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and yes i know what i talk about ... i was sitting for 10 hours on a laser ship and played around with this guide
https://forum.cosmoteer.net/d/13701-the-ultimate-guide-to-prisms
its simply way too space consumming.
i have a railgun on my ship which is 7 parts long (including the loader) and i could make it longer. this thing (if there are no shields in its way) cuts easily through T8 ships and does a massive amount of damage torwards higher tier ships.
you may say now "well, later has everything shields" yes, for that have i gaus and deck cannons which going nearly in an instant through those shields end killing them where then the railgun often (after 10~20 secs cuts straight through the ship reactorcore and that usually was it)
honestly, i am more disapointed of the ion laser stuff then from anything else in this game.
tho! in all fairness. i am more the balistic type. so, my opinion might be not neutral ^....^.
Also ion beam takes a lot of space and needs shields, the prism are brittle as hell so you end using a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of shields to protect the prisms making your ship weak and vulnerable to EMPS and disruptors.
If you focus the beams in a single prism for more armor to turttle up, then you run the risk of getting outdps by a ship with a more mixed-up arsenal. Ion beams and prism aren't cheap and a ship with laser, canons and missiles is going to end doing more damage for the same price.
rails gun are fine, railfanning is op unless you are facing someone with a lot of shields (like an ion beam ship heh)
Ions are good. They can be scaled very well and that, their range, and their sort of constant DPS all focused on one point make them great tools.
Railguns are good, too. But, if you're downing shields with disruptors, then you're not using the railgun's best advantage - range.
It's spashdamage is devastating, though, if there aren't any layered shields behind those bricks. And, it's really fun to watch those railguns pierce through your entire target like it was made of paper. :)
Railgun RoF makes it finicky and one has to keep their ship on-target if one isn't constantly rail-fanning.
Note: A bunch of stuff regarding Cosmoteer PVP commentary on different weapons systems and ship construction doesn't always matter a bunch in Cosmoteer "Career Mode" so far in my relatively brief experience with this release. If a player brings enough gun to the fight and can apply it, they'll probably do just fine no matter what Class of weapon it is.
^-- This.
I learned pretty quickly to prioritize targets like Disruptors and to load up on PDs for EMP missiles... and to stock a some EMP launchers for myself.
EMP Missiles and a decent Ion system work well together, i find. Protecting one's Crystal is priority, though. I use back-ups in the line, but am about to expand.
The one issue is that when facing ramming Cannon ships, their splash damage from all those cannons starts to get berserk and tears into secondary systems. So, if I rely on my Disruptors and they're gone to Cannon fire, well... I should have mounted more reverse engines. :)
Canons are fine, missiles barrage are fine, railguns are fine, all those weapons are fine in the correct situation and beams are very far to be op since it has a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of drawbacks.
i have gaus cannons which do massive damage to shields (its from a mod tho) and is a counter for cannons to shields
i have 4 gaus cannons 4 deck cannons and the railgun firing when the shields are not longer in the wayand literarly cutting the enemy ship in half.
ion lasers may have focused dps on 1 point but they need superlong to nom their way until they reach critical ship system such as the reactor. before you with your single laser reached my reactors which are way on the back of my ship+ having armor around them too, killed i your shield and probably hitted your prisms with the railgun already.
i mean, we could do this discussion forever.
fact is, 1 single ion laser is severely in disadventage vs concentrated cannon fire.
ion ships have so many weaknesses, just 1 break through their defense and you are literarly disabled. if you would manage to get my railgun destroyed would you need to deal still with my gaus cannons and deck cannons while i only need to aim at your prisms and concentrating fire on them because you probably have only that weapon on your ship since an effective ion beam (ya can click the guide link if ya want) takes SO MUCH SPACE and SO MUCH CREW that ya cant man anything else+you can not disrupt cannons.
tho to be fair the gaus cannons i have is from a mod called allegiance or something like that. but still, the normal cannons would be still powerfull enough if i would replace them with the gaus cannons to literarly cut within second through ya shields with the deck cannons together. ya would need a heavy point defense against my ship which is the weakness of my ship tho.
in any case. every ship has its weaknesses and in my opinion are ion laser ships the weakest ones because they are literarly glass cannons
the most dangerous thing in this game are nukes. o3o.
That was my main strategy: Having a ton of thruster blocks on my Ion ship, so I can keep everything at max distance of my Ion beams. This works well against most NPC ships, but recently I faced level 16/17 ships that also use a lot if Ions, or railguns. I have big problems with those at the moment. My front is already stacked tightly with shields Flak and PD, at the moment I do not see a way to put in more shields or anything else. Thinking about optimizing the shields that are there, some have a long way to the next power source....
