Hey, currently after this latest patch the rails have a few major issues. The energy drain of the fighter ships makes chasing a target and firing at the same time basically impossible, and they weigh too much to be effective in close combat, which is basically what you are stuck with. They have been turned into a weapon where youll only get one or two shots in before they either run away/close in enough that you cannot dodge thier fire fast enough, and since thats not enough to kill its kinda made the rails weak.

I've heard they're good on hive queens :p.

Nah just kidding. I agree with you here Tramshed. I can't really see a use for them in PvP.

tactical weapon?

like you mount 2 weapons with 1 being the rail... use rail if people run or come boosting at you...

I have two PK's with rails. I have two PK's total.

Are those PKs from before or after the 1.1.6 patch, Rogue?

actually tramshed, that sounds like the rails I used to know and love. Way back before the new universe thats how the rails behaved energy wise, and their accuracy has always made them pretty much useless in a close up fight.

UN-fortunately i'm stuck at work for the next 10 hours and cant log into the game to try out the new toys.

ditto :(

Ditto ditto : <

Roguelazer: your example isn't that great. if I killed a prom in a stock bus, does that mean the bus is awesomer than the prom?

(n0, n00b, y0u may n0t answer that 0ne)

yes it does, evoli, in some ways. If a bus (6000 hp, 1S) can destroy a prom (~18000 hp, 2S 1L), that shows that a) the pilot of the bus knows his stuff, b) the prom pilot *really* can't dodge (the prom isn't that bad. You have a large port, and that should *easily* be able to take the bus even if you have nothing else loaded), and c) the prom needs more armor.

Celkan: I think you kinda missed my point. I don't mean the pilot.
I mean the ship itself. just because roguelazer can take out some pilot with rails, does not mean rails are very balanced.

*sigh. your post contradicted itself.

"yes it does, evoli, in some ways."
then:
If a bus (6000 hp, 1S) can destroy a prom (~18000 hp, 2S 1L), that shows that a) the pilot of the bus knows his stuff,

(The Pilot is the good thing, not the bus itself)

b) the prom pilot *really* can't dodge (the prom isn't that bad. You have a large port, and that should *easily* be able to take the bus even if you have nothing else loaded), and c) the prom needs more armor.

it's the pilot. not the bus. that made the difference.

the stock bus is usually weaker than the prom. and that's the point I want to make:

we're talking about ships setups, not pilots. so don't use incomplete arguments with more than one control group; if the ship is the experimental, than the pilots have to be a control--they have to be of comparable skill. Having 2 experimentals is just silly.

You guys are goin off topic, ive got quite a few kills with rails and currently the rails need something done for them, they dont fire fast enough to kill anyone closing in on you, and most fighter ships just cant support the energy now

Rails are supposed to be a sniper weapon as I understand it. This means that they *should* have a slow rate of fire and they *should* have a high energy usage. I personally don't think the rails have been nerfed at all... you're not supposed to be able to turbo after someone and hit them with rails, they just aren't that type of weapon.

I've always used rails as more of a defensive weapon or as a way to break an energy fight stalemate. I recently fought spider using rails and scored a few hits on him, he got me in the end but the fight was quite close.

If anything perhaps there could be a railgun mkII added into the game that had a slightly higher damage and slightly higher velocity.

Rails mkII and mkIII are already in the game, however, no change to velocity only change the damage/energy consumption/weight.

And yeah, it was fun, I think you hit me twice with that rail, most of my suffering was myself bringing doom on me with ramming. I've lost the touch.

being that the rail is a 'sniper weapon' it should make the victim say "OUCH!" when he gets hit by one.. in any other FPS that's the reaction you'd get when taking a hit by a sniper rifle. I think even a moderately armored ship should take about a 25% blow to armor when getting hit by a rail. now with that give.. I think the railgun's mass and sluggishness would be justified. If it did that much, maybe even more mass would be a better balance (I haven't really studied the statistics much, this is all speculation). someone armed with a railgun should do just that, snipe. close range or midrange combat would be nerfed for you if you've got a railgun armed. your chance would be to take them out or crippled them before they get to you.. and if they're down to, say, 25% when they DO get to you, you can take em out with a few nicely placed shots with a neutron or gauss cannon. just as an actual sniper would bust out a small pistol in case of a close-quarters encounter.

please don't flame me for this! i'm just trying to offer something that might make it nice, I may have screwed up on someof the numbers, but like I said, i'm speculating. (i'm at work so I can't look it up :P )

I think Apex is right. When I first got access to the rails I was like now the bots will fear me. Due to what I figured I could do with a rail gun. But I was sadly let down. I was expecting it a pack a huge punch. I mean this thing is like a huge AP (Armour Percing) round. It should make big holes in stuff, causing massive damage to the ships. I mean when I think rail guns I think of huge gun that shoot large AP slugs that drop any thing in a short time.

Beyond this, the MKII and MKIII verions of the rail gun suck as well. I mean, we just killed a lot of players to get this, make them a little better!

APEX, if a ship receives 25% damage, just on 1 hit. Imagine what a quad rail hornet can then do... Namely kill you instantly.

We have had this insanely strong rail, and it has been deemed non fun to be insta killed and not have had a chance to fight back or even come closer.

It was nerfed because of it, and yes it needs a small beefing up, but not in that manner.

cheers

A desire for a potent sniper gun leaves me desiring ships to have a feature of an XL port. something that only say, a specialized hornet or prometheus could have.
maybe something like this?:

Hornet (heavy gunship version) (or maybe a new ship design?)
liscense req: (/5/-/8/-/-)
cruise: 40m/s
turbo: 190m/s
drain: 70e
mass: 7000kg (?)
1 XL port
1 s port
cargo: 8cu
spin Torque: (same)

ship:

(XL) Railgun MkIII
(S) neutron MkIII

(edit):

(XL) Railgun MkIII (or something like it):
liscense req: (/-/8/8/-/-)
damage: 4000
velocity: 450m/s
reload: 5 seconds
mass: 2500kg

all of these are tentative stats, I don't know at this point exactly what would be the most balanced, but you get the idea.

All that really needs to be done to rails to dernerf them is drop the energy usage quite a bit. With a moderate energy usage the rail would be much better and since it would still weigh an assload and has a limited amount of ammo it would still be pretty balanced.