Since it's only a matter of time before the secrets of Trans-Newtonian weaponry are revealed, it's time for another helpful guide that the players can read on their pleasure:
BEAM WEAPONRY AND YOU! AND OH OH SOME MISSILES TOO!
There are several different types of weapons in Aurora:
- Laser
- Meson
- Microwave
- Plasma Carronade
- Particle Beam
- Rail
- Gauss
- Missile
There are significant differences between them.
1) SPECIAL BEAM WEAPONS
Meson -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meson
- Ignores shields, armour, atmosphere and ground
- Starts with a range of 15,000 km
- Deals only 1 point of damage, regardless of range
- Requires capacitors and power plants
- Can be placed into a turret
- Uses 2 techs - Meson Focal Size and Meson Focusing
Microwave -
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/hpm.htm
- Ignores armour, cannot penetrate atmosphere
- Starts with a range of 15,000 km
- Deals 3 points of damage on shields, 1 point of damage to electric equipment
- Requires capacitors and power plants
- Cannot be placed into a turret
- Uses 2 techs - Microwave Focal Size and Microwave Focusing
So, these two special beam weapons have their uses, though only in specialized circumstances, as their short range severely hampers them. NOTE: Meson placed on a planet works everywhere on that planet, regardless of the diameter/radius of that planet, as Aurora calculates all distances from the centre of a body. Technically, all the player PDCs on Earth are on top of each other in the centre of Earth.
2) OTHER BEAM WEAPONS
Laser -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed-energy_weapon#Lasers
- Cannot penetrate atmosphere
- Starts with a range of 30,000 km
- Damage falls off with range
- Requires capacitors and power plants
- Can be placed into a turret
- Uses 2 techs - Laser Focal Size and Laser Type
Laser is the "basic" beam weapon, useful for many purposes and is probably the easiest one to research.
Plasma Carronade -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_weapon
- Cannot penetrate atmosphere
- Starts with a range of 60,000 km
- Very high damage
- Requires capacitors and power plants
- Cannot be placed into a turret
- Uses only 1 tech - Calibre of the carronade
Plasma carronade is a burst-fire, point-blank weapon, in that increasing its range is difficult and it has a slow reload rate, as its energy demands are enormous compared to other beam weapons.
Particle Beam -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particle_beam
- Cannot penetrate atmosphere
- Starts with a range of 60,000 km
- Damage is fixed regardless of range
- Requires capacitors and power plants
- Cannot be placed into a turret
- Uses 2 techs - Particle Beam Strength and Particle Beam Range
The main competitor of Laser weapons. Laser will deal more damage on short range, whereas Particle Beam will out-damage Laser on long range.
Rail guns -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railgun
- Cannot penetrate atmosphere (illogical but true)
- Starts with a range of 10,000 km
- Shoots four projectiles at once which can hit different parts of enemy ship, damage is not affected by range
- Requires capacitors and power plants
- Cannot be placed into a turret
- Uses 2 techs - Calibre of the gun and Railgun Launch Velocity
While it loses out to Laser in range, it's capability for higher rate of fire keeps rail guns in the competition. Useful for PD due to that element even if cannot be placed into turrets, especially in early game as each time RG fires, it has four chances to hit, instead of one.
Gauss cannon -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coilgun
- Cannot penetrate atmosphere
- Starts with a range of 10,000 km
- Shoots several shots every 5 seconds, though damage is fixed at 1
- Does NOT require capacitors or power plants
- Can be placed into a turret
- Uses 2 techs - GC Launch Velocity and GC Rate of Fire
Gauss cannon is pretty much the ultimate point defence weapon, though it's low damage and short range mean that it's not a very versatile weapon.
Every beam weapon, except for the Gauss Cannon, require Capacitors and Power Plants. Capacitor level means how much power the weapon can absorb per every 5 second pulse. Power plants determine how much power the ship/PDC can produce every 5 second pulse. Power Plants can be stacked to generate more power but a weapon is stuck with a certain capacitor until a new weapon is designed. So it is important to notice that
Capacitor Recharge Rate technology under Power/Propulsion is
extremely important if you ever want to wield any other weapons besides missiles and gauss cannons.
3) MISSILES
- Missiles can vary from Size 1 to Size 100
- Missiles require a launcher that is at least as large as the missile itself, though it can be larger
- Missiles require several different technologies:
- Warhead
- Agility
- Engine
- Launcher Reload Rate
- Magazine Ejection System
- Magazine Feed System
- Missiles are capable of multiple mission types:
- Missile interception (Anti-Missile Missiles)
- Ship destruction (Anti-Ship Missiles)
- Planetary bombardment (Bombs or "Siege missiles")
- MIRV-capable for the two missions above
- Sensor platform (Active, Passive, Geological)
- Ultra-long range drones carrying any of the four above
- Missiles must be build using ordnance factories
- Missiles can be carried in launchers but for reloads, magazines are needed
- Launchers can be miniaturized with the cost of reload rate, up to Box-launchers that can only be reloaded in hangar, boat bay or with maintenance facilities
- Direct hit to a magazine can cause catastrophic secondary explosions
- Missiles can be fitted with homing heads
- Missiles can be armoured
Every missile is a balanced compromise between warhead strength, speed and endurance. Installing homing sensors eats room from the other three. Missiles can easily reach multi-million kilometre ranges. Thus there is no possibility for a multi-purpose, general missile. Well, it's possible but wouldn't make any sense. Engagements can easily require hundreds of missiles, so while tactically missiles are almost always superior to other weapons, strategically they carry a heavy price in minerals, money and especially logistics.
Your military advisors will recommend that your future ships and planetary defence centres should be armed with various weapons. Naturally, you can overrule them and pick your favourites.