Oh, ok, I get what you are saying now.
I suppose you do make a good point, but I don't think it is fair to say just because they fire 4 shots at lower damage per shot, that this means that if you take a big railgun, you should compare it to a laser that outputs similar damage per shot, after factoring in weight and research cost and what not.
Indeed, you were right when you said that they provide different roles in combat. However, I cannot agree that lasers are superior to railguns. I have literally played 50 or so early start campaigns, at both very high tech levels, and very low, and the only two types of ships that were able to beat the nastiest sort of spoilers, at very low tech levels, were masons and railguns.
You underestimate the power of railguns on a few fronts:
4 pellets means 4 chances to hit. When you fire upon a very fast ship, you have a chance to miss. With a laser, you either need to turret it, which will increase it's size, or you need to fire more shots.
At high enough caliber sizes, railguns will cause shock damage per pellet. This means 4 shock damage rolls per railgun. This is absurdly powerful. At the same focal size, a laser will ruin your day, end of story.
It takes more research investment for laser, period. Beam fire range is extremely expensive to research. When you consider the damage output of lasers at long range, it may seem like it's not worth bothering with, but if you want to call laser long range artillery, you must take into account that it costs absurdly high amounts of RP to set lasers up to use their maximum range.
Some lasers can have such a huge range, that no beam fire control can actually support it.
The problem you point out that I like smaller shots more than one big one, is that to set it up with lasers, it costs a lot more power. And it is not very useful either- it is just a drawback of railguns.
Consider this: If you have 4 damage 8 lasers, you will penetrate 1 spot, 4 times. The chance of hitting the same spot is so low it's not even worth calculating. Railguns don't have that problem. 4 railguns will fire 16 damage 2 pellets. The chance of hitting the same spot is worth considering, and on subsequent runs it will just chew up armor.
I think at the end of the day, lasers and railguns will always have different roles in combat, depending on their focal/caliber size. Small railguns are as useless as small lasers, as you have pointed out.
You say that a 15cm laser with a matching capacitor is the best all-around weapon. I am inclined to agree. But I have played with 15cm railguns, with matching capacitors, and I can guarantee that they are the best brawling weapon in existence, that not even mesons can match.
Consider these two ships:
Laser Boat class Cruiser 6,000 tons 234 Crew 2920.4 BP TCS 120 TH 3000 EM 0
25000 km/s Armour 6-29 Shields 0-0 Sensors 12/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 5 PPV 20
Maint Life 2.54 Years MSP 1521 AFR 57% IFR 0.8% 1YR 330 5YR 4945 Max Repair 1500 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months Spare Berths 0
3000 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (1) Power 3000 Fuel Use 233.83% Signature 3000 Exp 30%
Fuel Capacity 1,000,000 Litres Range 12.8 billion km (5 days at full power)
15cm C6 Far Ultraviolet Laser (5) Range 300,000km TS: 25000 km/s Power 6-6 RM 5 ROF 5 6 6 6 6 6 5 4 3 3 3
Fire Control S01.5 180-10000 (1) Max Range: 360,000 km TS: 10000 km/s 97 94 92 89 86 83 81 78 75 72
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor Technology PB-1 (3) Total Power Output 30 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor MR11-R1 (1) GPS 48 Range 11.5m km MCR 1.3m km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR345-R100 (1) GPS 14400 Range 345.6m km Resolution 100
Thermal Sensor TH2-12 (1) Sensitivity 12 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 12m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Railgun Boat class Cruiser 6,000 tons 240 Crew 2566.4 BP TCS 120 TH 3000 EM 0
25000 km/s Armour 6-29 Shields 0-0 Sensors 12/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 5 PPV 24
Maint Life 2.33 Years MSP 1337 AFR 57% IFR 0.8% 1YR 336 5YR 5035 Max Repair 1500 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 14 months Spare Berths 0
3000 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (1) Power 3000 Fuel Use 233.83% Signature 3000 Exp 30%
Fuel Capacity 1,000,000 Litres Range 12.8 billion km (5 days at full power)
15cm Railgun V4/C5 (4x4) Range 120,000km TS: 25000 km/s Power 9-5 RM 4 ROF 10 3 3 3 3 2 2 1 1 1 1
Fire Control S00.5 60-10000 (1) Max Range: 120,000 km TS: 10000 km/s 92 83 75 67 58 50 42 33 25 17
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor Technology PB-1 (2) Total Power Output 20 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor MR11-R1 (1) GPS 48 Range 11.5m km MCR 1.3m km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR345-R100 (1) GPS 14400 Range 345.6m km Resolution 100
Thermal Sensor TH2-12 (1) Sensitivity 12 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 12m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
The difference between these two ships is almost immediately visible. The railgun boat has one less railgun battery, lower deployment time and lower rate of fire. This railgun boat, in it's current state, obliterated the laser ship. The lasers could not penetrate the armor in one shot, and due to the fact that the railgun boat has 29 columns, every 10 seconds it returned 48 damage, in 16 pellets. The lasers did 30 damage every 5 seconds. Indeed, this is more than the railguns, but it did not matter. It could not penetrate the same spot, and the railguns chewed it out, with a 33% chance to hit the same spot. After the armor was cratered enough, it did not even matter.
