Well sure, lots of things happen. I died in many remarkable ways, even in very good ships.
The point is that even a player with 0 experience but the ability to read will see that the Salvager/Raba are very different than other ships in their class. On top of that is a thing like shape which is more difficult to explain via stats, but is easily recognized through experience.
Now you have the experiences of folks less successful at PVP on the one hand, and the experiences of another group of players that are far more successful at PVP on the other - which set of experiences would you put your faith in?
Again there's the fact that the Salvager sports the hull of a battle transport, gunboat turrets and as many regens as a cruiser - you don't need skill or experience to realize that that sets these transports apart from other transports.
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I love that ship, it's a superior cash cow, it looks awesome and "unique" and has a nice infocard. Even a mining bonus and gunboat turrets and a pretty sweet cargo hold, not to mention the heavy armored hull and the OP do-all/carry-all Junker ID.
It doesn't need the regen capacity of a capital class ship to be a superb transport!