Has anyone tried out Laser Heads in a recent game?

[blue emu (OP)]

Has anyone tried using X-Ray Laser Heads on their Anti-Ship Missiles? In my current home game, I'm trying it out now. Just wondering what to expect.

The only opponents that I've encountered so far are the precursors... so for a proper controlled test, I'm going to need to build some Boarding Shuttles and Marine Companies, send an Assault Carrier with my attack force, destroy all the opposing precursor warships except one, bombard that one with Laser Head missiles (trying my damnedest to immobilize it without destroying it), and then board and capture it.

The whole idea of that rigamarole is that I want to see what sort of damage profile the Laser Heads inflict on Armor, and I can't examine the Armor unless I own the ship myself... so I'll need to NEARLY destroy it, and then capture it.

[Havear]

I've used them. Laser heads inflict the same damage profile as normal missiles, so lack penetration, have half the damage total as a standard warhead, and of the damage that they do have, it's evenly distributed among the beams. They also seem to cost half as much, but considering a sandpapering effect far worse then that of railguns, I consider them useless in their current state. I hope Steve revisits them soonish so they perform effectively as standoff weapons.

[blue emu (OP)]

I've used them.

Recently?

Laser heads inflict the same damage profile as normal missiles, so lack penetration, have half the damage total as a standard warhead...

I don't think this is still correct... at least, not according to the info on the missile design screen.

With Cobalt missile-tech (normally 1.0 MSP = strength-10 damage), I get the following results displayed (but not yet tested):

Warhead less than 0.6, the "Laser Heads" indicator disappears (even while still strength-1).
Warhead 0.6 MSP = 1 x strength-1
Warhead 0.8 MSP = 1 x strength-2
Warhead 1.3 MSP = 1 x strength-3
Warhead 1.5 MSP = 2 x strength-3
Warhead 1.8 MSP = 2 x strength-4

[Havear]

Yes, as in 5.60.

You get one laser head per warhead MSP. 1 MSP devoted to warhead, 1 laser head. Here's a standard 5 msp warhead.

Missile Size: 6 MSP  (0.3 HS)     Warhead: 60    Armour: 0     Manoeuvre Rating: 12

Here's the same missile with a laser head.
Missile Size: 6 MSP  (0.3 HS)     Warhead: 30    Armour: 0     Manoeuvre Rating: 12
Laser Heads: 5

While I originally thought that each laser produced a strength-30 hit, instead each produces a strength-6 hit.

I also have the armor penetration data images from a test I performed about two weeks ago.

[Steve Walmsley]

I've used them. Laser heads inflict the same damage profile as normal missiles, so lack penetration, have half the damage total as a standard warhead, and of the damage that they do have, it's evenly distributed among the beams. They also seem to cost half as much, but considering a sandpapering effect far worse then that of railguns, I consider them useless in their current state. I hope Steve revisits them soonish so they perform effectively as standoff weapons.

I will revisit them at some point. I did a lot of work on laser heads for Newtonian Aurora so I will probably look at a simplified version for standard Aurora.

Steve

[Vynadan]

There's been some discussion and even testing in this thread, especially the first post on the second page. Apparently, laser warhead missiles circumvent final fire PD entirely, including CIWS.

[Havear]

That's what they're *supposed* to do, but don't.