Thoughts on the 'Lazer'

According to the news post on the PA website, the real name for the laser is the "Annihilaser"

Hmm, now I think this might be an interesting place to allow planetary defense shields that can reduce or stop a death ray but wouldn't affect smaller attacks. These shields would need to be placed in multiple spots on the defending planet, and they would have an enormous permanent drain on energy.

There should be a countdown indeed. I won a match with several planets by just conquering the metal planet and destroying all other planets in one minute or so

I just did a quick test, and a smashed metal planet with a huge chunk missing from it still fires. I was also sad to see that they didn't give us the custom crater for the metal planet teased a few weeks ago.

Next test: What happens when a catalyst point get's smashed. My guess is nothing really, as soon as that's done it won't be able to fire. Now time to prove it! For science!

I figured out that if the metalplanet is too close to target planet it wont actually fire (Bug?).

i say cool down and bustable by asteroids ... asteroids are single use already .. harr harr
no but seriously a sort of cooldown should be in or a reload timer consuming energy

Yup a long cooldowntime with adjustable slider, changing how much power you are using to "cool it down". Maybe one of the catalysts could also be destroyed by the amounts of power in this weapon.

And yup, it's bustable by asteroids. As soon as a catalyst point is destroyed the whole thing is defunct.

You really ought to have to put a few halleys on the metal planet. Really. What is turning that thing?

Inertial thrusters?

engines and gears within the planet itself that rotate the outer shell.... good technolbla?

the charge up time for the laser is moddable. Currently set to 3 (sec?)

don't have time to test it now but someone set it to 120 or something as see what happens.

quite frankly it is extremely OP, once you build them you basically win. you can eliminate all opposing planets in a matter of seconds, ending matches really quick, especially ones with 2 planets.

I too think it should probably be 1 use, at least 1 use per set of catalysts (rebuild to reuse).

Unless someone smashes you first! Played an awesome game yesterday were we planet smashed the catalysts about 3 seconds before it fired. Was truly epic.

errr well its a gameender after all ...
but i aggree with the time .. so yea cooldown or reload ... but i am against single use or rebuilding catalists ... i rather would want it be fight for control or permadestroy a catalist slot than the metalplanet being "only one single use ever" ...

One idea: give it a charge-up period both when first built, and after firing each shot. Have each Catalyst consume about 25K energy/second, and let it keep charging until it has consumed 30 million energy (4 minutes if you don't stall energy). Once it's charged, the fire option becomes available.