turner

[Arya]

Interesting post, thanks. What do you thing of PAs effectiveness against say, two Huge Multicannons with Rapidfire G5? I'm planning a Corvette build early next year and I'm mostly split between two PAs and two MCs.

[fishbazooka]

Originally posted by 狼 Wolfey:

Interesting post, thanks. What do you thing of PAs effectiveness against say, two Huge Multicannons with Rapidfire G5? I'm planning a Corvette build early next year and I'm mostly split between two PAs and two MCs.

Thanks & for maintained effectiveness, I use two huge overchraged multicannons with incendiary thermal rounds (incendiary converts kinetic to thermal for shields). The rest of my multicannons (G3, two G2s, and two G1s) all are overcharge with no experimental effect that way they can keep kinetic and max damage when I get to hull. (except for a G1 with corrosive). Corrosive on all multicannons applies the same damage bonus. Best to apply that on your weakest mutlicannon so the others can dish out the max damage possible.

Two PAs isn't efficient. It's just great to lob them around and see foes drop quickly. I'd say they're most efficient fighting large ships. It can be tough to hit little fellers zipping around. But if the little ones get hit they go bye bye instantly Hope this helps.

[Arya]

It does, thanks a lot Fish.

[raymazoida]

I've used two pas on my conda and would agree efficient seems way to go.

Most npcs lose at least all shields if you hit with both at the same time....

[Aris]

I use a plasma FAS for pvp not competitive yet but it will be with the new update 2.2.03 , all multi is the way to go and it will still be but only for fixed after the patch, an average pvp fdl can go up to 100mj per second full multi with 2 pips to wpn, so plasma has to be heavy hitter.

Need a mix of special effects to spice up plasma although ;)

[Turih]

You have not considered everything in your testing/verdict. Disregarded some vital aspects. Your opinion is/seems biased but it for sure is not objective.

[fishbazooka]

Originally posted by Turih:

You have not considered everything in your testing/verdict. Disregarded some vital aspects. Your opinion is/seems biased but it for sure is not objective.

I didn't put in all the details. Even if you go for powerplant/distributor upgrades not using efficient, you're going to have high level power draw/high level heat.

I tested 5 PAs yesterday all with efficient. I can hold down the fire button (mind I have slightly faster recharge on distributors) and my thermal load doesn't budge. The thermal load went from 29 about on the huge to around 3-6 which is incredible.

[fishbazooka]

2 efficients are perfect to combine with any build (especially if you like running G2 rail guns). It's not a bad replacement. I think 2 PAs seated on your ship next to one another is perfect. More is overkill. It's best to combine these with other hardpoints. I had trouble using all PAs and getting every shot to hit, especially on smaller ships.

[Turih]

Originally posted by Fish Bazooka:

Efficient is the best route for multiple PAs. Not only do you get a slight damage boost, but you get less thermal load, power draw, d& distrib draw. It's by far the best route to get upgrading PAs.
(...)
I have done tests with my Corvette utilizing 2 huge (grade 5) upgrades.

Overcharge leaves you with thermal, power draw, and distrib draw issues for a +40 damage boost around max but you won't be able to deal that damage if you can't fire.... Only carry one if so. Goodluck trying to fire off your other weapons. Heat is bad... especially on ships with armor builds. It can get costly to repair.

Rapid Fire leaves you with thermal issues. If you're going rapid, one is sufficient, if you're using 2, you need vent lasers to disipate heat.

Don't even bother with the other options.

As for experimental effects, they are all terrible. Phasing is useless because you'll get through shields quickly. It's probably only decent going against a prismatic cutter in pvp.

Why would one not bother with, lets say, "Focused" mod. Its getting a rework and a good one.
You said Phasing sequence is useless but you have to realize c4 plasmas on corvette are not the only plasmas. Someone might actually use c2 on small ship and thats where the value of bleed-through lies.
Other ships can be built heat-efficiently and voila, thermal load of PA is not a problem.

[fishbazooka]

Originally posted by Turih:

Originally posted by Fish Bazooka:

Efficient is the best route for multiple PAs. Not only do you get a slight damage boost, but you get less thermal load, power draw, d& distrib draw. It's by far the best route to get upgrading PAs.
(...)
I have done tests with my Corvette utilizing 2 huge (grade 5) upgrades.

Overcharge leaves you with thermal, power draw, and distrib draw issues for a +40 damage boost around max but you won't be able to deal that damage if you can't fire.... Only carry one if so. Goodluck trying to fire off your other weapons. Heat is bad... especially on ships with armor builds. It can get costly to repair.

Rapid Fire leaves you with thermal issues. If you're going rapid, one is sufficient, if you're using 2, you need vent lasers to disipate heat.

Don't even bother with the other options.

As for experimental effects, they are all terrible. Phasing is useless because you'll get through shields quickly. It's probably only decent going against a prismatic cutter in pvp.

Why would one not bother with, lets say, "Focused" mod. Its getting a rework and a good one.
You said Phasing sequence is useless but you have to realize c4 plasmas on corvette are not the only plasmas. Someone might actually use c2 on small ship and thats where the value of bleed-through lies.
Other ships can be built heat-efficiently and voila, thermal load of PA is not a problem.

