So what are the best Railjack weapons currently?

[JackHargreav]

I like my Lavan Apoc and it does a nice amount of damage.

But for the gunners I don't know what would be the best. 

The Cryophon seems really annoying to use. So that one is out of question.

[Knight_Prospekt]

I'm having pretty good results with Zetki Mk III Apocs in my pilot seat with Lavan Mk III Carcinnox for my gunners.

[Hawk_of_the_Reborn]

Try carcinnox's of the best tier you can get. I don't know what tier your clan has researched up to or what missions you do, but I would go for Vidar mk(insert best number you got here) Carcinnox as the damage types it uses. Plasma deals damage that's like corrosive procs, slowly reducing enemy ships damage reduction over a short time before ramping up to its peak. This is very useful for 'prepping' crewships up before you hit em with a dome charge(Assuming you have Gunnery 5). If not, then they are pretty viable as their longer range than Apocs lend better forgiveness on enemies further out. Chem damage is the part that makes me choose Carcinnox's. This damage type, for some reason or other, listed as Toxin on the wiki. But it acts instead as a Radiation proc, meaning it confuses the target. Which is kind of a cool thing, cuz it helps get the crewships to stop shooting at you as much if there are still fighters and other things around.

[Skaleek]

My buddy has mentioned pulsar's are quite good. Personally i stopped playing Railjack for a bit since i got my vidar reactor. Burnt out so waiting to regenerate my stamina and let DE settle their changes.

[JackHargreav]

Hmm so the Carcinnox is still popular.

Good thing I have the Lavan and the Zetki version.

The vidar needs resources.

[JackHargreav]

12 minutes ago, Skaleek said:

My buddy has mentioned pulsar's are quite good. Personally i stopped playing Railjack for a bit since i got my vidar reactor. Burnt out so waiting to regenerate my stamina and let DE settle their changes.

Yeah I actually tried out the Zetki mk3 version and I liked it in the pilot seat. It melts stuff really quickly.

But I don't know if It's ideal for the side guns.

[DrakeWurrum]

I prefer Cryophon for the pilot seat, but that was before the hotfix to adjust the guns. I haven't played around with it too much yet, but my main reasoning is that the slow-firing, hard-hitting guns work better for the pilot so the ship isn't spinning around like crazy.

I usually go Carcinnox for the side-guns, but I've started to experiment and see what fits better. I might use Pulsar or Apoc instead, but I like the longer range on the Carcinnox. Photor might be worth trying now, come to think of it... but seem harder to aim.

One thing you can try is joining other people's ships and try out their side-guns, so you don't have to waste resources.

Edited January 14, 2020 by DrakeWurrum

[TheGrimCorsair]

Zekti Cryophons for wing guns and Zekti Photor for nose gun are decent, though Carcinox is probably better.

Just tell your gunners not to be shy with the missiles.

[Skaleek]

40 minutes ago, JackHargreav said:

Yeah I actually tried out the Zetki mk3 version and I liked it in the pilot seat. It melts stuff really quickly.

But I don't know if It's ideal for the side guns.

From what I hear, pulsar is effectively hitscan. Ideally you want hitscan on the gunner weapons, depending on your pilots flying style. I personally maneuver and boost a lot so i don't want my gunners to have to guess where to shoot. I would never put cryophon or apoc on the gunner turret, for example. Even pre-nerf.

Edited January 14, 2020 by Skaleek

[hendrix923]

I run Zetki MK3 Cryophon on the front turret and Zetki MK3 Carcinox on the sides both have high rolls.  Have the damage/turret heat avionics maxed which gives an extra shot or two.  I’ve tested a few different weapons and the Cryophon seems like the best TTK wise (can 1 shot Gian Point enemies). Just need to be disciplined trigger wise. Using homing missiles and particle ram to soften up groups of enemies is a big help. 

[JackHargreav]

50 minutes ago, Skaleek said:

From what I hear, pulsar is effectively hitscan. Ideally you want hitscan on the gunner weapons, depending on your pilots flying style. I personally maneuver and boost a lot so i don't want my gunners to have to guess where to shoot. I would never put cryophon or apoc on the gunner turret, for example. Even pre-nerf.

Huh That is actually a good point. I will try out the Photor then, since I have it already.

[Coire_Bhreacain]

If you have a friend who can fly your railjack, then I'd recommend testing the gunner weapons yourself. Having crewed a lot of Railjacks as a gunner I'll share my opinion on the side turrets.

