This is all based off starmade wiki block stats I've read up on so subject to change. Also depends of it their correct and in theory should work.
I did do a search on salvage forum posts and someone did to some actual tests that seems to match up with these numbers.
Terminology used.
Salvage Beam: Total master and slave blocks with one to one ratio. eg. rapid fire salvage beam 200 is 100 salvage beam blocks and slave set of 100 cannon blocks always based on a 1:1 ratio if slaves are involved.
Under the old system before master and slaves, Salvagers worked by the more salvage blocks the higher the salvage tick speed where each tick salvaged a block. So bigger salvage beams salvaged blocks faster. You could say as the salvager fired a beam which salvaged a block and the fire rate depended on how many blocks were in group and each shot salvaged a block. This resulted in the computer only having to calculate 1 shot per tick that would salvage an entire block.
With the new master and slave system. Each salvage system using no slave, cannon slave, missile slave fires in 0.025seconds or 40 shots a second. This is 4 times faster than the fastest cannon/cannon rate of fire possible. So 100 x salvage beams is firing as many shots as a 400 x cannon/cannon systems. The computer has to calculate each shot path and add the salvage damage to each block and record it. That's a lot more number crunching than the old system.
Also while the slave beam and slave pulse systems have a slower rate of fire. Slave beam is 0.075seconds or three times slower but has 3 times the range. Slave pulse is 0.15sec or 6 times slower put uses far less blocks to do the same about of salvage damage explained later.
All salvagers have a range of 12% sector range except salvage/beams at 36% sector range.
All salvagers when held on, fire 100 shots then cooldown for another 100 shots except for slave cannon systems which have effectively no cooldown eg. after it fires 100 shots its ready to fire the next 100. So except for slave cannons salvagers spend half there time in cooldown the other half salvaging.
No slave,missile slave: 2.5sec fire then 2.5sec cooldown
Cannon slave: 2.5sec fire no cooldown
beam slave: 7.5sec fire then 7.5sec cooldown
pulse slave: 15sec fire then 15sec cooldown
To salvage a block you have to do 200 salvage damage to it. That's any block there all 200 salvage damage.
To make efficent salvage beams just requires you to not waste damage and thus not have excess blocks or power use. A salvage beam with no slave or beam slave does 2pts salvage damage to a block per block per tick. So to salvage one block per hit requires a salvage beam made up of 100 blocks to do the 200 salvage damage per block. Anything larger and the damage is wasted. Due to the individual hits a salvage beam of 50 to 99 blocks would both require two hits per block so a salvage beam made up of 50 blocks salvages just as fast as a 99 block salvager since both require 2 hits per block to salvage.
no slave or beam slave the effective number of shots to salvage a block are: shots-total blocks (master/slave)
1- 100 (50/50) eg a 100 block salvager will salvage one block with 1 shot or a 50 salvage/50 beam with 1 shot
2- 50 (25/25)
3- 34 (17/17)
4- 25 not a 1 to 1 system so (13/13)
5- 20 (10/10)
slave missile salvagers split there damage into 9 beams I've read. So use 9 times the above numbers.
Slave missile systems should cause massive lag since there is so little damage per beam and the computer has to calculate all the shots and keep track of all the partial salvage damage. Unless you use few large beams. For instance it should take a 900 block salvage/missile system for each of the 9 emitted beams to salvage a block per hit.
Slave cannon salvagers do 1pt per block per shot or tick so the effective number of shots to salvage a block are: shots-total blocks (master/slave)
1- 200 (100/100)
2- 100 (50/50)
3- 68 (34/34)
4- 50 (25/25)
5- 40 (20/20)
slave pulse salvagers do 12pts per block per shot or tick so the effective number of shots to salvage a block are: shots-total blocks (master/slave)
1- 18 (9/9)
2- 10 (5/5)
3- 6 (3/3)
5- 4 (2/2)
Due to rounding and a 1 to 1 master slave ratio there is no 4 shot for the salvage/pulse.
So if you size your respective salvagers using these numbers you should waste less blocks/damage/power.