But let's not draw the line here. Let's take it a step further, and pick a railgun caliber to match the 10 second ROF, with the capacitor-6 that the laser boat uses, and bring the number of weapons up to the same number, at the cost of our speed and tonnage.
Railgun Boat II class Cruiser 7,000 tons 275 Crew 2867.6 BP TCS 140 TH 3000 EM 0
21428 km/s Armour 7-32 Shields 0-0 Sensors 12/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 5 PPV 35
Maint Life 2.02 Years MSP 1280 AFR 78% IFR 1.1% 1YR 418 5YR 6277 Max Repair 1500 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months Spare Berths 2
3000 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (1) Power 3000 Fuel Use 233.83% Signature 3000 Exp 30%
Fuel Capacity 1,000,000 Litres Range 11.0 billion km (5 days at full power)
20cm Railgun V4/C6 (5x4) Range 120,000km TS: 21428 km/s Power 12-6 RM 4 ROF 10 4 4 4 4 3 2 2 2 1 1
Fire Control S00.5 60-10000 (1) Max Range: 120,000 km TS: 10000 km/s 92 83 75 67 58 50 42 33 25 17
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor Technology PB-1 (3) Total Power Output 30 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor MR11-R1 (1) GPS 48 Range 11.5m km MCR 1.3m km Resolution 1
Active Search Sensor MR345-R100 (1) GPS 14400 Range 345.6m km Resolution 100
Thermal Sensor TH2-12 (1) Sensitivity 12 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 12m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
These railguns are not matched for their max range, to round off to a close number, I added another layer of armor- and this has resulted in a 3 column increase of armor, with 7 depth. The railguns now fire 20 damage 4 pellets for a total of 80 damage per 10 seconds, or 40 damage per 5 seconds. Even in the previous example, if we kept the same number of railguns as lasers, the damage per 5 seconds would've been 30. But since it is obvious that lasers have the advantage in ROF, we are taking this little detour in matching the capacitors with the caliber on a 2:1 ratio.
This ship is bad news for the laser boat and whatever the hell gets within that 120k range. But obviously, considering we did this, it cannot defeat the laser ship, as it is now faster, due to it being lighter.
Even in the previous case, it could maintain it's range, if I wanted to set it up that way, but just looking at it statistically, I believe it is clear to see which ship is superior. In this scenario, obviously, speed is life. And if we were to get into a optimization arms race, the clear winner is the laser, as it is lighter. For this purpose I specifically used max power ratio to demonstrate this fact. The lasers are lighter, if we were reduced to just one weapon, the laser ship would be faster, and thus, able to maintain it's range away from the railguns, and end up victorious.
In closing, I did not mean to start a war over this. True, I found issue with your statements, due to my misunderstanding of what you originally intended to convey, but I hope this breakdown, and yours, will shed some light on the matter of beam weapons, where they are useful, and what role they fulfill.