Many people have said that the spartan laser would be less effective than a MAC gun on this site for variuos reasons, like MAC rounds go almost as fast as them or that the amount of shots you can get off before recharging means that it would not be usefull.

Since I have not been able to sleep I did some research on the matters and discoverd this-

MAC rounds travel at approx 1/10(4/10 for SMAC) the speed of light, where as the spartan laser which is in fact actually a particle accelerator, fires at almost the speed of light(say 9/10th). This means in terms of the speed of the rounds fired, The Laser has the MAC gun beat.

Since A shipborne(or stationborne for that matter) laser would be much larger it would not use the same power source as the Infantry version. Consider this, since the laser would use only energy, freeing up space. Because of this a shipborne Laser could be powered by an onboard generator instead of a battery and a stationborne one could be powered by ground generators.

MAC's take up alot of space where as the laser generator would take only a fraction of it. This would be a major advantage over MAC guns also, as the generator could be placed in the interior of the ship or station.

Since the particles emmited from the laser can be guided, the ship or station can use turrets to fire the beam instead of turning an entire ship or station. Plus, since the beam can be splitted you can route the shot from those massive laser generators into multiple turrets at once, allowing a single ship or station to track and attack multiple targets at once, possible even smaller fightercraft. 

When firing over a distance the laser is more effective than a MAC round because it travels several times faster, thus decreasing the time it takes for the shot to reach its target greatly reducing the enemy's time to dodge the shot. While both MAC rounds and shots from the laser can punch through multiple targets, the MAC shot would slow down after going through just one, where as the laser shot would continue at full speed.

The only trouble now is comparing the damage of the two. This is hard since the Laser does not actually have a spaceborne counterpart that we know of so we will have to compare the laser to a shot from a gauss hog.

A single laser shot will penetrate through any number of spartans, including their shields, and continue through. The same goes for puncturing through vehicles.

1 shot will destroy a warthog using the laser

3+ shots will destroy a warthog using the gun of a gauss hog.

The spartan laser is superior as a weapon to the MAC.

Let the arguing commence

 

---

"The pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"-Led Zeppelin

Nice info, but the energy required for a larger scale would be astronomical and they would need a huge.

Mac guns are more practical and are cheaper where the laser must be very expensive.

---

Vigil is watching you

Halo: The Unlatched Casket- The horror is released........

The size of a laser im thinking of would not take much more power, if not less, then a MAC. Remember that they are energy hogs as well.

I could not find how much the MAC itself costs but the laser costs 218,00cR. While that is alot of money(even alot more for a spaceborne one) the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. With the laser on board ships could hit enemies further away, deal more damage, attack multiple targets at once, and fire relatively fast (3 second charge  and fire time ).

I doubt the UNSC could outfit more than one ship or station in their currentsstate with this system, but one ship is all it takes

 

---

"The pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"-Led Zeppelin

sadly, one ship that could be fried instantly in a space battle

yes, sadly one ship can be destroyed quickly. A laser defense station would probably slaughter enemy forces.

---

"The pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"-Led Zeppelin

I'm pretty sure the reason the UNSC haven't done it is because laser tech was only perfected recently (which is why the spartan laser is out in halo 3)

The PoA was fitted with a new reactor that used lasers to cool it, so i think it's only recently the UNSC have looked into energy based weapons, where as before there wasn't that much of a need for them (rebels only had ballistic armour, if any)

And the way you describe the station it just seems to be a very large point defence station rather than a ship to ship one

---

http://www.brokenlinestudios.net/forums/

a big ass laser for PD?

About the station system-

 A spartan laser generates three seperate beams

Lets say that the staion board one used 60(very powerful)

Since the barticle beams can be split you can have turrets. Using the turrets, lets say the station had 6. With this in mind 5 turrets could each track a smaller fightercraft while one targeted a capital ship. When the laser fired lets say 2 beams got routed through the five turrets tracking fighters to destroy them. That leaves 50 beams to fire at the capital ship out of the other turret. it could fire 10 beams from each turret if thats the case and be used as a very strong PD system. It has multiple purposes. Plus, the beams dont have to be split between turrets so you could fire a 60 beam shot and destroy a supercarrier from one turret for that matter.

---

"The pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"-Led Zeppelin

You forgot something important: Overheating.

As you all know, lasers use tremendous amounts of energy, and some of that energy heats up the weapon firing it. So, while the laser might be able to take out several Covenant ships, while it is cooling down, the Covenant could just swarm the station/ship until it is destroyed.

Also, I'm sure that the Covenant could easily just swarm a single station just by sheer numbers. In the end, the UNSC cannot afford large scale laser production, and using only the handfull that they can afford would just be a waste, as the Covenant would still destroy the station.

---

Looking for a clan? Check out the S.T.A.R.S. clan

Arma tuentur pacem

From what I have seen of the spartan laser in the beta it does not overheat. Plus it only has a 3 second charge. The only major drawback I can see is the large power consumption it would take to keep it running at full strength.

plus, it is a particle accelerator(a very efficient one), not just a plain laser as you are thinking of.

If there were heating problems that could be easily solved by using the cold vaccum of space as a cooling system, as it would take only seconds to cool it down.

---

"The pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"-Led Zeppelin

maybe ZPM?

and yea lasers

---

thanx commander FOX

"tho i walk through the valley of death, I shall fear no evil"

lol Stargate at its best

But if the MACs were replaced with lasers, the UNSC ships have lost their advantage over star wars ships, because lasers are energy based weapons, so they can't go through imperial sheilds and then covenant ships are on their own to fight the ISDs!  NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A Covenant frigate can fry an SSD

hmmm did they ever consider extracting energy from slipspace? Is it even possible?

UNSC couldn't possibly have the resources(including people) to initiate another plan while the last stronghold is fighting. I think the next concern for mankind would be hiding from the covies......sorry off topic
 

---