I did read here a few times that rails are weak against shields, yet that lvl 17 ships with three railguns cuts through my shields every time I encounter it....
the thing is, they arent weak. a railgun with full 10 parts has its full potential aka 10k damage each shot. peoples just build the 3 parts and think thats enough.
no, it isnt. if i got it correct from the files adds each railgun part, the top excluded (the middle parts and the loader) 1k damage up to a maximum potential of 10000. so, building more then 10 parts is a waste of space.
there is a post here where someone builded a 25parts railgun which is so much waste of space lol. he could split that into 2.
But but... STYLE.
Lol. I personally love effecient systems and making them better. but in this kind of game where so much just works**, having something look nice actually feels good to build.
TLDR Sort-a...: The most important thing of all is just to have fun. :) So, if it works to let you have "fun," then it's the best thing in the game, no matter what it is.
Your Gauss Cannon mod is heavily influencing your opinion, in my opinion... :)
Just a note: Again, if you're closing with the enemy with your Railgun ship, you're defeating a huge tactical advantage that Railguns provide. Overloading a ship's PDs, which is entirely possible, with EMPs can give you that one devastating open-window to attack which is the "signature moment" of a great Rail Gun shot that becomes the key to winning the battle. Just "in my opinion" as I'm no Cosmoteer "vet." :)
Every Ion-focused ship must absolutely use shields at some point to protect the aiming Crystal, even if it has an aiming Crystal deep within or secondary Crystals that can take over should the first be destroyed. And, higher tier Ion ships are going to have more of them and use a good bit of those as a main "first line of defense" build.
You have a can opener in your Gauss Cannon, thus cans are easy to open for you, rendering their tough outer defenses in Shields relatively meaningless.
That doesn't mean things like EMP and Distruptors aren't significant threats to an ION ship, it just means you don't have to use those systems and get your ship within range or get past point-defenses in order to deal with the heavy shielding Ion ships have as nearly a necessity. (In Career mode play, of course.)
A few things, though:
Rail Guns can take up significantly less space than a decent Ion Beam config. And, ships relying on those likely present less of an exposed front for enemy ships to attack. But, for each Rail Gun on a ship, that's space and a weapon dedicated entirely to being completely vulnerable - One tile between loader and muzzle taken out removes the entire weapon system from play. Ion Beam arrangements can be a bit more robust, there, with their weakness to damage also including the power systems in use that have to be transported by Crew. (Take out a corridor and that could take out an entire bank of Ions by orphaning its power supply.)
Because of the above, Rail Gun ships could be a bit more durable. Or, rather, are more friendly to the player adding more defensive capabilities. Also - Because of the reduced space required, they can pack more Rails. Even with the power requirements, they could get more DPS-Dealing-Potential "up front" per square than an Ion ship, even one with multiple outputs.
While that/those Rails are reloading, the Ion is still chugging away, too. No, that's not about durability, but nobody is going to be around to complain about it if they're eating too many Ions between reloads. :)
Railguns are awesome, 'tis true. I like them, at times a bit more than a fancy Ion setup. I really love the Cannon's splash damage and boom-booms... But, glass cannons are built "as they are" and an Ion ship doesn't have to be built like that.
Oh, yeah - Nukes suck...
I had a tough enemy Nuke boat to deal with last night in Career mode. I lost 2/3 of the time in my reload/retries/experiments.
But, unlike most Rail ships, in many repeat engagements half my ship was literally gone and I was still able to get a few Ions contributing to the battle for a few short moments... The day was won, when I won it, by a lone combo battery of Disruptor/Flak/Heavy Laser that survived because it had yet to have any Nukes land nearby. I hate AI Nuke boats in Career mode... :)
So far, and I haven't finished a complete Career playthrough yet, Nuke encounters are largely RNG. For my single ship, the best tactic against a Nuker is to ram it and get my Ion beam eating towards a reactor. That's...it. So, I'm planning on adding another ship just to help counter Nukers.
Multiple smaller Cannon Rammer enemy ships seem to present the other "biggest threats" in Career for me so far. To counter that, I need to add some more reverse thrust. :)
/agreed
It can be a bit frustrating, though, to be having a fun time building a bit for "style" and then getting faced with the obvious - The game places no value on artistic sensibilities. :)
"Great looking" ships often end up in the Graveyards.
arguably one of my best ships I've made so far.... other than the cheesy fleeing ION prism with 14 emitters in 7 beams that just flees faster than any ship can catch them burning them to the ground.
Has been my Cannon Rammer. I got tired of fixing up my ship because they got through my shields and large cannon/small cannons. SO i made a bullwark on the front, and swapped to 6 Deck cannons and I play that ramming style.
I also counter intuitively have 2 railguns in the center for sniping targets like stations, OR if they are one of the faster ships that can outrun me.
They cannot outrun Rail gun bullet *(in TF2 Heavy gunner voice)*
So I engage with a pot shot (* sometimes ending the fight right there), and then rush in and smash their ship with deck fire.
my problem is this ship is not optimal... and i do NOT have the crew for it to be smooth.
I think i'm running 130 crew, in a ship that *wants* 300+.
need the fame.
I did make it a bit stylized though... so i'm still happy. Just need to paint it proper :/