Laser vs Plasma

[Icarus]

If we talk about sniper rifles ..which is best ?
I dont mind the slow projectiles

[Langkard]

I'm partial to the Overseer's Guardian two shot combat rifle. Fully upgraded with scope and suppressor, it's silent and deadly at base 140+ damage per shot (then add on riflema, ninja, etc. perks and it's amazing). You can buy it from the shop in Vault 81 for 3200 or so caps, much less if you go in with plenty of items to trade and maybe some grape mentats and charisma gear). Since it's for sale, you can get it really early and use it as a non-sniper main weapon until you get Gun Nut 4 for the max upgrade to scope and the suppressor. It's way overpowered early though, since you usually don't see combat rifles until level 20+.

It's possible to get a plasma rifle to do more damage than the above, but they aren't silent. IMO, silent is part of the basic concept of sniping.

[Icarus]

Ye i use O's Guardian as my main weapon , i asked so specifically because these are the options im interested atm .. so what do you think its better for a sniper .. lase or plasma ?

[ghpstage]

Both options are very poor, to the point that pipe revolvers would probably prove more capable.
If I had to choose I would pick a laser musket.

[Langkard]

Originally posted by ghpstage:

Both options are very poor, to the point that pipe revolvers would probably prove more capable.
If I had to choose I would pick a laser musket.

Yeah, 5 crank laser musket can pack a nice wallop. It needs rank 5 of Gun nut to get there, I think. It suffers from the same range problem of the laser rifle, though, at just 71 range and 76 accuracy (base numbers).

Danse's laser rifle has much better range, at 203 and slightly better base accuracy at 76.

The legendary rifle, Limitless Potential, has the Never Ending ammo effect and has great range at 227 and a base accuracy of 96. That would be my choice for a laser sniper rifle. Only Virgil's rifle comes close to it in terms of range, damage per shot and accuracy for lasers, at least in the base game. Aeternus from Nuka World is the best laser rifle in terms of range and base damage, but it's base accuracy is lower.

For plasma, Experiment 18-A is the top, with 203 range.

Plasma rifles do about the same base damage as laser rifles, but they also add on an additional radiation damage. So 18-A does 25 damage + 25 radiation damage as a base. Between the two, plasma rifles do more damage, but the top laser rifles have more range. That's another reason to prefer ballistics for sniper, since they have better range, damage per shot and accuracy.

[Jouni]

Originally posted by Langkard:

Yeah, 5 crank laser musket can pack a nice wallop. It needs rank 5 of Gun nut to get there, I think. It suffers from the same range problem of the laser rifle, though, at just 71 range and 76 accuracy (base numbers).

Laser Musket only requires Gun Nut for scopes. Everything else requires up to three ranks of Science. Specifically you need 2 ranks(level 17) for 5 crank and rank 3(level 28) for 6 crank. Everything else requires only rank 1 at most.
Laser Musket is probably the best sniper you can get early since it has so low upgrade requirements. Legendary variants also start to drop from level 1 so with a bit of luck or save scumming you can get an Instigating or Two-Shot variant which both deal double damage.

[Lil C]-[ew C]-[ew is ☂д☂]

I was fine to use penetrator plasma sniper rifle for quite sometime but yesterday have found two shot overcharged laser sniper rifle that deals a lot of damage of course still no better than my VATS Enhanced Shielded gauss rifle.

[JODEGAFUN]

Gaussrifle is best sniper, you get extrem high dmg (over 400 is possible with no drugs), a noise damper is possible (make the right choice in Nuka World and you get 25% dmg bonus if you use it, but you need to do the whole raider stuff, before you can wipe them out to go back to good guy) and this does not include legendary adds. Still the ammo is expensive.

[red255]

the gauss rifle ammo costs 12 caps a shot but it gets the job done. I have a lucky Gauss rifle and I use it to snipe spending banked criticals it takes off an amusing amount of HP with a headshot critical from across the map. and if I get a sneak attack, WOOO boy.

the issue with lasers is well, they suck damage wise they got bugged. and the ammo isn't really all that cheap considering how much you need to use to get the job done.

Plasma is great for generating Nuclear material. I have a combat rifle with extra plasma damage I use for weaker enemies to turn them into goo with the cheap and plentiful .45 ammo which I then use to craft grenades for XP.

for the matter at hand the laser weapondry isnt very good, it just doenst do damage because it doesn't properly get upgraded damage from stuff. when I do use lasers I use them as automatics with a +50% damage to humans for cutting down humans with a light, low recoil gun.

the plasma rifle does better damage, but the projectile gets caught on all sorts of cover making it largely useless at range. again its more of a close range damage dealer. packing a significant punch for its weight.

but yeah as mentioned I went with the gauss on very hard. on survival I did go with a plasma for the lower weight. and enemies resist less damage.

[Beautiful Ham Sandwich]

As much as I love the Laser Musket, I don't feel like it's great as a sniper with that abysmal fire rate due to having to crank it. I'll have to parrot what everyone has been saying since the game launched, Gauss Rifle is one of the best guns in the game, especially for sniping.

Edit: Oh I just realized the topic was about Laser vs Plasma, not the best sniper. You specifically say you don't mind the slow projectiles, but they can really be a hindrance when sniping, so I have to give it to laser weapons, even though they're not particularly amazing

[Lil C]-[ew C]-[ew is ☂д☂]

Originally posted by red255:

....

Plasma is great for generating Nuclear material. I have a combat rifle with extra plasma damage ....

I have Plasma Infused makrsman 50.cal sniper rifle that do the same thing and pretty much if you find any weapon with this legendary effect will pretty much do the same thing which is far greater you will be doing plasma and ballistic damage.

[The Inept European]

Laser vs Plasma

For short range, Plasma. The egregiously high hit probability and (vs humans) extra damage. For long range, Laser is the better sniper. Relatively.

I guess we are talking the pre-war Lasers rather than the post-war Muskets. Which as others have said are a better class of weapon in all aspects except rate of fire. But if you are stealthy and behind cover it's Laser Muskets FTW.

In this discussions it's good to separate what you can do with standard weapons through modding, vs what you can do with legendary drops. Which are you interested in, OP?

[red255]

oh yeah if you get an instigating laser musket it is rather preferable for 6 crank sneak attacks.

[bunny de fluff]

Both can't be silenced, don't use them as sniping weapons, but as storming weapons

[jonnan.west]

I like silencers, but only the Gauss Rifle actually out performs the laser musket, and then only with the right perks at from like level 45ish up. The ammo is cheap (for some reason I almost never find gauss ammo) and plentiful, and silence isn't as big a thing when you're sniping from range.

On the other hand you can have a 4-crank musket at level 2. That's 128 points of light up your life.

[JODEGAFUN]

Originally posted by jonnan.west:

I like silencers, but only the Gauss Rifle actually out performs the laser musket, and then only with the right perks at from like level 45ish up. The ammo is cheap (for some reason I almost never find gauss ammo) and plentiful, and silence isn't as big a thing when you're sniping from range.

On the other hand you can have a 4-crank musket at level 2. That's 128 points of light up your life.

the right perk you can get give +25% dmg with all wapons with a noise damper, so all wapons which are silenced get 25% more dmg. You can get it by supporting one special raider faction (and you keep it if you clean Nuka World after that from them).