Nice idea. Not sure how to explain it away though. I could go for a 100% EM crystal though, or a 90%thermal 10% em. Make amarr the kings of EM and thermal, or just EM.

Kinetic/explosive lasers are feasible even in the real world.

https://what-if.xkcd.com/13/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_ablation

"Propulsion
Finally, laser ablation can be used to transfer momentum to a surface, since the ablated material applies a pulse of high pressure to the surface underneath it as it expands. The effect is similar to hitting the surface with a hammer. This process is used in industry to work-harden metal surfaces, and is one damage mechanism for a laser weapon. It is also the basis of pulsed laser propulsion for spacecraft."

At high enough energy it can create an explosion of plasma on the surface of the target.

http://www.eve-wiki.net/index.php?title=Blaze_M

The blaze crystal would have been sick. It would be like having phasers with that microwave orange. And explosive damage of course.

From what I've observed of a lot of these threads, it usually turn into arguments by essentially two main groups of people-

1) Those who believe there should be differences between the racial types (damage types, ranges, looks, feels, speeds, etc.) and;
2) Those who believe everything should be the same between all racial types (i.e., things may appear different but everything is balanced and all the same no matter what race you pick)

Ultimately, CCP always strives to make balance changes to each (weapons, ships, etc.) only to find there is always someone, somewhere who feels things are imbalanced. (can't please everyone all the time)

Being an Amarr pilot (not always), and using energy weapons almost primarily- I've learned a lot about how they perform and what they work well on or don't. Sure they're not always the greatest, and sure there's a lot of other weapon systems that do better. But then again I think there's also a lot of perks- like switching crystals for range on the fly, being able to reload almost instantly (minus weapon cycle wait) small cargo encumbrance, etc. That said, I'm not really sure if the damage type is the issue, anymore than other racial weapon types have a particular issue- however the caveat here is that missiles have many selectable damage types and the only drawback is the sheer amount of ammo you have to carry around in order to change it. Some will argue that others could use drones for selectable damage types, however not every ship has a drone bay (therefore it's not an applicable argument, IMO).

Either everyone needs to have the same ability to choose damage types- or all must have limitations based on racial preference (i.e., whatever ship you choose to pilot) at least IMO.

(drops 2 isk in the bucket)

Guys, this is the guy that lost 17 tengus in a month that was ****** fit, one of them even was an arty fit.

I think you're kind of missing the point by trying to say they should do different damage types. It's fine that they do just EM/therm; what really needs to be changed is their tracking speed.

It makes NO sense whatsoever for advanced laser weaponry that has had centuries to perfect has comparably the worst tracking out of each of the gun weapon systems for short-range. Yeah sure you can make the argument that it correlates with range, but that makes little sense considering the total range that AC's get, specifically on ships that get falloff range bonuses.

They should flip the two tracking speeds for them around; min ships have plenty of boats that get tracking speed bonuses, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue overall, especially considering amarr lore history and how they are placed in the game technologically. Also, while they're at it, they could swap the Quad Light Beam Laser into a pulse weapon while they're at it...if they could just do that I'll be very happy.

Guys, this is the guy that lost 17 tengus in a month that was ****** fit, one of them even was an arty fit.

Lasers can't be made good without significantly redesigning the game. It's not a problem with cap use, damage type, or fitting. The problem is nobody wants the things that lasers are good at.

Beam lasers offer the best DPS and tracking when people are looking for the best alpha or the best range when they fit a long-range weapon system.

Scorch's range advantage isn't good enough on BS hulls because there are no BS hulls that get both a damage bonus and optimal range bonus. Compare the DPS and range of pulse lasers with Scorch to railguns with CN antimatter loaded, there's very little difference. The ability of the railgun user to snipe from afar is far more valuable than the ability of the pulse laser user to deal more DPS when up close.

Lasers are very very good on cruiser hulls because cruiser hulls can actually get both an optimal range bonus and a damage bonus. Laser hulls that have both of these are pretty much all exceptional, but unfortunately they're the only laser platforms that are any good.

If you changed the damage type son t2 lasers as per the OP the. This would open up and argument that hybrid t2 ammo should deliver explosive/em.

Essentially observing an enemy's guns would give you no clue as to what their damage output is likely to be, which removes a strategic element of combat that many miss but many others take advantage of.

Lasers can't be made good without significantly redesigning the game. It's not a problem with cap use, damage type, or fitting. The problem is nobody wants the things that lasers are good at.

Beam lasers offer the best DPS and tracking when people are looking for the best alpha or the best range when they fit a long-range weapon system.

Scorch's range advantage isn't good enough on BS hulls because there are no BS hulls that get both a damage bonus and optimal range bonus. Compare the DPS and range of pulse lasers with Scorch to railguns with CN antimatter loaded, there's very little difference. The ability of the railgun user to snipe from afar is far more valuable than the ability of the pulse laser user to deal more DPS when up close.

Lasers are very very good on cruiser hulls because cruiser hulls can actually get both an optimal range bonus and a damage bonus. Laser hulls that have both of these are pretty much all exceptional, but unfortunately they're the only laser platforms that are any good.

Why in the name of fruity goat frolicking would I compare anything range related concerning Pulse Lasers to the ranges on Railguns? If you want to snipe with lasers you need to consider selecting a beam laser.

Consider the dps of Blasters at ranges beyond 20km vs. the dps of Pulse lasers. At that range you are into falloff even with null ammunition, and most ammo types had optimals closer to 10km. By 40km you are past falloff on all ammo except null and more than halfway on that. At 70km you are at the end of Null with two optimal range scripted tracking computers in Bastion Mode on a Kronos. If you want to talk damage projection of pulse lasers, that is your comparison.

