dark

Understanding the Role of MDs and Rails

admin
2025-01-16 10:11:36

Introduction

For new players, there is a steep learning curve of knowledge in nebulous. When players design their first fleet, they often see the words "Mass Drivers", and "Railguns", and immediately assume they are very important weapons worthy of a full investment. After all, modern science suggests that these weapons are potentially extremely strong, making new players assume the game models similar behavior.

Railguns and mass drivers are not weapons that can be relied on as a sole weapon, nor can it be relied upon to kill a ship alone. Instead, they are niche weapons that serve certain specific functions within the Nebulous battlefield. This guide will go over them, how they work, and various methods of employment to ensure that you use these weapons properly.

Railguns

Railguns are the ANS long range gun platform, though the OSPN Ocello can access it as well. They come in two variants, a spinal mount, and a turret. When hitting a target, the railgun is virtually guaranteed to penetrate all the way through. Any module hit by the passing round has a chance to either be inflicted with a critical hit, a debuff, or a fire. This ties up enemy damage control teams, deals fire damage over time, and potentially also shuts off the ship by messing with reactors and drives. Rails also break damage threshold (DT), and soften up armor, potentially allowing smaller calibers to effect ships that otherwise would not be.

None of these effects outright kill a ship. Instead, they cripple or slow them. As such, rails should be deployed on a small scale, either to target already damaged ships or wound fresh ships before guns and missiles come in and finish them off.

Mass Drivers

The mass driver is the OSPN long range gun. It behaves as the opposite of the railgun. It cannot break most DT, it does not seem to cause critical hits or fires, It does however, do damage.

Mass drivers are best employed to cripple ANS PD, or supplement the damage output of plasma or other armor-stripping fleets. The high damage rounds are very efficient at breaking apart radar panels and PD turrets. If the enemy has been structure broken, or had it armor stripped by plasma, the round is also able to penetrate with ease, causing damage without endangering other front line assets.

Notes On Fleet Building

When building a fleet, please keep in mind that such assets should never account for the majority of a fleet's points. These weapons are niche, and cannot kill at all on their own. It is far too common for new players to go all in on them, only to realize they cannot do much to the enemy at all.

Afterword

Thank you for looking over this. I felt it was necessary to clear this up, as I have noticed many new players falling into these pit traps. While I am fairly familiar with both platforms, there may still be some mistakes I have made with the info I presented, so please bring up any mistakes if you see them, and I will correct them as soon as possible.

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3367276288

More NEBULOUS: Fleet Command guilds

⮙