Weapons Rating

Weapons Rating is how much damage one shot from a unit does. Every ship and every defense has one. The game calls it Attack Strength on the Shipyard and Defense pages, and the Calculator calls the research that lifts it Weapons Lvl. It is all the same number.

Where the number comes from

Unlike Hull Rating, a weapon is not worked out from what the unit costs. Every unit simply has a set rating, and some are far better value than others. A Laser Cannon costs 2,000 resources and shoots for 100. An Artemis Class Fighter costs 4,000 and shoots for 50.

Ships

Ship	Base Weapons Rating
Hermes Class Probe	0
Shadow Probe	0
Hephaestus Class Attack Platform	0
Helios Class Solar Satellite	1
Genesis Solar Satellite	1
Zagreus Class Recycler	1
Dionysus Class Recycler	1
Atlas Class Cargo	5
Hercules Class Cargo	5
Carmanor Class Cargo	10
Artemis Class Fighter	50
Gaia Class Colony Ship	50
Apollo Class Fighter	150
Poseidon Class Cruiser	400
Hades Class Battleship	700
Athena Class Battleship	1,000
Ares Class Bomber	1,000
Prometheus Class Destroyer	2,000
Zeus Class	200,000

Defenses

Defense	Base Weapons Rating
Decoy	0
Large Decoy	0
Anti-Ballistic Missile	1
Missile Battery	80
Laser Cannon	100
Particle Cannon	150
Pulse Cannon	250
Gauss Cannon	1,100
Plasma Cannon	3,000
Interplanetary Ballistic Missile	12,000

Five units have no weapon at all and never damage anything: the Hermes Class Probe, the Shadow Probe, the Hephaestus Class Attack Platform, the Decoy and the Large Decoy. They are on the field to soak shots, not to fire back. The two recyclers and the two satellites are barely better at 1.

Weapons Tech

Weapons Tech adds 10% of the base rating for every level you research, and it does not compound. Level 1 gives you 110% of base, level 9 gives 190%, level 10 gives 200%. There is no cap.

The Shipyard shows both numbers. Base is the figure from the table above and Current is what you actually get with the Weapons Tech you have. Here is the Athena at Weapons Tech 10, so its Attack Strength is doubled to 2,000.

Defenses work exactly the same way. The Defense page shows the same two columns.

One tech covers everything you own. It lifts your ships and your turrets at the same time, and it counts wherever they fight, on a raid or sitting at home. In a group attack or a group defend, the whole side fights on the highest Weapons Tech anyone in the group has, so one well researched player lifts every shot on their side.

What one shot does

Damage hits the target's Shield Rating first and whatever is left over comes off the Hull Rating. An Apollo Class Fighter shoots for 150. An Atlas Class Cargo has a shield of 10 and a hull of 400, so the shield eats 10 and the other 140 drops the hull to 260.

Shields refill in full at the start of every round. Hull damage does not. That is why a big rating is worth more than the raw number suggests: the part of your shot that gets past the shield is the only part that sticks.

Shots that bounce

A shot is absorbed completely, for zero damage, when it is worth 1% or less of the target's full Shield Rating. The comparison uses the target's rating with their Shield Tech included, and it uses their full shield, not whatever is left of it that round.

Because Weapons Tech and Shield Tech both add the same 10% a level, research almost never changes the answer. An Artemis at Weapons Tech 20 still bounces off a Large Decoy owned by a player with Shield Tech 20. Combat and Shield Rating both carry the full table of what bounces off what.

Three ratings get through everything in the game at equal research: the Prometheus Class Destroyer at 2,000, the Plasma Cannon at 3,000 and the Zeus Class at 200,000.

Rapid fire

Rapid fire ratings are fixed and Weapons Tech does not touch them, but the two work together. A shot that lands on a rapid fire target wins a chance at another shot. A shot that bounces ends the chain right there. So a rating big enough to clear the 1% line is what keeps a rapid fire chain running.

Missiles

The Interplanetary Ballistic Missile has the second biggest rating in the game at 12,000, and Weapons Tech lifts it like everything else, so it hits for 24,000 at level 10. Missile damage is not absorbed by shields at all. It goes straight onto the hull of the defenses it hits, though the defender's Armor Tech still counts.

Missiles never fire in a fleet battle. The Interplanetary Ballistic Missile and the Anti-Ballistic Missile both sit out every ship fight, so their ratings only matter in a missile strike.

What a weapon costs

Divide the rating by what the unit costs and defenses win by a mile. This is base rating per 1,000 resources of ore, crystal and hydrogen together.

Unit	Rating	Cost	Rating per 1,000
Laser Cannon	100	2,000	50.0
Missile Battery	80	2,000	40.0
Pulse Cannon	250	8,000	31.3
Gauss Cannon	1,100	37,000	29.7
Plasma Cannon	3,000	130,000	23.1
Zeus Class	200,000	10,000,000	20.0
Particle Cannon	150	8,000	18.8
Apollo Class Fighter	150	8,500	17.6
Athena Class Battleship	1,000	60,000	16.7
Prometheus Class Destroyer	2,000	125,000	16.0
Poseidon Class Cruiser	400	29,000	13.8
Artemis Class Fighter	50	4,000	12.5
Ares Class Bomber	1,000	90,000	11.1
Hades Class Battleship	700	85,000	8.2

A Laser Cannon buys three times the shooting an Apollo does for the same resources, and it gets rebuilt for free after most battles. That is the case for a defense wall. What it does not do is fly anywhere, plunder anything or earn you Destroyed Ships Points, and a dead turret leaves no debris for the attacker either.

Among the ships the Apollo and the Athena are the best value, and the Hades is the worst by a clear margin. The Zeus looks strong on this measure but costs 10,000,000 resources, so almost nobody is choosing it on efficiency.

Test it in the Calculator

The Calculator has a Weapons Lvl box on both sides, so you can run the same fight twice and see exactly what the research is buying you.

Here is one. 150 Artemis Class Fighters with no shield or armor research, attacking a planet holding 80 Laser Cannons and 80 Missile Batteries with no research at all. The only thing that changes between runs is the attacker's Weapons Lvl.

Weapons Tech 0. The defender wins. All 150 Artemis die and about half the turrets are still standing.
Weapons Tech 5. Too close to call. Usually a draw at the end of round six with a handful of Artemis and a handful of turrets left.
Weapons Tech 10. The attacker wins in four rounds with about half the fleet still alive.

Same ships, same turrets, three different results. The Calculator runs each fight three times and shows you the worst of the three, so it reads a little pessimistic on purpose.