Target painters are NOT getting touched. Ever.

...

I think the naming order is a little off.

Upgraded (meta level 1)
Limited (meta level 2)
Experimental (meta level 3)
Prototype (meta level 4)......?

The order (in my opinion) should run as follows-

Experimental (meta level 1)
Prototype (meta level 2)
Limited (meta level 3)
Uprgraded (meta level 4)

For example: ''We made some experimental railguns, before deciding on the prototype. We then created a limited run for the Gallente Navy, but have already issued an upgraded model for the discerning capsuleer.''


I know this must seem pathetic but.... it just makes more sense. Why would you call the crappest tier of guns upgraded?

This can "take" for as long as you stick to a scale people are already used to. As in, meg, gig and tera. Small, medium and large.

Just saying.

I would think from a game lore standpoint that you wouldn't want all meta levels named the same for all 4 empires. no?

As far as Amarr goes, how about some sort of religious descriptor.

Anointed
Blessed
Holy
Exalted

I understand why you're doing it, but I don't really like it. I preferred the Light/Heavy/etc nomenclature to Small/Med/...

-Liang

I rather like the gigawat convention, but it should probably be abbreviated. 200mm turrets, 50GW lasers

This would be hilarious. Misses the point, but hilarious. Gives a whole new meaning to the word "holy light"...

As far as Amarr goes, how about some sort of religious descriptor.

Anointed
Blessed
Holy
Exalted

+1 Best Idea so far.

CCP FoxFour

In real life, the strength of a laser is often expressed in watts. Watts is a measure of the amount of energy per second they can put out.

For example this article speaks about a megawatt laser: http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-01/navys-free-electron-laser-weapon-takes-big-leap-forward-powerful-new-electron-injector

Hybrid and Projectile turrets already have their barrel diameter in the name (ie. 250mm Railgun) why shouldn't lasers carry their wattage in the name? It fits nicely into a science fiction universe. The gigawatt values here very roughly reflect the actual energy consumption of the lasers too (though your resident physicist could certainly do a better job than me).

So this my proposal:

Frigate lasers
Light 2 Gigawatt Pulse Laser (formerly Gatling Pulse Laser)
Light 3 Gigawatt Pulse Laser (formerly Dual Light Pulse Laser)
Light 4 Gigawatt Pulse Laser (formerly Medium Pulse Laser)

Cruiser lasers
Medium 10 Gigawatt Pulse Laser (formerly Medium Focused Pulse Laser)
... (if it existed, this laser would be 15 Gigawatt)
Medium 20 Gigawatt Pulse Laser (formerly Heavy Pulse Laser)

Battleship lasers
Large 50 Gigawatt Laser (formerly Dual Heavy Pulse Laser)
... (if it existed, this laser would be 75 Gigawatt)
Large 100 Gigawatt Laser (formerly Mega Pulse Laser)

Capital lasers
X-Large 500 Gigawatt Laser (formerly Dual Giga Pulse Laser)

After that you, can add the usual meta prefixes (upgraded, limited, experimental, prototype)

Distinctive features of each turret, such as certain laser turrets having 2 "barrels", can be acknowledged in the description of the module.


Edit 1: and before somebody says the gatling pulse only uses 1 GJ per shot, how can it put out 2 GW? Well, 1 GJ over 0.5 seconds (a brief pulse) would be exactly 2 GW.

Edit 2: for best market-search results, this naming scheme is even better: "2 Gigawatt Light Pulse Laser".

Edit 3: Aamrr suggested to abbreviate the wattage. 50 Gigawatt Pulse Laser becomes 50GW Pulse Laser. I like shorter module names.

Naming lasers after their power (Megawatt, Gigawatt, Terawatt etc) isn't a great idea give that:

A) They already have a power grid usage measured in Megawatts
B)They already have a a Cap consumption value, measured in Gigawatts
C) Their use of both cap and PG changes as skills and rigs are applied.

So you end up with a situation where a Laser's name corresponds to neither its power usage nor its energy cost (and overlaps with both), and doesn't scale with the damage it puts out.

gigawatts/plasma

Naming lasers after their power (Megawatt, Gigawatt, Terawatt etc) isn't a great idea give that:

A) They already have a power grid usage measured in Megawatts
B)They already have a a Cap consumption value, measured in Gigawatts
C) Their use of both cap and PG changes as skills and rigs are applied.

So you end up with a situation where a Laser's name corresponds to neither its power usage nor its energy cost (and overlaps with both), and doesn't scale with the damage it puts out.

Actually it makes sense, but to those less familiar with the definition of power and energy it might seem nonsensical.

The capacitor consumption is the amount of energy that goes into a shot. For a Heavy Pulse Laser II with max skills, this is about 5 gigajoule before any crystals.

This energy is converted into light and projected onto the target in a few short pulses. Some of the energy is lost during the conversion process. Let's assume 1/5 is lost .

I suggested the Heavy Pulse Laser to be called Medium 20GW Pulse Laser.

The 20GW number matches perfectly if we pretend that the laser expends its remaining 4 GJ in a series a series of short pulses that last 0.2 seconds in total. The pulses are effectively 20GW laser beams. After that, the laser pauses for a moment to dissipate heat (the energy that was converted into heat instead of light).

Disclaimer: I'm no physicist or engineer. They could probably explain it better.

Actually it makes sense, but to those less familiar with the definition of power and energy it might seem nonsensical.

The capacitor consumption is the amount of energy that goes into a shot. For a Heavy Pulse Laser II with max skills, this is about 5 gigajoule before any crystals.

This energy is converted into light and projected onto the target in a few short pulses. Some of the energy is lost during the conversion process. Let's assume 1/5 is lost .

I suggested the Heavy Pulse Laser to be called Medium 20GW Pulse Laser.

The 20GW number matches perfectly if we pretend that the laser expends its remaining 4 GJ in a series a series of short pulses that last 0.2 seconds in total. The pulses are effectively 20GW laser beams. After that, the laser pauses for a moment to dissipate heat (the energy that was converted into heat instead of light).

Disclaimer: I'm no physicist or engineer. They could probably explain it better.

nitpicking

This is still a game and we don't have to concern ourselves with simulating everything accurately. If we did, we should rightfully throw the whole idea of skills reducing cap usage out.

And here are beam laser names. Note that their wattage should be lower despite higher energy costs as they maintain a lower energy beam for longer compared to pulse lasers. :

Small 1GW Beam Laser (formerly Dual Light Beam Laser)
Small 2GW Beam Laser (formerly Medium Beam Laser)

Medium 3GW Beam Laser (formerly Quad Light Beam Laser. This one has actually lower cap consumption than the Medium Beam Laser, but not giving it a higher wattage seems wrong)
Medium 4GW Beam Laser (formerly Focused Medium Beam Laser)
Medium 8GW Beam Laser (formerly Heavy Beam Laser)

Large 16GW Beam Laser (formerly Dual Heavy Beam Laser)
Large 24GW Beam Laser (formerly Mega Beam Laser)
Large 36GW Beam Laser (formerly Tachyon Beam Laser)