| “ | The Mass Driver is a superior Projectile weapon. It has moderate damage, and longer range than most other weapons. | ” |
| — In-Game Description |
| Mass Driver | I | II | III | IV | V | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mass | 220t | 330t | 495t | 745t | 1,120t | ||||
| DPS | 11 | 15 | 20 | 27 | 37 | ||||
| Range | 2,500 - 5,000 m | ||||||||
| Projectile Speed | 1,000 m/s | ||||||||
| Sound Effects | |||||||||
| Research | |||||||||
| Arms Lab Required | VII | VIII | IX | X | X | ||||
| Other Requirements | Gauss Driver I | Gauss Driver II | Gauss Driver III | Gauss Driver IV | Gauss Driver V | ||||
| Time | 1d 2h 56m 40s | 2d 5h 53m 20s | 4d 11h 46m 39s | ||||||
| Helium 3 | 8,675,033 | 17,629,750 | |||||||
| Antimatter | 762,132 | 2,168,758 | 5,876,583 | 15,558,800 | 23,338,200 | ||||
| Build | |||||||||
| Time | 7m | 19m | 1h 6m | 3h 10m 30s | 5h 18m 30s | ||||
| Helium 3 | 70,034 | 325,449 | 1,356,056 | 3,700,395 | 6,245,213 | ||||
| Antimatter | 3,686 | 36,161 | 239,304 | 1,233,465 | 2,081,738 | ||||
| Repair | 0s | 0s | 0s | 0s | 0s | ||||
General
Mass drivers are the final weapon to be researched. They are long range projectile weapons and is particularly effective at out ranging anti-blitz base turrets. Mass drivers fires a single large blue/white shell at its target with long reloads
They are less commonly seen in PVP, but are mediocre options to use in FvF. Most players choose for Gladius drivers or other weapons in fleet combat.
Strategy and Setup
Advantages:
The Mass Driver's key advantage is its extremely high range, on par with the Siege Driver. Thus, they are mostly seen on "sniper fleets" which are designed to outrange turrets with long ranged destroyers and decoy hulls to dodge fire, they outrange many anti-blitz turrets like the SICO Missile Turret.
Unlike the Siege Driver, the Mass Driver doesn't have the incredibly large minimal range arc which allows it to be something threatening with Iridium Arrays V.
Disadvantages:
The Mass Driver has incredibly slow projectiles without any booster like Iridium Arrays V allowing even non thruster hulls to easily dodge the projectiles, it also makes the minimal range arc easily exploited because of this along with its low DPS.
The Mass Driver is inferior to both the Siege Driver and Gladius Driver in many ways, the massive cost of Mass Driver V and weight for the low DPS is better used on one of the above mentioned weapons.
Setup:
If you do not have any better weapons other than the Mass driver for sniping you should get a Trident Destroyer and equip dual Mass driver V and hopefully a Metaphase Shield III or a Deflector Shield V and for specials equip Strafe Thrusters V and Armored Hold III or if you don't have it, some armor
Frigates should not use this weapon but if you wish, kiting can be made with this driver if equipped on Nighthawk Frigates and Iridium Arrays V
Gallery
Trivia
- Destroyers equipped with mass drivers out range Plasma Missile Turret, which is a very common low level base defence turret.
- Each slug or shell inflicts damage equivalent to approximately five times its damage per second specification. For example, three Mass driver II total 45 damage per second and hence each salvo delivers 115 damage, using six Nighthawks, it's a total of 695 damage.
- The Mass Driver appears in The Market for some reason and is always joked about because of this being how useless it is for its cost.
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