lpmagic, on 24 July 2014 - 08:06 AM, said:
eh, a mixture of both, with the TBR meta build and the Direwhale meta build, along with the popularity of the stormcrow also running ppc's I see that as "one" of the main reasons, Clan Ballistics are pretty much universally considered DOA in general, for just the reason your mentioning, and the face time needed for standard energy weapons does indeed ensure some damage spread as the beam duration is long enough that if the target moves at all your going to spread some damage even just by accident. So I tend to agree with you, but the actual use of the ballistics is very very rare IMHO, lasers, yup the range draws people to use them all the time, I still think the dominant weapons are cerppc's (or at least the most widely used) followed by Gauss which spreads not at all. I just think the prevalence of the cerppc is a big reason for spread, biggest fan of srm's you may ever meet, but they spread the heck out of damage too, even with artemis....
Down in Solo Pugland where I dwell, I see CUACs on the majority of Clan heavy/assault mechs that I come across (especially Daishis). Sure, I still see CERPPC and CGauss everywhere, but CUACs seem to be more prevalent, at least from my own experience.
I get much higher damage totals with my CUAC boat Dire Wolf than I do with my gauss+ppc Dire Wolf. I get more KILLS with the gauss+ppc version due to it's greater efficiency.