Apoc - Nice rapid fire cannons. Long range, gets good damage relatively quickly. Satisfying to use.

Carcinox - Nice rapid fire cannons. Long range, gets good damage relatively quickly. Good satus effects. Satisfying to use.

Crypohons - Very effective, though need to be used at really, really close range, and do need some skill on your gunners part to use as they kind of need to be fired instinctively.

Photor - Long range and hitscan are a positive, but the low damage so takes ages to get any useful amount of damage on a target especially if your using Zetki ones as your having to stop to allow them to cool. I find them awkward to use as a gunner due to needing to have to constantly re-adjust the aim as the railjack moves. I'll usually resort to firing missiles as the gun cools (if the Railjack is carrying a Tycho Seeker).

Pulsar - I just really don't get on with this one and will try find another crew position to fill instead.

Personally I went for a Carcinox on mine due to the stus procs. I'd look to use the non-zetki weapons on the turrets, just because of the extra heat buildup on the Zetkis.

[Ham_Grenabe]

3 hours ago, Skaleek said:

From what I hear, pulsar is effectively hitscan. Ideally you want hitscan on the gunner weapons, depending on your pilots flying style. I personally maneuver and boost a lot so i don't want my gunners to have to guess where to shoot. I would never put cryophon or apoc on the gunner turret, for example. Even pre-nerf.

As a gunner, I find it a lot harder to hit with Photors than Apocs or Carcinnoxes -- I tend to try to find something else to do if there are hitscan guns provided to the gunners. Hitting the pixels that represent the enemy is just not as easy for me as hitting the lead indicator (it seems like the hitbox for hitscan is less forgiving than the hitbox for projectiles, actually). 

Now, I haven't tried a Pulsar - or even seen one on anyone's ship - since like the day Railjack was released, so those might be better. But I just delete photors when I pick them up. 

One othe reason I avoid photors on my gunner's turrets is that one of my clanmates and frequent crewmembers uses a controller, and he says it's much harder to stay on target with a photor than with a projectile weapon. 

Edited January 14, 2020 by Ham_Grenabe

[Skaleek]

2 minutes ago, Ham_Grenabe said:

As a gunner, I find it a lot harder to hit with Photors than Apocs or Carcinnoxes -- I tend to try to find something else to do if there are hitscan guns provided to the gunners. Hitting the pixels that represent the enemy is just not as easy for me as hitting the lead indicator (it seems like the hitbox for hitscan is less forgiving than the hitbox for projectiles, actually). 

Now, I haven't tried a Pulsar - or even seen on - since like the day Railjack was released, so those might be better. But I just delete photors when I pick them up. 

It's all preference, which is a good sign. That we are all able to use different turrets and have them all be effective. Although i think cryophons took the nerfs a tad too harsh.

[Ham_Grenabe]

2 minutes ago, Skaleek said:

It's all preference, which is a good sign. That we are all able to use different turrets and have them all be effective. Although i think cryophons took the nerfs a tad too harsh.

Agreed, yeah - if I came across as saying they were objectively bad, that was unintentional. I'm bad at using them, whereas I love using the machine-gun feeling ones.

I do maintain that Cryophons should never be on the side turrets because you often don't have the range to really do much until you're completely swarmed, but even that is just my opinion on the matter. But the Cryophon really took it in the teeth, and that's a shame because it was fun to slap down ships that got in your grill. 

Edited January 14, 2020 by Ham_Grenabe

[Crusher_Bob]

I'll add that Apocs are probably more relatively bad after everything else got it's falloff ranges buffed.

Part of what made Vidar Carcinox so meta was that it had a falloff range of 2000-4000 when everything else was 400-800 or 500-1000.

Now we have:

Cryophon: 700-1400

Carcinox (seems to be all models) 2000-4000

Photor: 2500-5000

Pulsar 3000-6000

With Apoc now having the worst falloff at 500-1000.

Quite often you are wanting to shoot at targets that are 800 to 1500 meters away,  even the Cryophon can get in on that action these days, but with the apoc, you still have to wait for them to come closer.

 

[buffalobuffalogaming]

As far as I have tested.
Photor (Any house except Zekti).
Pros:

1. Longer range than Apoc. Perfect for popping the Crewship's healing bubble (one of the most annoying thing in the Veil)
2. Higher fire rate than Apoc.
3. Low heat accretion.
4. Hitscan. Impossible for enemy to dodge.
5. Do small AOE damage, Perfect for shooting enemies stuck in Void Hole.
6. Ease of usage.