Have you tried focused? We'll see, but now it's not good either. Sure maybe for long range but you're more likely to miss by the time it reaches that far. Plus thermal load actually gets worse and by default it's high. G2 PAs do 50+ damage a piece. You could do bleed through but I don't recommend it. Heat efficiency barely helps on PAs. The default thermal load is insanely high. The efficient is just phenominal. I'm running better heat efficiency and faster weapon recharge and 2 huge were still bringing up about 20-30 every shot. I could cool down back to default before firing again. But when I combined them with other hardpoints that's where issues arose. I went efficient and now I can use an entire loadout at the same time and my heat doesn't budge. I even tried 5 PAs, it's really nice to fire with ease

[Aris]

Rapid fire on an APA with phasing is very..very deadly each shot 1-2% hull damage

[Turih]

Originally posted by Fish Bazooka:

Originally posted by Turih:

Why would one not bother with, lets say, "Focused" mod. Its getting a rework and a good one.
You said Phasing sequence is useless but you have to realize c4 plasmas on corvette are not the only plasmas. Someone might actually use c2 on small ship and thats where the value of bleed-through lies.
Other ships can be built heat-efficiently and voila, thermal load of PA is not a problem.

Have you tried focused? We'll see, but now it's not good either. Sure maybe for long range but you're more likely to miss by the time it reaches that far. Plus thermal load actually gets worse and by default it's high. G2 PAs do 50+ damage a piece. You could do bleed through but I don't recommend it. Heat efficiency barely helps on PAs. The default thermal load is insanely high. The efficient is just phenominal. I'm running better heat efficiency and faster weapon recharge and 2 huge were still bringing up about 20-30 every shot. I could cool down back to default before firing again. But when I combined them with other hardpoints that's where issues arose. I went efficient and now I can use an entire loadout at the same time and my heat doesn't budge. I even tried 5 PAs, it's really nice to fire with ease :summerghost:

I know what I am talking about. Also you are saying you are likely to miss with the mod as it is right now but do you realize they have increased projectile flight speed? At g5 it flies as fast if not faster than a standard cannon shell. You can work around the thermal load with right eng modifications. I have tried 2x c2 PA 2x c1 Pulse on DBS. I have tried 3x c2 PA on iCourier. Everything worked fine. It is all about setup.

EDIT: It flies much faster - PA (1658 m/s) vs. Cannon (1051 m/s)

[fishbazooka]

Originally posted by Turih:

Originally posted by Fish Bazooka:

Have you tried focused? We'll see, but now it's not good either. Sure maybe for long range but you're more likely to miss by the time it reaches that far. Plus thermal load actually gets worse and by default it's high. G2 PAs do 50+ damage a piece. You could do bleed through but I don't recommend it. Heat efficiency barely helps on PAs. The default thermal load is insanely high. The efficient is just phenominal. I'm running better heat efficiency and faster weapon recharge and 2 huge were still bringing up about 20-30 every shot. I could cool down back to default before firing again. But when I combined them with other hardpoints that's where issues arose. I went efficient and now I can use an entire loadout at the same time and my heat doesn't budge. I even tried 5 PAs, it's really nice to fire with ease

I know what I am talking about. Also you are saying you are likely to miss with the mod as it is right now but do you realize they have increased projectile flight speed? At g5 it flies as fast if not faster than a standard cannon shell. You can work around the thermal load with right eng modifications. I have tried 2x c2 PA 2x c1 Pulse on DBS. I have tried 3x c2 PA on iCourier. Everything worked fine. It is all about setup.

EDIT: It flies much faster - PA (1658 m/s) vs. Cannon (1051 m/s)

Sure, you get double the flight speed and range. I do like the armor pierce upgrade. What's the thermal load increase? Stays the same? And the range on PAs is 3.5. so 2x is 7 which sounds amazing but it'll still be difficult to hit smaller ships zipping around ya while maintaining damage & yes with right ENG mods but I'm running overcharged multis, heavy shield boosters, aug resis, dirty tuning, heat eff + cap, shield cells, faster pp recharge. It gets power hungry and going efficient leaves me firing cool. I can use my other weapons in combination without increase thermal load or sucking the power draw too much.

I think the focused PAs would be very good on faster ships. I'd actually like to try that one day. On imperial ships sounds like a great route to go. You can out run and fire at long distances with that increased flight speed. Very interesting.

[fishbazooka]

^ Nvm, just chekd that thermal load increase on focused, 9% increase in thermal which is bad. But 2 would be fine but your other hardpoints can't be too thermal hungry.

[raymazoida]

Originally posted by Turih:

Originally posted by Fish Bazooka:

Efficient is the best route for multiple PAs. Not only do you get a slight damage boost, but you get less thermal load, power draw, d& distrib draw. It's by far the best route to get upgrading PAs.
(...)
I have done tests with my Corvette utilizing 2 huge (grade 5) upgrades.

Overcharge leaves you with thermal, power draw, and distrib draw issues for a +40 damage boost around max but you won't be able to deal that damage if you can't fire.... Only carry one if so. Goodluck trying to fire off your other weapons. Heat is bad... especially on ships with armor builds. It can get costly to repair.

Rapid Fire leaves you with thermal issues. If you're going rapid, one is sufficient, if you're using 2, you need vent lasers to disipate heat.

Don't even bother with the other options.

As for experimental effects, they are all terrible. Phasing is useless because you'll get through shields quickly. It's probably only decent going against a prismatic cutter in pvp.

Why would one not bother with, lets say, "Focused" mod. Its getting a rework and a good one.
You said Phasing sequence is useless but you have to realize c4 plasmas on corvette are not the only plasmas. Someone might actually use c2 on small ship and thats where the value of bleed-through lies.
Other ships can be built heat-efficiently and voila, thermal load of PA is not a problem.

Fyi focused is not getting a rework. Its been dropped.

So much for "I know what I'm talking about" eh?
Try and keep up before being mouthy next time?