Talk:40mm Auto Cannon (Apocalypse)

The 40mm Auto Cannon is an ok choice for the first 2 weeks, they can handle UFO's up to UFO Type 4 quite effectively on top of storing 300 rounds, basically not requiring any reloading at all during that period. Similar to the Plasma Turret Cannon, one full load will suffice for its lifespan.

On UFO Type 9 and 10 they will deal no damage at all / 1 damage per hit, you can have an entire armada chase and hit those UFO's but not even scratch them other than taking down the shields -> https://imgur.com/m9eblVE

However, it might be financially better to instantly sell the 40mm Auto Cannon off as well as the ammunition, simply because the overall profit you gain from that and the use of the Bolter and Janitor weapons can be invested into having more crafts or equipment and so on.

As for it doing low damage, it is still very prone to destroy the Alien Probe (UFO Type 1), as usually 3 - 4 bullets will still be flying towards the already crashing UFO.

Weapons with a slower fire rate are better to down the Probe, by micro managing the weapon you can turn off shooting after each shot when the UFO has low HP to prevent an unneeded additional shot that could destroy it.

Overall the 40mm Auto Cannon is an underrated craft weapon and seems to be usually perceived as weak by most players even though the opposite is the case. Probably also the fact that is uses ammunition might deter players from using it, even though one full load is more than enough to cover the entire 2 weeks, however one might still see the "not enough ammunition to rearm" message here and there because it's at 250 rounds instead of 300.

It's more that economically selling it along with the ammunition can be better in the long run over the battering it causes on the UFO's within the first 2 weeks. Bard (talk) 01:27, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

The autocannon isn't a bad weapon, it's just that Bolters are generally more efficient.

In Week 1 you have more than enough money and mostly just want to avoid spending it because you know you'll crunch in Week 2. Bolters are effectively free to use because you can recover 100% of the cost by selling them; you can't recover the cost of autocannon ammo that's expended.

Unless I've badly miscalculated, the autocannon is dominated by both the Bolter and Janitor against Fast-Attack Ships (type 4). The Bolter takes just over half as many hits to down one (~145 vs. ~275), and is more accurate in practice due to faster projectiles (though still awful - I'd call 20% a good day); the Janitor takes only ~40 hits to down one, and has nearly 100% accuracy. That is to say, the Bolter has equal performance for far less cost, and the Janitor has far better performance for slightly less cost. Against Assault Ships (type 6), the autocannon does perform better than the Bolter and cost less than the Janitor, but those only show up in week 3 and the Lineage makes the point moot. Magic9mushroom (talk) 13:45, 8 February 2020 (UTC)