I'd like to express again my point of view about the Chain Guns, those nice particle-based extremelly-high refiring rate energy weapons everybody seems to own and use.
They are just TOO POWERFUL for being weapons of such refire rate. Some of the basic ideas of the game is, for example, Plasma weapons which has a slow speed and refire rate but does impressive damage, Laser weapons that does reduced damage but high refire rate and Particle weapons are supposed to have a decent refire rate and damage output but high energy costs. But what I see is a very high refiring gun proportional to the damage of a Plasma Gun (this is not a fact, it's just something I perceive), it's likelly you'll hit stuff like mines and missiles with little energy usage, and you can land an amazing amounts of hit because of the fast nature of a "Chain Gun", with almost the same damage as a slow refiring weapon.
Now, about Solaris... Why does it haves such disturbing range and speed? I don't even consider that weapon a "Chain Gun" thought, since it's refire rate is almost as high as a normal Particle Weapon... i'd say its unbalanced too....
My point is, that those monsters are just too powerful! :(
Hm. Yeah. Early on, I decided they were the most effective weapons in the early-game (Bluebells beat out every single other Class 4 just by virtue of energy use, range, shot speed, and damage-per-second - AKA Damage*Refire). They tended to drain my powerplant fairly quick (energy use of 4 for each shot, at a 33.33 shot rate is very hungry), but they would also kill the enemy before the ship-wide capacitors went dry.
Also, I have an idea for an experimental weapon: A LASER (Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation) that really is a laser. Make a Laser-based weapon with the highest refire rate (33.33 seems to be a pretty damn good refire rate), give it the fastest shot speed (Damned if I know, but if 1000 km/s is possible, that sounds good for a first experimental model), and the crappiest damage-per-shot and energy consumption in the univerese (a point less energy than the average Chain Guns of a relative Class (3 for Level 4s, for instance) and fractionally less damage). Range can be standard for Laser weapons (700?).
"In metric units, c is exactly 299,792,458 metres per second (1,079,252,848.8 km/h). Note that this speed is a definition, not a measurement. Since the fundamental SI unit of length, the metre, has been defined since October 21, 1983 in terms of the speed of light; one metre is the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. Converted to imperial units, the speed of light is approximately 186,282.397 miles per second, or 670,616,629.384 miles per hour, or almost one foot per nanosecond."
Anyway, carry on the discussion of the uber 'Chain Guns'.
The chain guns are fine as they are. They use tremendous amounts of energy, so it is not exactly "easy" to use them.
Chainguns use your energy faster than the other guns of its class. Also, you must keep a sustained fire on another fighter to chew its shield. Not true of 4.00 and 2.00 guns. One shot does decent damage. The chaingun alerts the enemy to dodge and they do, Making sustained fire difficult.
Because of this and a few other factors, they are well balanced with the other guns. Personally I think fighter weaponry is perfectly balanced at the current time.
chainguns are fine now... They chew my power plant, even on a werewolf (aka large power plant). Really bad for pirating, which is what i do, but really good for pvp which i do too. (the solaris that is)
normal chainguns are fine, because you dont hit that often with a chaingun....i prefer 4.00 refire guns though 3.03 and 2.00 are tolerable for me. Its the projectile speed im really concerned about. I can never get my guns to hit the target in unison because one or more projectiles always lags behind.
nevermind.
I'm OK with most of the chainguns, but I too am a bit confused about the Solaris. Why is it's shot speed and range so ridiculously high? As far as I'm concerned, it's one of the best overall fighter/freighter guns in the game. I'm not sure there's any other gun that does as much damage per second... and the Solaris does it with shots that go twice as fast and twice as far as shots from other guns. Power consumption isn't even that bad.
Also, it would be good if we could find "owners" for some of these guns that don't seem to belong to any faction.
Solaris is fine, but the damage could be taken down a bit to compensate for its accuracy through speed.
The projectile is really small for the solaris. I dont use it since it rarly hits for me. and McNeo, I PvPed you once... hehe. My talon was flying rings around you and you barly hit me with your solaris guns. I think I even hit you with a nova when you were still. Untill your friend came, Iwould not have died.
Regardless of size, I find the solaris is completely balanced while its range makes it effective at getting the first shot in. It allows a period of time where you can hit your opponent but he can't hit you - that's critical when you're dogfighting at 1.1k away from each other. Get a few hits in, retreat, get a few hits in, retreat, etc... I think that it is not overpowered, but it is extremely good in the correct hands (just like plasma weapons and mini razors are good in the correct hands as well)
Solaris has high speed and pretty good damage, but will completely empty your energy bar faster than any other gun. The Purple Goddess is same slot class (10) but uses less energy and less damage. Solaris for capships is the way it is because its an anti-fighter weapon. On fighters its a spray-and-pray weapon.