Weapon Balance Question: Turbolasers versus Ion Cannons

[wminsing]

So is it just me or are Turbolasers still absolutely better than Ion Cannons? You get them at similar points in the Tech Tree, they do similar levels of damage, but Turbolasers are 'laser' class weapons and can benefit from the 'Rapid Fire Lasers' and 'X-Ray Lasers' techs which grant then RF and AP, at which point the become much better overall in my experience. Am I missing something major? The AI seems to favor Ion Cannons.

-Will

[bjg]

Had never cared for Ion Beams in SiS. They are needed to research Disruptors and Neutron Beams though.

[Arioch]

There are two issues. First, Ion cannons were supposed to be a different damage type (electrical/charged), but instead were implemented as another "heat" beam weapon. Second, a number of nice mods were implemented for lasers, but not for the other weapon types. So there's not really any compelling reason to use ion beams over turbolasers.

If we ever get around to implementing the tactical revisions for AoE, template weapons and more specialty weapons, I'd like to try to get the "charged" damage type implemented as it was originally envisioned.

[wminsing]

Ok, so they are supposed to be just be different, but the current engine doesn't reflect that, which is fine. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing some game mechanic that would have made my Turbo-laser strategy obviously wrong.

-Will

[TheDeadlyShoe]

There is one major flaw in sticking to laser techs - interceptors and strikefighters scale with your best researched weapon, and rapidfire/xray mods don't help.

[Arioch]

It's possible in the future that we could make mods available to small craft as well.