Lasers have exceptional damage projection. Stop thinking your highest damage short range weapon should have ranges competing with the lowest damage long range hybrid weapons and you might see that lasers do indeed have an excellent advantage in this area.

The point is that if you want to shoot at your targets from Scorch range you can get the same DPS by using railguns with CN antimatter at that same range. The pulse laser boat has the ability to do more DPS at ranges closer than this by using closer range ammo, while the rail boat has the ability to snipe from further away if needed. The ability of the rail user to still deal DPS if they get further away is generally more useful than the ability of the Scorch user to do more DPS if they get closer.

I think you're kind of missing the point by trying to say they should do different damage types. It's fine that they do just EM/therm; what really needs to be changed is their tracking speed.

It makes NO sense whatsoever for advanced laser weaponry that has had centuries to perfect has comparably the worst tracking out of each of the gun weapon systems for short-range. Yeah sure you can make the argument that it correlates with range, but that makes little sense considering the total range that AC's get, specifically on ships that get falloff range bonuses.

They should flip the two tracking speeds for them around; min ships have plenty of boats that get tracking speed bonuses, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue overall, especially considering amarr lore history and how they are placed in the game technologically. Also, while they're at it, they could swap the Quad Light Beam Laser into a pulse weapon while they're at it...if they could just do that I'll be very happy.

Howabout give Amarr ships more launcher hardpoints instead? Even if they don't missile spec, it makes sense to assume they would be well aware of their damage type weakness, and would make some sort of arrangements for it. I don't understand why they hate missile launchers almost as much as Gallente do.

If we allowed reality to cloud the physics of eve then lasers would indeed track almost instantaneously. They would also damage opponents at the rate of 1dps per laser. Laser technology is an extremely inefficient way to direct energy, generating several orders of magnitude more heat in the source than at the destination (hence heat sinks being the damage mods of lasers).

But in 'reality', you can't get rid of heat very quickly in space so to hit someone with 500dps from your lasers, you'd need to be damaging yourself with 50,000dps. (Assuming the most efficient x-ray lasers).

You'd be better served by firing your escape pods at the enemy.

UmGǪ what? The proposal was just to swap out thermal for kinetic damage on the T2 faction crystals (only). That's it. In most cases EM damage will still dominate, so the change isn't as drastic as might appear at first glance. But hey, if players are perfectly fine with EM-Thermal - far be it for me to suggest otherwise...

Lasers can't be made good without significantly redesigning the game. It's not a problem with cap use, damage type, or fitting. The problem is nobody wants the things that lasers are good at.

Beam lasers offer the best DPS and tracking when people are looking for the best alpha or the best range when they fit a long-range weapon system.

Scorch's range advantage isn't good enough on BS hulls because there are no BS hulls that get both a damage bonus and optimal range bonus. Compare the DPS and range of pulse lasers with Scorch to railguns with CN antimatter loaded, there's very little difference. The ability of the railgun user to snipe from afar is far more valuable than the ability of the pulse laser user to deal more DPS when up close.

Lasers are very very good on cruiser hulls because cruiser hulls can actually get both an optimal range bonus and a damage bonus. Laser hulls that have both of these are pretty much all exceptional, but unfortunately they're the only laser platforms that are any good.

This guys gets it. Laser have many advantages it's just that those advantages are undesirable by players. Let's look more closely at pros and cons:

Advantages:

Long range: it's not long range it's scorch. But a long range in brawling fights does not give you that much. Primary target will be locked in place, so you only do more damage for that brief time when you fly to the target (because the point is to go conflag to do as much dmg as possible to punch through rr). It's only OP in PvE coz you do short range dmg on long range. In PvP it only gives small bonus. For beams others have pointed out that rails get more range...

Instant changing of ammo types: in most pvp scenarios missiles (HAM and HML) don't need to switch ammo according to range. the same with hybrids (u spend more time swapping ammo then flying to target). Projectiles are swapped mid-fight but they get a huge return on that by shooting in the resist hole. Instant swapping of ammo does not give laser the advantage - it closes the gap between the other weapons who have much more powerful traits (raw dps, selectable dmg types)

No need to carry a lot of ammo in cargo: LOL. I do PvP for 1,5 year now Only once I saw a fleet run out of ammo. It's not an advantage coz for other races need to use ammo is not a disadvantage. They can carry more than enough ammo in their holds (for PvP, for PvE u run out of missiles sometimes), and have little to none risk of running out of it. So this advantage for lasers is nothing but cr*p) further reinforced by fact that T2 laser ammo DOES run out.

Disadvantages:

EM/Thr - no different that hybrids Kin/Thr? Wrong. Every T1 ship has high Em/Thr resist. With T2 ships its more balanced. BUT u donGÇÖt do a lot of DPS. So not only you shoot in high resist you also shoot with mediocre DPS.

Cap use - no need to say more. It not only affect weapon itself it also affects hulls who need -10% cap use bonus which is not really a bonus (Why Revelation is the worst Dread - except phoenix that is ).

Low tracking - again the real value on close range gun is your maximal dmg to go through rr. So you need tracking. Well you have the worst - DESPITE no selectable dmg types and mediocre dps.

So lasers look good on paper, they can also be used effectively if used properly (both PvE and PvP) BUT they will always be less desirable by FCs that hybrids and projectiles. They just don't have any IMPOTANT advantage over them...