I have had HEAT on my lightning for a while now and I never want to use it. AP is better at taking out vehicles and just as effective at killing infantry as both need a direct hit for a kill. Theoretically you can kill with 2 hits of splash, but the falloff is so quick that it rarely seems worth it to count on that. So how do you use HEAT effectively?
HEAT has theoretically the highest DPS of the canons. It doesnt hit as hard but it reloads faster. On the Lightning specifically its a rough trade off since it loses the ability to 1 shot infantry. Who are typically more dangerous than other vehicles.
What he said. I can only think of HEAT having become slightly more useful on the Magrider since the Splash cannon completely lost its ability to one-shot infantly with splash alone. On the Lightning I consider the standard 6-shot autocannon (fogotten the name) to be better than the HEAT cannon in pretty much all circumstances.
It's good against stationary sunderers at longer distances than the VIPER. It has the highest DPS at max reload speed. So in situations where you can fire as fast as you can reload and have 100% HR it's decent. Those scenarios are few and far between though. Ultimately I would say don't ever bother with it unless you have extra certs just lying around or you want to auraxium the lightning.
HEAT have more damage per minute than any other choices, it also have a better splash radius than AP. (1-5m for HEAT vs 0.5-3m for AP; splash damage are the same) Python HEAT need 8 / 7 / 4 shells to kill a lightning from front / side / rear, doing it in 14 / 12 / 6 sec Python AP need 7 / 6 / 4 shells to kill a lighting from front / side / rear, doing it in 18 / 15 / 9 sec Against infantry, HEAT have a larger ammo pool, 50% more RoF and better splash than AP (it's still hard to two splash kill). The only con is you can't OHK infantry that wear auxiliary shield. (but since they don't have C4, they aren't a real threat) So on tank versus tank, the python HEAT is much better than the python AP. And since python HEAT buff, you can now OHK infantry on a direct hit. In other words : unless you are in a situation where projectile velocity and alpha are important (i.e. : a "trench war"), then HEAT is a better choice than AP.
It's great in duels with other lightnings. Y'know those knife-fight ones? The reload speed gives you higher dps than everything except the viper, and the penalty for a miss is greatly reduced since both tanks are gonna be duckin' and weavin'. It equal vs infantry as the AP. The added splash radius isn't worth much. Either you are OHK or you aren't. Most infantry are too slippery and clever to allow a second shot. HESH remains king of infantry.
FYI if the infantry has Flak armour equipped then an AP cannot one shot them either. The only good cannon now is the HESH.
Get some friends with lightnings and all use heat with the max reload speed... you just kill **** like nobodies business. If you are a reclusive solo nerd then HEAT is not for you.
Heat is good for DPS-centric objectives. Getting a sunderer before everyone around starts re-classing engineer, taking out base turrets, PMBs, etc.
That's the reason I actually bought HEAT. I saw that it had better TTK compared to AP and I play with tanks up close anyway. But in practice I noticed that I was getting better results from the higher alpha damage of AP since it gave me more freedom to maneuver, pop out, and take cover without losing as much DPS. Right now I'm just pulling HEAT to take out sunderers. But I'll keep trying to make it work (it's not like I can refund the certs anyway).
HEAT best used without cover. Use the speed of the lightning to protect you. If you are taking out sundies just straight up circle strafe them. You'll take it down before the protecting infantry can do much. It's also very strong in a lightning "duel" which are usually two tanks circle strafing, ducking and jiving, but not actually behind cover.
