Advanced Plasma Accelerator

Class 3 Plasma Accelerator

A faster firing plasma accelerator that sacrifices per shot damage to achieve the increased fire rate.

— In-Game Description

The Advanced Plasma Accelerator is a Plasma Accelerator variant that has a higher rate of fire in exchange for reduced damage per shot. This weapon is a merit reward in Powerplay.

Usage

Like the Plasma Accelerator, it projects relatively slow moving plasma projectiles from a fixed mount and can be challenging to hit with, but is compensated for by relatively high damage that ignores Armour Hardness and is highly effective against shields and hull alike - even if protected by specialist Bulkheads. The Advanced Plasma Accelator's increased fire rate may make it easier to hit with each shot, and pilots who can keep every shot on target will be rewarded by more overall DPS than its Plasma Accelerator equivalent.

Compared to the class 3 Plasma Accelerator, the Advanced Plasma Accelerator has 41% damage per shot, 286% ROF, and a resultant 124% DPS; but has a distributor draw that is 116% and a thermal load of 145% over sustained fire. It has an ammo clip size of 20 and a maximum ammo of 300 compared to the Plasma Accelerator's clip size of 5 and maximum of 100. Given its ROF, this means it will be able to fire longer than the Plasma Accelerator before exhausting its ammunition.

It is important to note that one of the biggest advantages of the standard Plasma Accelerator is its high damage per shot and low shot interval. Allowing players to deal maximum damage in a short time window allows normal plasma weapons to be more effective against very agile enemies, especially in PVP use cases, where there may be only very short opportunities to hit a target. The Advanced Plasma Accelerator largely sacrifices this benefit, requiring greater time on target, and can therefore be considered a downgrade in some ways. Much like the Imperial Hammer, it might be considered most useful for triggering Power Plant detonations, its higher rate of fire allowing multiple hits much more rapidly than a standard C3 Plasma Accelerator. While it does have slightly higher DPS than its standard counterpart, its higher rate of fire requires greater and more constant effort, and so may not always be desired for standard damage purposes.

It is a very expensive weapon which quickly goes through expensive ammunition, so pilots hoping to get access to it should ensure they have sufficient credits to purchase it before reaching the required rank in Powerplay.

Specifications

Class	3
Rating	B
Mass (T)	8.00
Integrity	64
Weapon Mode	Fixed
Damage Type	Absolute Kinetic Thermic
Power Draw (MW)	1.97
Damage	34.40
ROF	0.83
DPS	28.67
Thermal Load/shot	11
Distributor Draw (MW)	5.5
Armour Pierce Rating	100
Ammo Clip Size	20
Ammo Maximum	300
Reload Time (s)	6.0
Damage Falloff Range (m)	2000
Maximum Range (m)	3500
Value(CR)	4,576,800

• Damage Type for all Plasma Accelerators is divided as follows:
  • Absolute: 60%
  • Thermal: 20%
  • Kinetic: 20%
• Absolute Damage ignores shield resistances.
• Thermal load and distributor draw are given per shot. Multiply by the ROF to get per second for comparisons.