Uranium slug turret

The uranium slug turret is a defensive turret with very long range and shot damage, but with a wide blind zone.

Acquisition[edit]

Uranium slug turrets can be constructed once the Uranium slug turret research project has been completed. They require 300 Steel, 30 Plasteel, 60 Uranium, 6 Components, 15,000 ticks (4.17 mins) of work, and a Construction skill of 6.

Summary[edit]

The uranium slug turret uses the uranium slug cannon weapon. In addition to the weapon's accuracy, the turret itself has a per-tile shooting accuracy of 98% or equivalent to a Shooting skill of 14. It has a maximum range of 45.9 tiles, but is unable to hit enemies within an 11.9 tile radius. These ranges are centered on the lower left tile of the turret, regardless of orientation. Despite its damage, the uranium slug turret's stopping power is almost non-existent, not even being able to stagger humans - the same is also true for the autocannon turret.

After firing 30 slugs, it needs to be reloaded with 60 uranium by a hauler. This can be adjusted in the storyteller settings, but all default difficulty settings do not alter this.

Since uranium slug turrets are large 2x2 structures, ranged attacks are twice as accurate against them.

As of version 1.4.3580, uranium slug turrets do benefit from cover but only if the lower left corner of the turret is covered from the shooter as confirmed by empirical testing. In practice this means that the turret can only be in cover if engaged from the south-east, as pawns will target the nearest tile of the turret and cover only applies if it is directly adjacent to the targeted tile.

Like all turrets, they cannot target enemies through blind smoke and are temporarily disabled by sources of EMP, with downtime scaling to the EMP damage dealt. Unlike mechanoids, turrets do not adapt to EMP and thus can be continuously restunned.

Visualization of effective turret range of all three turrets, from uranium slug turret (top), to autocannon turret (middle), to mini-turret (bottom).
Green is 80 - 100% of peak accuracy, blue is 50 - 80% of peak accuracy, red is below 50% of peak accuracy and grey is outside range. Gold tiles are spaced every 5 tiles. Values from 1.0.

Explosion[edit]

Uranium slug turrets have a 50% chance to explode when damaged below 20% health. The exploding turret will spark and emit a hissing sound for 240 ticks (4 secs) before exploding, dealing 50 Bomb damage in a 5.9 tile radius centered around the lower left tile of the turret. Bomb damage is multiplied 8x against walls, 4x against other impassable structures and plants, and 2x against passable buildings. All nearby raiders will attempt to move out of the blast radius before detonation.

Radius of uranium slug turret explosion. Note the slight offset from the 'true' center of the turret.

Analysis[edit]

Uranium slug turrets are expensive, with high research requirement and high ammo costs. Getting enough uranium to use the turrets is difficult, at least until you have either ground-penetrating scanners or long-range mineral scanners. In return, they don't offer much firepower. Turrets in general aren't strong - you should not expect them to defeat raids on their own. In any case, autocannon turrets are often the more practical choice.

Autocannons are cheaper, yet have better raw DPS - to the vast majority of targets - until past 25 tiles of range. To make the comparison worse, the uranium slug turret has a tendency to overkill. It deals 55 damage per shot, but a human's largest body part, the torso, only has 40 HP. This leads to wasted overkill damage. Thus, even against armored humans, the autocannon may outperform. Against centipedes and other heavy mechanoids, the uranium turret ends up being stronger, due to higher AP and lack of overkill damage.

The real niches of the uranium slug turret are its massive range and AP. With 45.9 tiles of range, it outranges every enemy in the game. Unlike most weapons, this turret gets more accurate the further away a target is, performing the best around 35-45 tiles. The high AP is useful against heavy mechs and armored humans, which other turrets can struggle with.

Due to their impracticality, uranium slug turrets are relegated to the late-game / end-game, where the uranium cost is no longer an issue. It performs great against high-armor targets from far away. Since uranium turrets are most accurate from far away, you'll want to design any killboxes around that fact. Give space to place your turrets, but place them out of line of your colonists to avoid friendly fire. Also, due to their range, uranium turrets remain effective outside of a killbox.

Graphs[edit]

True DPS over Range

Version history[edit]

0.19.2009 - Added.
1.1.0 - Received a massive nerf to damage (75 -> 30), nerf to armor penetration (112.5% -> 70%), reduced range (49.9 -> 39.9), increased reload cost (60 -> 80 baseline) and nerf to shooting accuracy (98.8% -> 98%).
1.1.2618 - Received a buff to damage (30 -> 45), increased range (39.9 -> 45.9), increased reload cost (80 -> 120) and reduced magazine capacity (40 -> 30).
1.1.2624 - Received a buff to damage (45 -> 50), buff to armor penetration (70% -> 75%), and reduced reload cost (120 -> 90).
1.3.3200 - Damage increased from 50 to 55. Accuracy increased: touch 0.2 -> 0.22, short 0.3 -> 0.33, medium 0.4 -> 0.44. Turret ammo cost is no longer factored by difficulty.
Between 1.3.3117 and 1.4.3580 - Turrets now benefit from cover. Despite displaying in the mouse-over box as such, empirical testing demonstrated that turrets did not benefit at all. However, a new issue was introduced. See above.

Architect

Security: Barricade • Sandbags • Spike trap
(research): Autocannon turret • Foam turret • Mini-turret • Rocketswarm launcher • Uranium slug turret • Mortar
IEDs: IED trap • IED incendiary trap • IED EMP trap • IED firefoam trap • IED smoke trap • IED antigrain warhead trap • IED tox trap
Related: Antigrain warhead • EMP shell • Firefoam shell • High-explosive shell • Incendiary shell • Smoke shell • Tox shell