Plasma weapons

[Scottyvader]

I am working on a ultra tech campaign and plan on having plasma weapony being
one of the major armaments of the campaign, but I am finding that the description of plasma weapons from the book to be somewhat confusing.
The ultra tech book lists 2 plasma weapons types the first being a "plasma flamer" that says that it is a projector yet they seem to behave like normal guns and the other plasma weapon causes a small explosion with each shot which is a little to devastating in my opinion to be a standard weapon of soldiers aboard a spaceship.
I am trying to make plasma weapons that behave more like the plasma weapons from the convenient from halo or the plasma weapons wielded by the aliens in xcom enemy unknown, or the staff weapon of the goauld from stargate.
With this in mind I was hoping that someone has a better idea on how to achieve what I am trying to do. The best I can figure is to just use the plasma flamers and jump up their rof and treat them as a plasma bolt thrower rather then a flame thrower.
Also do you think that the energy cells of plasma weapons would be interchangable with the power cells of say a laser weapon or would the plasma weapon require a sort of hydrogen fuel cell to make plasma from?