Gunboats balance

[Dusty Lens]

the reason it isnt a missile or torpedo weapon is because those are explosive weapons... and explosive weapons have proven to be nearly useless against capships. To even deal shield damage with a torpedo, the explosion radius has to hit the shield generator hardpoint on the target ship - which is usually at the very center of the model, and thus out of explosion range.

Supernova Torps are actually dead useful against vanilla caps. A bomber with dual supernovas can destroy an Osiris in a 'single' shot if it has anything of cap 5 armor or lower, or so I've been informed, this having to do with the damage taking place across multiple components in the same fashion that a well placed cannonball can shred an Eagle.

However, they're a joke when being put up against non vanilla caps or when fired at range due to the poor tracking performance of missiles in addition to being useless against shields.

Can you imagine actually attempting to use a torpedo against a gunboat? I'm a medium skill bomber pilot and I miss 3 shots out of every four with the cannon firing at gunboats as they thrust and spin about the battlefield.

That being said, gunboats are plenty tough as it is. Three of them can rip a solo battleship in half, let alone anything else. For the credits you have to put down to get one up and running, they're a pretty sweet piece of kit.