A part of chatlogs, an idea

[Coin]

will be too easy to hit, die very quickly, and usually to the caps that have a thinner attacking profile. the only way to balance this is to give it a bunch of cap mortars, or line the side with forward cannons, and then it'd need an enormous powercore...

ship design moved away from the broadside concept in the age of sail, as the cannons required a lot of space to dissipate the recoil (fixing them onto the deck just rolled the ship over). now the guns point foward/aft and are firmly secured to the deck, and the ship itself absorbs the recoil.

the change in propulsion from sails to steam-driven propellers allowed for the change in gun orientation, as the wind dictates the direction of travel in a sail-boat, meaning that forward facing guns would be rarely lined up on target, and would lose to the broadside ship.

now we have space-boats that can even barrel roll, we can point them in any direction we choose, and so the broadside configuration becomes a disadvantage

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