Let us go back to early 2008 (because this is the earliest I personally can remember). The mod version 4.84 has been out for a couple of months now and it is the second large update, which focuses on RP and, apart from new goodies, also adds tons of lore to the gameworld. While new pilotable capital ships were added by every update thus far, the 84 update added capital ships to almost every single faction.

Though capital ships back in 2008 were not at all as they are now. The currently used Turret Zoom and Turret Steering did not exist for the next few years, so capital ship PVP was not as good until 4.85 hit. The small choice of viable loadouts also hindered their usefulness in general and overall, capital ships were simply large transports, which happened to have large guns and small cargo holds.

But make no mistake- they were still popular and quite used. While many players flying them were newbies, who simply did not know better and sought out to get the largest ships they could, only to find how useless they were and sell them off again, other players did fly them quite often for a completely different reason. 4.84 was a mod version, which still focused mainly on snubcraft as the everyday ship and the PVP itself was still very similar to vanila Freelancer. There were very many good PVPers, who often flew around and looking for a fight.

Back in 2008, server rules regarding PVP interactions were a lot more strict than they are now. A player, who lost a fight would have to leave the system for 4 hours. And that is not all. A PVP ''death'' constituted not only being blown up by another player, but also engaging cruise engines during an engagement or otherwise ''fleeing'' out of range of the attacker. There was no way to ''escape'' a combat scenario.

And this is where capital ships came in. While they were almost completely useless in PVP, the biggest reason why people flew them was because of their survivability. It was almost completely impossible for a lone snubcraft, no matter how good of a player flying it, to take out a capital ship. And so caps became a safe heaven for players with low pvp skills, who actively flew them in order to avoid lone hostiles looking for a cheap kill, especially during the mornings, when the server activity was lower.

Needless to say, this sort of thing angered the snubcraft players a lot. It did not take long for the usage of a capital ship to be compared to being a newbie player or an unskilled one. There was an ever increasing gap between snub and capital ship flyers and now it was fueled with the pvp elite specifically teaming up to hunt down these players regardless of what kind of caps they flew. Capital ships soon became targets for huge raids and nobody really was inclined to feel any pity for them.

However, the hate towards capital ships was not just because they were a way to avoid skilled players from killing you, otherwise the argument would be way too one-sided. It did not take long for players to start getting back at the so called ''pvp elite'' for their current position and the server rules at the time offered them just that. Since a player could not flee from an engagement without losing the battle, capital ship players started actively hunting down lone fighters. The players, who had great PVP skills and were looking for a fight quickly learned that if they were caught by a capital ship, all the cap had to do was to sit back, cross their arms and wait for the snubcraft to fly away. There was no way for a lone fighter to force the capital ship to flee. The rules were on their side.

Not only this sparked a huge flame war and an even bigger dislike towards capital ships and the players behind them, it also was one of the driving forces for the elimination of that specific rule and the implementation of the Cruise Drain system, which did not allow capital ships to cruise up to fleeing targets.

At that point, the fighter pilots could mock capital ships full force once more. While they themselves could not easily kill those players, they themselves could not be killed and both sides knew who was the ''more skilled player'' at the time.

Until Turret Steering/Turret Zoom happened. This new mechanic flipped the table in more ways than one. One could only imagine just how it felt for the ''snub elite'' to have been ridiculing the playerbase that flew capital ships for years, only to suddenly realize one that "Oh god. These things hurt!". They were not safe anymore. It is hard to explain how odd it was to realize that hugging a capital ship was not an option anymore, that their weapons at that range hit flawlessly regardless of what kind of dodging you did or what skills you happened to possess and while it was possible to avoid capital ship fire by out-running them, it was clear that they were now a dangerous opponent, regardless of the player's skill. This made skilled PVPers burn through their seats in anger.

Snub pilots realized the change. Capital ship pilots realized the change. The bridges were burned and now we are where we are, both sides sitting on either side of a long table with enough distance between each other in order to wave their swords around, but close enough to tickle someone's chin with the tip of the blade. One side became ''pvp/snub purists/elitists'' while the other side was "unskilled/aimbot-using".

Gunboats
Being the smallest and cheapest of capital ships, these are usually the first ones a new player might get. While not sporting too much in terms of armor, the ships themselves are agile enough to survive against larger capital ships if they keep a healthy distance. SOLARIS turrets have a small range, but high projectile speed, giving you the edge over small craft (including other gunboats), while the BASIC gunboat turrets are often used to kite larger capital ships.

Cruisers/Destroyers
This particular group of capital ships are considered one of the more balanced one. While they are a lot larger and slower than gunboats, they are still agile enough to evade fire at a good enough distance. Their weapons of choice are Cerberus turrets, which allow dealing damage to other capital ships over distance. Alternatively, the player can also use Razors for surprising snubcraft and gunboats if they get close enough.

Battlecruisers
A rather specific subspecies of the Cruiser, the battlecruiser sports more heavy weapon slots (Including two battleship primary turret slots) and can be devastating if it gets up close to cruisers, their thrust speed similar and thus not allowing the later to get distance from the BC. The tradeoff is the huge drop in agility, while the hitpoint pool stays roughtly the same, making these caps an easier target for battleships if they do not watch their back.

Light Battleships
These ships are usually shaped differently than their heavy counterparts and rely on strafing and rear-view fire, rather than charging other battleships head-on. Their size also makes using anti-snub weapons such as solaris turrets a viable choice. Like all battleships, their primary weapons are Battleship Cerberus turrets and Primary Turrets, which are usually never fired alongside their other guns due to energy consumption.

Heavy Battleships
These ships work best with large armor upgrades, allowing them to tank damage, while they go in close and unload all of their twenty-something turrets into the target. Their size, however, makes them a very easy target for cruisers and smaller battleships if they can keep distance. Their huge amount of secondary turrets, however, makes them lethal to gunboats and cruisers, if they get too close.