What length are your railguns? 30 accelerators?

[Daniel_USA]

I read online that it basically stops at 30 long and then changes formula.

Do y'all do multiple railguns at shorter accelerators?

[Plaus42]

The shorter the railgun the more dps per cost efficient it becomes. In pvp the most popular rail archetype uses mostly 4 accelerators. Kites often use 8 as that is when they reach their maximum range.
For career ships though you can make them a lot longer into the late game in order to save on surface area. I just recommend sticking to 8 length rails in the beginning.

[Daniel_USA]

Originally posted by Plaus42:

The shorter the railgun the more dps per cost efficient it becomes. In pvp the most popular rail archetype uses mostly 4 accelerators. Kites often use 8 as that is when they reach their maximum range.
For career ships though you can make them a lot longer into the late game in order to save on surface area. I just recommend sticking to 8 length rails in the beginning.

thank you. I am asking for career in particular.

[mrolli]

with railguns it's less about damage than penetration. max lenght you can fit has 359%, that's 45900 dmg and 15*4.59 = 68.85m peneration. If no shielding or armor is present (or depeleted from pervious shots), that is a 1 shot kill.
Funniest part is, if you have the sensor and a duel barrel (make the right next to each other) railgun and some enemies don't have sensors, yet. You chase from behind, i shot into the bridge / reactor and they are dead.
Most ingame ships also only give limited chase. then they turn and it's game over for them.
just finished playthrough where i basically went dual barrel railguns and speed. grand adrimal, starwright and scarce crew. only for the level 18 enemies i then changed to a dirffrent design.

[pkoko]

for career--> there is no max range or dmg? I am confused.

[mrolli]

for carreer it's +359% = 459% of the base value for dmg / peneratrion and max range is limited always to 600m. without mods, you can't fit anything bigger. you would have to activate the big ships mod (built in) to make longer ones. then you could go up to something like 450'000 dmg / 675m of penetration (range still is limited to 600m). but you now have a 1200m long railgun..., kind of akward to aim.
i think the tolltip simply run out of space.

[blackknight24]

i think its 8 that maxxes out range, but more will increase dmg and velocity.

[Paradox]

8 for max range (600). Then, you can choose to either build more of them and/or to build them longer. I typically build more of them long before I consider building them longer, but it depends a lot on your ship. You can build some shorter and some longer, to accommodate your design, but the goal should be at least 8 for max range.