nakaya indigene wrote:There is not a long range blaster. Why would dust be the exception.
This man gets it.
EDIT: Shortly after posting this, it occurs to me that the misconception of weapon parity meaning 'Everyone needs a shotgun' or in this case 'Everyone needs a sniper rifle' stems from one source. Weapon types.
In DUST, weapon types are Laser, Hybrid - Plasma, Hybrid - Rail, Projectile, and Explosive.
Lasers are typically seen as being Amarr weapons and do +20% damage to shields, -20% damage to armor. They are medium-long range.
Hybrid - Plasma are typically seen as being Gallente weapons and do +10% damage to shields, -10% damage to armor. They are short range.
Hybrid - Rail are typically seen as being Caldari weapons and do -10% damage to shields, +10% damage to armor. They are long range weapons.
Projectiles are typically seen as being Minmatar weapons and do -5% damage to shields, +10% damage to armor. They are short-medium range weapons.
Explosives are typically seen as being Minmatar weapons. Some people think DUST's missiles are Caldari weapons and say "but you can get missiles turrets from the Caldari LP store and EVE and blah blah blah' but you would be wrong. There are no 'missiles' in DUST. There are explosives. Find me a Caldari anything that gets bonuses to explosives, or even 'missiles' for that matter. You can't. Anyway, explosives do -20% to shields, +20% damage to armor. Their range varies.
You may or may not agree with my statements because a rail rifle raped your face at 5m away, but they are factual as per
this dev blog.
In EVE, weapons types are Energy, Hybrid, Projectile, and Missile. Drones also.
Each weapon type is split into two categories, i.e. Energy - Pulse or Beam. When compared to Beams, Pulses follow the pattern of low damage per shot, higher DPS (through higher RoF), short range, and easier application of damage. This is the case with the other weapons types too, i.e. Hybrid - Blaster / Rail, Projectile - Autocannon / Artillery, Missile - Rocket / Missile/ Each sub category can be roughly sorted by DPS and range compared to each other. Of the 'short range' weapons, DPS from largest to smallest is roughly Blaster > Autocannon > Rocket > Pulse, and range from farthest to shortest is roughly Pulse > Rocket > Autocannon > Blaster.
Each sub category is split into four sizes from Small, Medium, Large, and XL.
Weapon types don't typically 'belong' to a race, but the Amarr, for example, lean strongly to Energy weapons as shown in their ship's bonuses. They also support Drones and Missiles.
The weapons do some combination of EM, Thermal, Kinetic, or Explosive damage.
If DUST followed EVE's pattern, we would never have to see a thread asking for a blaster sniper rifle. Because like nakaya indigene says, there is not a long range blaster.