Assault cruiser build

Hey all. Now that I'm routinely picking up class 11 gear drops, and starting to buy fleet weapons (now that we can, yay!) I'm curious for some advice from you game veterans re: beam weapons. I've already committed to a fleet photon torp in the front, and for now I"m using my transphasic cluster torp in the back (approach the target, drop the shields with narrow-arc high damage direct-fire weapons, then turn away, where wide-angle weaps keep the shields down during the turn, and the cluster enters through a down shield. Wait for the forward torp to reload, then turn back and repeat).

Which beam weapons should I invest in? I was using tetryon for the possible extra shield nerf, but recently switched to phasers. Any advice?

Thanks all.

Vanyev

my favorite beam weapon is a disruptor. they don't take long to go through shields and once they do, they are nasty on the enemy's hull. Anti proton is good too but they are pretty much useless if you dont have a high critical chance. this is just my opinion though.

I like the dual proc weapons, like the phased tetryon, polarized disruptors, and phased polaron. They have two weapon procs. I think the polarized disruptors are probably my favorite.

If you're soloing, doing missions or other solo content, then honestly it doesn't matter much. You can take a constitution-class through any mission in the game, space battles in regular content are pretty easy.

If you're doing team content, like STF's and the like, flying a beam boat your dps is always going to be on the weak side so I prefer weapons with good procs.

thanks... but what be procs?

sirvanyev wrote:thanks... but what be procs?

Sorry, gamer slang. A proc is an effect that has a chance to go off when attacking something (or when you get hit).

All the energy weapons in star trek have a proc, they're the specific weapon effects:
Phasers - have a chance to disable a subsystem
Tetryon - do extra shield damage
Plasma - DoT (Damage of Time) effect
Disrupter - Damage resistance debuff
Anti-proton - critical damage
Polaron - reduce system power levels

The dual type weapons have the procs from two different energy weapon types. So, the polarized disruptors have the disrupts damage resistance debuff as well as polaron's energy drain. Phased tetryon has phaser and tetryon. Phased polaron has phaser and disruptor.

If you're curious, the word comes from MUDs back in the bygone early days of internet. In the programming, items would have effects linked to them with a tag called "spec_proc" which stood for special procedure. So people would talk about the spec_procs of items, and later it got shortened to proc.

cool, thanks! Now I just need to figure out if I want the extra damage to be either before or after I drop the shields.....

I run all beam boats and, IMO, Polarized Disruptor is, hands down, the best in the game, currently. They're fairly inexpensive on the Exchange though the disruptor consoles can be expensive. 2nd best would be Antiproton but you need a decent crit chance already for the proc to be of much use. If so, though, they can be nearly as effective as Polarized Disruptor.

For what it's worth, the flavor of the month build for this is an aux to battery fit.

Using the fleet assault cruiser, you'd go something like:
x3 beams front and back
Wide angle quantum torp front (if you have it, your favorite torp if not)
Borg cutting beam back

Use your universal for science, get hazard emitters and transfer shield strength

For engineering boffs you want: emergency power to shields and auxiliary to battery on one, emergency to auxiliary, auxiliary to battery, emergency to shields, and direct energy modulation on the other.

For tac boffs, you want torp spread, tactical team 1, attack pattern beta, and fire all weapons.

Then you need three purple technician boffs (these can be got for free doing the b'tran cluster chain missions).

The basics of it is: The technicians reduce your boff ability cooldowns whenever you use aux to battery, with three of them your cooldowns will be 30% shorter. So you'll be able to spam your abilities much more often than normal. Not only that, but aux to batteries will up your shield, weapon, and engine powers so you'll be doing more damage, have stronger shields, and go faster in most situations. Be sure to use emergency to aux before triggering your heals, to maximize their effect.

Should be pretty high damage output for a beam boat, and with the reduced cooldown for your heals should still be pretty tanky. Plus, remember, superior dps is a pretty good tank as well. If you blow something up it can't shoot you, so you've reduced the incoming dps.