Cons:

1. Lower crit chance than Apoc.
2. Lower damage per shot than Apoc.

Edited January 15, 2020 by blimsoon

[taiiat]

as noted, everything went up in Range except Apoc, so Apoc is now kinda just bad. it doesn't matter what the theoretical DPS of a Weapon is, if you can't hit the Enemy for several extra seconds before you get into Range. the time you weren't shooting, is a loss of your effective Damage.
Apoc could compete now if to compensate for shorter Range there was a model with actually good Hybrid Stats so that it could stack Puncture&Slash.

Cryo got heavily nerfed (for some reason, i'm sure it was because "we think its popular"), and ofcourse to destroy anything that already existed, Vidar Cryo is now useless and you may as well use Zetki. before Vidar Cryo was overall better because it hit harder but Zetki still technically fired faster (even though that didn't matter that much), but now Vidar is actually useless since Zetki has Crits and Vidar doesn't really anymore plus that Zetki no longer has extra Heat problems.

 

Carcinnox is still the best 'all rounder' if you ask me.
but now there are some other Weapons that can be potentially interesting. Photor is potentially interesting, and Pulsar can now be pretty good.
Zetki Photor is pretty interesting, but Photor does still deal lower DPS to trade its perfect Accuracy at all Ranges.
Vidar or Zetki Pulsar is a bit of a tough call, i'm more in the Vidar camp because it loses a little bit of Base Damage but it gains a fair amount of Crit Chance. Zetki would have more DPS provided that you don't miss, but Vidar will hit harder per Shot.

[Crusher_Bob]

Have run the numbers on the guns, so here's my results:

The Zetki Apoc replaces the Cryophon as the close range damage gun,  It manages roughly twice the DPS of most of the other guns, but still keeps an acceptable damage per heat.

 

Lavan guns are generally not worth keeping, as they have worse critical stats; and status effects are not really a decisive factor in killing stuff.  Lavan Apoc is probably the only one worth looking at, as the Apocs can proc 'slash' status.   But now that slash procs only boost damage by 7.5%, and the Lavan Apoc only has a 14% status chance, a lot of slash procs aren't going to save these guns.

The Vidar Cryophon is now pretty mediocre, since it now takes many shots to kill most things. 

The Zetki Cryophon and Zetki Carcinox both have terrible damage per heat numbers, and you are likely to overheat your guns before killing your target. 

--------------------------

The Pulsars generally win over the Photors,  They win in both damage per second and damage per heat over the same house Photor.

---------------------------

So, for general purpose guns, Vidar Carcinox or Zetki Pulsar

For close range, and only if running a meta damage setup (Zetki Predator + Zetki Sectional Density), the Zetki Apoc.  Otherwise use the general purpose guns.

----------------------------------------

Methodology:

Assume 15-30% damge roll guns get 23%

Assume 30-60% damage roll gun (the Vidar Cryophon) gets 45%

Assume 30-60% fire rate guns get 45%

Calculate gun damage taking into account critical hits and fire rate.

Compute damage per second (DPS) as single shot damage * fire rate

Compute heat per second (HPS) as heat per shot * fire rate.

Derive Damage per heat (DPH) by dividing DPS by HPS

Note that these numbers are only for comparison between guns, actual damage will be effected by hyperstrike, but it will multiply all damage equally, so it can be ignored if you just want to compare guns.

Sample Numbers:

With full predator + sectional density:

Recommended Guns:

Zetki Pulsar DPS: 5991.81 DPH: 27.88

Vidar Carcinox DPS: 4997.19 DPH: 33.31

Zetki Apoc DPS 11204.08 DPH 22.82

 

Honorable Mention:

Zetki Photor DPS 5853.48 DPH 24.39

 

OK Guns:

Zetki Carcinox DPS: 7570.82 DPH: 17.40

Vidar Cryophon DPS: 5104.60 DPH: 20.42

Vidar Apoc DPS 5990.97 DPH: 35.96

Edited January 15, 2020 by Crusher_Bob

[Diangelius]

If you use Cryophon, always go for Vidar. It has damage buff, sure, and it has highest crit chance of 28% among 3 houses, which scale up to ~50% crit with Predator. You need crit dmg from Section Density to have a chance to one-shot-kill those fighters.

You can snipe those Fighters off within a few hits with Zetki Apoc Mk III. It has 30% base crit, up to 51% crit chance with Predator and it is auto trigger so the DPS is overall stable. Or you can pick Lavan one with 59% fire rate for 14% status and to destroy those healing bubbles, which Cryophon cannot.