How good are mining lasers in ship - ship combat?

[Freezie]

considering they're build into the deck, it seems like you could build a ship with alot of shields and armour plates.

[CptnRedstone]

They're technically viable as weapons but are outclassed by pretty much everything else. They're supposed to be usable in combat, but mostly as a "last ditch effort" sort of thing. Deck cannons offer the same defensive ability and do significantly more damage (not to mention they can actually aim properly), and large ion cores offer the same hitscan, far better damage, range, and accuracy, all without sacrificing much surface area.

[tuti250]

I'm trying them out in my current run! I'm just left the level 6 sector and I still have my mining lasers.

I started with the Model S and Heavy Laser Blaster. After getting a bit of cash I switched to 4 Standard Cannons fed by 2 Ammo Factories with two shields covering them and some armor. Behind that I had my Mining Lasers, two of them at that point iirc.

I think this was a great combo. The shields' weakness to Distruptors is lessened by the toughness of the Cannons. The Cannons need Sulfur to manufacture Ammo, the Mining Lasers are already in place to get it. The Mining Lasers are energy-hungry, but the Cannons barely use any energy for their ammo production. Both the Cannon and Mining Laser need to be in close range of the enemy.

The Mining Laser by itself has a very short range and requires a lot of power to sustain its fire. It deals 75% of the DPS of a Heavy Laser Blaster. However it require only 1 operator and it has enough batteries to fire for a bit; you might be able to rush down the opposing ship before the energy becomes an issue. The Mining Laser is also roof-mounted so you can add it without making your front larger.

I'm currently entering a level 7-9 sector and I'm not sure I will keep the mining lasers as a main weapon. I have a front of standard cannons protected by small shields and with a layer of armor behind them. The shields and 6 mining lasers are sustained by two medium reactors. A shell of armor surrounds my reactors and resource storage. An opening is left for the newly added missile launchers. This ship is getting very heavy and can't chase down kiters like the Hotwiser, although I hope the new missiles will help with that. I could also start looking at the Deck Cannon.

[Bobucles]

The mining laser is itself unimpressive, but being top mounted is a huge deal. Top mounts add a second line of firepower, which can be stacked with more front line weapons or turtled up behind heavy defenses. The short range does force the ship into a brawling type of role, so it's probably better to go heavy defense and add auxiliary weapons like missiles.

[Person001]

Your ship would have to be horizontally long, I've only had good results with 6 or more in stages 10+, but you have to be able to get around to their engines to cripple the enemy ship pretty much first priority... which makes its play extremely rinse/repeat.

You can scavenge very quickly, but you need 130+ movement, most ships in later tiers won't move quickly, but seem to turn on a dime.

[HuMaNgUtAn]

I made a nice starter ship with 2 mining lasers once, which did quite fine for the first system. and helped get an economy head start- but I wouldn't try it on Admiral difficulty.

How I like to use them is on my main miner / deck gun ram. the mining lasers are un-crewed for combat but located right nearby the deck guns and the crew can switch duties very quickly by turning off the deck guns. This is useful if you get caught salvaging or if you want to finish an enemy off with the mining lasers for bigger profits.

The main reason I do this is because I don't really rate the mining lasers in combat and running this dual purpose ship allows me tonnes of them (2 per deck gun) for salvaging while costing me 0 crew.

[fbspamme]

I seem to recall somebody made a mining laser ship with tons of armour in the shape of the letter U. It had many mining lasers on both arms of the letter U. I cannot say how well it worked but I am tempted to try something like that out in creative mode.

I guess it just flies up to the ship and eats it with the mining laser?

[Person001]

Originally posted by fbspamme:

I seem to recall somebody made a mining laser ship with tons of armour in the shape of the letter U. It had many mining lasers on both arms of the letter U. I cannot say how well it worked but I am tempted to try something like that out in creative mode.

I guess it just flies up to the ship and eats it with the mining laser?

That sounds awesome!!

[Daynen Drakeson]

Mining lasers aren't the go-to weapon for most because other weapons hit so much harder and faster. The nice thing about mining lasers as weapons is that you actually get to salvage the juicy bits of the enemy ships. Nukes and cannons just blow up reactors, leaving you with mostly steel and some coils, but if you can successfully "mine" the enemy to death, you get ALL of it. Uranium, processors, diamonds, all the good stuff. It takes some lateral thinking to make mining lasers work in combat but you can get SO much more out of it if you do.

Try pairing them with disruptors to get past enemy shields. Just make sure you have large reactors close to your lasers because they're power hungry little bois.

[Dakone]

Originally posted by Freezie:

considering they're build into the deck, it seems like you could build a ship with alot of shields and armour plates.

From what I got from dps wise.. you need 6 per each deck cannon.

[fbspamme]

I wonder if anybody can show a sample design with more than 24 mining lasers?

I wonder how many mining lasers can be powered by a medium reactors? or a large reactor?

I am not very good with ship design, so I am curious to see what other people can come up with.

[icuurd12b42]

Originally posted by fbspamme:

I wonder if anybody can show a sample design with more than 24 mining lasers?

I wonder how many mining lasers can be powered by a medium reactors? or a large reactor?

I am not very good with ship design, so I am curious to see what other people can come up with.

You need 2 large reactor for 26 mining lasers

or 6 medium reactors

Use my calculator
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18GdqKIhhClvSvCSowcg9erB8ReViwQm7Sz_0RFGsJA8/edit#gid=2047452809