[Draxx]

So I, along with many others took advantage of the lifetime sale (many thanks to my wife who let me get it), and there are many perks. Out of these perks to have is the heavy battle cruisers. Now I know they have a t5 and a t6 versions and I'm really liking the t6 that was free to buy (relatively speaking).

So every one has a 4/3/experimental weapon slots. 5 tactical, 3 engineer and 2 science. So as far as t6 goes, there are better options.

What I think makes the ships fun is the console that transforms the ship into defence or offense mode and has a 180 degree Lance weapon that fired 8 times at many targets, or drains away thier shields adding to your own. The damage is nice and a 2m cool down means you can switch between them every minute to cause some havoc. The JH version even comes with wingmen that really makes it fun.

So build would suggest cannon or torpedo build. They are fast and agile and with some of the experimental weapons out there means it can be configured multiple ways.

For far I have the fed on one character, the klingon on another and my JH has his version.

So layouts are different but in general I have 3 duel heavy (or a single quad and 2) and a a torpedo on the front 3 turrets on the back and either the wave experiment weapon or the missle launcher from the terran escort.

Now I know these ships won't break any dps records, but I'm sure I'm not the only one here that thinks they are fun to play with, and even if they are older, they can still do some decent dps for tfo's.

Think I'm on the right track or should I dump the rear turrets for mines given how fast these things can move?

[darthnovawave]

Welcome to the LTS club! I always liked the look of the LTS destroyers, but as you've already seen, these were some of the earliest T6 ships, made before 5-forward ships were a thing and when specializations were still just kicking off and unfortunately never got updated once specializations matured. Maybe someday Cryptic will revisit them. The other thing to keep in mind is there are also fleet versions of these ships, so if you really love the ship, you might want to consider the upgraded versions for a little extra hull and shields and an extra console slot.

At any rate, sounds like you are on the right track build-wise. With a lt. cmdr. Command seat, you could do a torp boat with mines on the back, but torp boats mostly shine on a few select maps, so for a daily driver build you probably want to stick with DEW. Since it lacks specialist firing mode options, pure cannons and turrets with CSV are probably going to have the most DPS potential. A torp on front is an option, particularly if you have something like the Super Charged Weapons trait to synergize with it, or you just like the space barbie of a torp.

[Draxx]

well thats why i was thinking 4 duel heavy cannons on the front and 3 mine layers on the back. just keep the engine and weapon power maxed out and fly through the enemies leaving presents everywhere. cannons rip down the shields on the way in and dump the mines out the back. Add in gravity well or anything else that gathers enemies up and should work. Then a 360 experimental weapon. There is one that does a minor gravity pull when firing.

So could do mine relocation, scatter volley, beta and tact team for the Tactical commander spot. The weapon synergy should set off on a fly by.

The lt Commander spot could be used for science, gravity well, energy siphon or scattering field *since the idea is to be doing fly by's* and hazard emitters for hull healing.

Lt Commander engineering would seat reverse shield polarity, emergency weapon power and engineering team. This should keep the shields going in an emergency if things are going sideways. great help in borg missions.

Lt science uh well aoe stuff or tractor beam

not sure for the UN ensign. maybe tactical for alpha maneuver?

[darthnovawave]

well thats why i was thinking 4 duel heavy cannons on the front and 3 mine layers on the back. just keep the engine and weapon power maxed out and fly through the enemies leaving presents everywhere. cannons rip down the shields on the way in and dump the mines out the back. Add in gravity well or anything else that gathers enemies up and should work. Then a 360 experimental weapon. There is one that does a minor gravity pull when firing.

So could do mine relocation, scatter volley, beta and tact team for the Tactical commander spot. The weapon synergy should set off on a fly by.

The lt Commander spot could be used for science, gravity well, energy siphon or scattering field *since the idea is to be doing fly by's* and hazard emitters for hull healing.

Lt Commander engineering would seat reverse shield polarity, emergency weapon power and engineering team. This should keep the shields going in an emergency if things are going sideways. great help in borg missions.

Lt science uh well aoe stuff or tractor beam

not sure for the UN ensign. maybe tactical for alpha maneuver?

On the boff powers, one thing you aren't accounting for here is a cooldown strategy. You might want to consider using one of your Sci seats for a copy of Photonic Officer I or II to make all your Boff abilities available more often. You could look to to Aux2Batt and technician doffs (or a "half2batt" build if you don't want to run 2 copies of Aux to battery) or more expensive options like Boimler Effect, but PO would be the cheapest option to at least start from here. You also might consider throwing in a copy of Emergency Power to Engines 1 in there, as there is an emergency conn hologram doff in the Phoenix store Very Rare token list (which is not hard to get) that causes your Evasive Maneuvers captain ability to massively reduce its cooldown when EPTE is triggered.

On the weapons side, which is "best" probably depends on a lot of other considerations of your build here (e.g., traits, doffs, consoles, etc.) as well as your piloting style. Sounds like you are doing strafing runs rather than "park and facemelt" as a lot of high end cannon builds tend to do for maximum damage. The problem with strafing is that your main sources of damage are going to come from your front cannons, so any time your nose isn't pointed straight at your target, you are going to have a pretty drastic damage falloff. Mines might offset this damage falloff more than turrets if timed right, but they likely aren't going to fully compensate much over continuous combat. Sticking with cannons and turrets tends to have more build option synergies, as they benefit from the same fire modes and buffs, and if you do keep your nose on target, you have all 7 weapons able to fire on your target.

As for the mines approach, "Relocate Mines" is a captain ability with a 1 minute cooldown, so it isn't something you'll be able to continuously spam. The tactical boff powers are Mine Dispersal Pattern Alpha and Beta, which just deploys extra mines for your next mine to fire off. You might be able to get more out of strafing with mines if you pick up the "Hot Pursuit" trait from the Exchange to extend the chase range of your mines or other gimmicks like that, but again the more you invest into making mines good usually comes at a cost to your cannons potential whereas what helps turrets also benefits your main cannons up front. There is a bit better synergy between mines and torpedoes as there are some things that benefit both, but in general mines don't get a lot of love out there. Torp boats most often are the builds that also slot mines, and in general shine best on maps with big targets with a ton of hull health (e.g., ISE, HSE, etc.), which also gives time for your Relocate Mines to cool off and be ready to slam the next big target. They tend to be more mediocre builds when facing content that flings a bunch of weaker targets at you.

Build theorycrafting aside, while "park and shoot" is what rewards you the most from a DPS parser standpoint, I can totally understand the immersion aspect of strafing. At the end of the day, it comes down to what is most fun for you, so it may be less about the math and more about what feels "right" to you, so don't be afraid to experiment.