To reduce lag instead of having many salvage beams firing many shots each to salvage individual blocks, have a lower number of salvage beams but make them large enough to salvage a block per hit. This way the server doesn't have to record partial salvage damage, and less shots are calculated for each block salvaged.
I would recommend a salvage/cannon setup with 200 blocks in each beam and setup the outputs in a line so you can clear blocks like wiping with a paint brush. Also by having a line you can stack the salvage modules up and down and not make the system very deep requiring a very long ship. Or maybe a cross setup. It will salvage 40 blocks deep per second. Each 0.025 tick will salvage an entire block each salvage beam.
For salvaging in a checkerboard and not using a lot of blocks the salvage/pulse 18 (9/9) is ideal. With just a checkerboard pattern 18 deep it can salvage a layer of blocks every 0.15seconds up to 100 deep in 15seconds, limited by range, but you have to wait another 15seconds to fire again. But it doesn't use a lot of blocks per beam.
Depending on your play style when you first start off with little resources maybe a salvage/pulse system might be more useful. You could alternate fire between 2 salvage/pulse systems.
Power usage
Normally due to ships not being in combat while salvaging usually energy use isn't to big a problem. I usually build capital class ships so maybe smaller ships have problems. Using the minimum required salvage blocks for a certain number of shots to salvage a block lowers wasted power. By using less salvage beams grouped together you will also waste less power. The power loss for multiple beams is currently calculated as
power use multiplier = ([ (number of beams -1) x 0.1] + 1) x number of beams
1 x1
2 x 2.2
3 x3.6
4 x5.2
5 x7
6 x9
7 x11.2
8 x13.6
9 x16.2
10 x19
11 x22
100 x1090
So using 11 beams grouped together uses the power x22 of the one beam. A 100 salvage beam array uses x1,090 single beam power. It not unusual to see old system salvage systems use upwards of 400 individual beams which is x16,360. Large arrays of salvage beams use very large quantities of power. Outdated designs made before the master/slave system was introduced is likely to have extreme power problems from large salvage arrays. This power use multiplier also applies to all weapons as well.
Anyway I hope my long winded post will help with your ship designs and maybe reduce server lag a bit.
I did do a search on salvage forum posts and someone did to some actual tests that seems to match up with these numbers.
Terminology used.
Salvage Beam: Total master and slave blocks with one to one ratio. eg. rapid fire salvage beam 200 is 100 salvage beam blocks and slave set of 100 cannon blocks always based on a 1:1 ratio if slaves are involved.
Under the old system before master and slaves, Salvagers worked by the more salvage blocks the higher the salvage tick speed where each tick salvaged a block. So bigger salvage beams salvaged blocks faster. You could say as the salvager fired a beam which salvaged a block and the fire rate depended on how many blocks were in group and each shot salvaged a block. This resulted in the computer only having to calculate 1 shot per tick that would salvage an entire block.
With the new master and slave system. Each salvage system using no slave, cannon slave, missile slave fires in 0.025seconds or 40 shots a second. This is 4 times faster than the fastest cannon/cannon rate of fire possible. So 100 x salvage beams is firing as many shots as a 400 x cannon/cannon systems. The computer has to calculate each shot path and add the salvage damage to each block and record it. That's a lot more number crunching than the old system.
Also while the slave beam and slave pulse systems have a slower rate of fire. Slave beam is 0.075seconds or three times slower but has 3 times the range. Slave pulse is 0.15sec or 6 times slower put uses far less blocks to do the same about of salvage damage explained later.
All salvagers have a range of 12% sector range except salvage/beams at 36% sector range.
All salvagers when held on, fire 100 shots then cooldown for another 100 shots except for slave cannon systems which have effectively no cooldown eg. after it fires 100 shots its ready to fire the next 100. So except for slave cannons salvagers spend half there time in cooldown the other half salvaging.
No slave,missile slave: 2.5sec fire then 2.5sec cooldown
Cannon slave: 2.5sec fire no cooldown
beam slave: 7.5sec fire then 7.5sec cooldown
pulse slave: 15sec fire then 15sec cooldown
To salvage a block you have to do 200 salvage damage to it. That's any block there all 200 salvage damage.
