I've got an older KDF character I've resurrected in the rush to get ready for Season 7 and I've noticed that his equipment (where ships are concerned) is utter crap. So, given their almost absurd turn rates and lack of tactical options, what kind of weapons layout should I give my Vor'Cha Retrofit and soon-to-be-unpacked Mirror Battlecruiser? I'm not looking for damage type recommendations, I've already decided what I'm going to do there, but what kinds of weapons should I use? Dual Heavy Cannons and Turrets even though I lack an effective ability to buff them? Dual Beams and Beam arrays? Dual Beams and turrets? Cannons and turrets?

I'd like to hear your suggestions before I commit to grinding out what I can through episode replays.

If you want to go cannons you'll want 2x uncommon or better Energy Weapon Specialists with "Chance to reduce cooldown on cannon special abilities" in your Active Space roster. With those you have almost as much uptime on your single cannon ability as it would if you had 2x of the same ability. I'd go DHCs and maybe a torp fore, and all turrets or 3x turrets and one torp aft. A base turnrate of 10 is plenty good to line up DHCs in missions and PvE.

Yeah...until I get my fleetbase to T5 (sometime in 2015) then I'm not going to be monkeying with DOFFs in my build save perhaps a few of the Exploration DOFFs or the ones from Facility 2048.

I'm actually partial to beam/torp builds, but I'm not sure what the best set up is. The current set up on this character's Vor'cha is 2xDBB, 1xArray, 1xTorp forward and either 4xArray or 3xArray, 1x Torp aft; can't really remember which.

One of my toons in a similar situation runs a Mirror Battlecruiser with 4 DHCs fore, 4 turrets aft, and it works out well enough. An Aux2Dampeners 1 lets it turn pretty quick about half the time (though lots of powersliding) and deploy EWP without much trouble, and dual EPTS at only level 1 still tanks pretty solidly against PvE stuff. Altogether its not my ultimate killing machine or anything, as a Chubby Escort it's solid enough for ESTF work.

I envy the fleet vor'cha, such well made and balanced ship. Wish more ships would get such awesome fleet version treatment.

3 DHCs, 1 quantum. Aft you can slot what you want but turrets plus a TCD wouldn't be a bad thing.

Run it with Tac Team 1, Cannon Rapid Fire, and Torp Spread 1 (hence why you mount the quantum up front!)

The problem with the mirror is you lose one ENS slot for TAC. If you've got the vorcha retro, use it instead of the mirror.

Everything I ever say or do is aimed at PVE.

Somebody will probably laugh at me, but this is what I use on my Mirror Vor'cha.

Front weapons:
* beam array
* dual beam
* dual heavy cannons
* photon torpedo
Rear weapons:
* beam array
* 3 turrets

Boff arrangement
Tacteam1, AttackBeta1
EPTW1, Aux2Dampener1, EngTeam3, Aux2Structural3
EPTA1, RSP1, EPTS3
Polarize1, TSS2
HE1

Equip:
KHG shield
KHG deflector
Efficient Impulse engine

Consoles:
Disruptor coils * 3
Neutronium armor * 2
Monotanium armor * 1
RCS * 1
Plasmonic Leech
Assimilated console

The ad-hoc weapon loadout is based on a theory I have, where the more you can break up the weapon firing patterns so that not everything is firing at the exact same time, the more efficiently you use your weapon power. And it seems to work. It also looks really really cool

Boff powers aimed at survival. I can help allies, but mostly it's intended to keep ME alive. Even without fancy tactical abilities I can do enough damage to grab aggro usually simply because with my survivabilty I'm right in the enemy's plasma vents. Running 100 to weapons and 50 to shields constantly, alternating between EPTS and EPTW when on the attack or between EPTS and EPTA when tanking defensively. Between Aux2ID and Evasive and the inherently good agility for a cruiser, it's easy to be wherever you want to be as long as you remember that it drifts like crazy on sharp turns

Moves well, hits pretty hard, difficult to kill, and can throw some good heals on allies. Mirror Vor'cha is probably my favorite ship in the game.

I have to strenuously disagree with your build above.

You're losing about HALF your potential. First, DHCs will do double the output of your beam arrays. Second, while a DBB build is feasible it will overall do less damage then a comparable DHC build.

Second, you're wasting your tac slots. They're too precious to waste on APB. And yes, I said waste, I mean it. The only real reason to use BAs or DBBs on the Vor'cha is to maximize your available tac skills with FAW and BO. Otherwise if you run cannons you only get 1 skill that affects them (though it is a very good skill, CRF!).

APB is one of those skills you use AFTER you've taken care of the basics. You're using it BEFORE you've got the basics. Without BO or FAW to modify the damage output you're doing a mere fraction of your possible damage.

With the Vor'cha it is maneuverable enough without RCS consoles to keep the DHCs on target. There's no reason not to mount them, at all.

These require that you have at least 2 Purple and 1 Blue Technician DOffs.

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Classic Vor'cha (only if you're going to use a torpedo and at least 2 KHG pieces)

Front Wep: 3 DHC / 1 Torpedo (Quantum)

Rear Wep: 4 turrets

COM Eng: EPtS 1 / Aux2Bat 1 / RSP 2 / DEM 3 (EWP 3)

LTC Eng: EPtA 1 / Aux2Bat 1 / EWP 1 (DEM 2)

LT Sci: HE 1 / TSS 2

LT Tac: TT 1 / CRF 1 (CSV 1)

ENS Tac: Torpedo Spread 1

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Mirror Vor'cha (if you're not using a torp, just all cannons)

Front Wep: 4 DHC

Rear Wep: 4 turrets

COM Eng: EPtS 1 / Aux2Bat 1 / RSP 2 / DEM 3 (EWP 3) [Extend Shields 3]

LTC Eng: EPtA 1 / Aux2Bat 1 / EWP 1 (DEM 2) [ET 3]

LT Tac: TT1 / CRF 1 (CSV 1)

LT Sci: HE 1 / TSS 2

ENS Sci: Tractor Beam 1 (Polarize Hull 1)

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By combining the Technician DOffs with Aux2Bat you'll be able to get basically all of your BOff power's cooldowns to their global timer, essentially running everything as though it was in duplicate and you'll have 125 in weapons, shields, and Engines at almost all times. Keep a stack or two of Aux batteries on hand, and you should be okay once you get the hang of the ship.

If you need Technician DOff's the B'tran cluster colonial chain rewards them (check both B'tran Cluster and B'tran Cluster [Vice Admiral] when looking for the missions, they count as separate locations for DOff missions, thus possessing the chance for the colonial chain missions to appear in either instance). You get a blue for the B'tran Renown mission and purples when you get a critical success on the "Support B'tran Colonization Efforts" [Rare] mission.

I'm dubious. Are you available to run ISE some time? Run both ships through the same mission and then see what the combat log says...