View source for Talk:Beam Laser/@comment-94.12.31.80-20170722145014

Beam lasers are only better in your larger slots than burst or pulse if you can afford to put more pips into weapons. That's great for sneak attacks, getting shields down quick to let other weapons like multicannons to do the work, or if you're so overmatched against your target that you don't need to worry about weakening your shields.

Over extended dogfights or against someone who can really hurt you, or if you have limited hardpoints, it's usually better to go with burst lasers, which (if you keep pips in engine and sys) will deal more damage over the same amount of time because they can keep firing.

In your smaller hardpoints beam lasers are _probably_ better than burst, as the problems in big ships are much reduced. Pulse in general should be avoided unless you have power or heat (or money!) limits.

But ignore all of the above if you can get an engineer to modify your beam laser to make it more efficient.