To make efficent salvage beams just requires you to not waste damage and thus not have excess blocks or power use. A salvage beam with no slave or beam slave does 2pts salvage damage to a block per block per tick. So to salvage one block per hit requires a salvage beam made up of 100 blocks to do the 200 salvage damage per block. Anything larger and the damage is wasted. Due to the individual hits a salvage beam of 50 to 99 blocks would both require two hits per block so a salvage beam made up of 50 blocks salvages just as fast as a 99 block salvager since both require 2 hits per block to salvage.
no slave or beam slave the effective number of shots to salvage a block are: shots-total blocks (master/slave)
1- 100 (50/50) eg a 100 block salvager will salvage one block with 1 shot or a 50 salvage/50 beam with 1 shot
2- 50 (25/25)
3- 34 (17/17)
4- 25 not a 1 to 1 system so (13/13)
5- 20 (10/10)
slave missile salvagers split there damage into 9 beams I've read. So use 9 times the above numbers.
Slave missile systems should cause massive lag since there is so little damage per beam and the computer has to calculate all the shots and keep track of all the partial salvage damage. Unless you use few large beams. For instance it should take a 900 block salvage/missile system for each of the 9 emitted beams to salvage a block per hit.
Slave cannon salvagers do 1pt per block per shot or tick so the effective number of shots to salvage a block are: shots-total blocks (master/slave)
1- 200 (100/100)
2- 100 (50/50)
3- 68 (34/34)
4- 50 (25/25)
5- 40 (20/20)
slave pulse salvagers do 12pts per block per shot or tick so the effective number of shots to salvage a block are: shots-total blocks (master/slave)
1- 18 (9/9)
2- 10 (5/5)
3- 6 (3/3)
5- 4 (2/2)
Due to rounding and a 1 to 1 master slave ratio there is no 4 shot for the salvage/pulse.
So if you size your respective salvagers using these numbers you should waste less blocks/damage/power.
To reduce lag instead of having many salvage beams firing many shots each to salvage individual blocks, have a lower number of salvage beams but make them large enough to salvage a block per hit. This way the server doesn't have to record partial salvage damage, and less shots are calculated for each block salvaged.
I would recommend a salvage/cannon setup with 200 blocks in each beam and setup the outputs in a line so you can clear blocks like wiping with a paint brush. Also by having a line you can stack the salvage modules up and down and not make the system very deep requiring a very long ship. Or maybe a cross setup. It will salvage 40 blocks deep per second. Each 0.025 tick will salvage an entire block each salvage beam.
For salvaging in a checkerboard and not using a lot of blocks the salvage/pulse 18 (9/9) is ideal. With just a checkerboard pattern 18 deep it can salvage a layer of blocks every 0.15seconds up to 100 deep in 15seconds, limited by range, but you have to wait another 15seconds to fire again. But it doesn't use a lot of blocks per beam.
Depending on your play style when you first start off with little resources maybe a salvage/pulse system might be more useful. You could alternate fire between 2 salvage/pulse systems.
Power usage
Normally due to ships not being in combat while salvaging usually energy use isn't to big a problem. I usually build capital class ships so maybe smaller ships have problems. Using the minimum required salvage blocks for a certain number of shots to salvage a block lowers wasted power. By using less salvage beams grouped together you will also waste less power. The power loss for multiple beams is currently calculated as
power use multiplier = ([ (number of beams -1) x 0.1] + 1) x number of beams
1 x1
2 x 2.2
3 x3.6
4 x5.2
5 x7
6 x9
7 x11.2
8 x13.6
9 x16.2
10 x19
11 x22
100 x1090
So using 11 beams grouped together uses the power x22 of the one beam. A 100 salvage beam array uses x1,090 single beam power. It not unusual to see old system salvage systems use upwards of 400 individual beams which is x16,360. Large arrays of salvage beams use very large quantities of power. Outdated designs made before the master/slave system was introduced is likely to have extreme power problems from large salvage arrays. This power use multiplier also applies to all weapons as well.
Anyway I hope my long winded post will help with your ship designs and maybe reduce server lag a bit.