And for a fraction of the effort, you can have a monster of a Beam boat. Which requires half the piloting skill.

This is my biggest problem with the game and with the people in /r/stobuilds in general and especially with Mastajdog. Mastajdog seems like a nice and intelligent person but every time someone comes along and points out a problem with non-beam weapons in the game he jumps in with some anecdotal post about how he knows a guy who does a million DPS using only cloaking tractor beam mines so you're wrong.

The fact that something CAN be done doesn't take away from the point that it's not worth it. You can build a beam boat using low quality gear that will do a crap ton of DPS even if flown by a pre-pubescent chimpanzee with a learning disorder.

It takes better gear, more concentration, more effort, and more skill to do less overall DPS with a cannon boat than the aforementioned idiot-proof beam boat.

This game needs to make it more rewarding to fly skillfully. I think Pedal to the Metal is a great example. For the unaware, if you invest enough points in the Pilot specialization tree you get a bonus called Pedal to the Metal that gives you a % damage increase for every second your ship is at maximum speed, this is a great idea but its current implementation still favors beam boats because they can turn in circles FAWing at max impulse and get the bonus. I think a Pedal to the Metal effect should be built into all cannons, the faster you're going the more damage cannons should do and that would allow escorts and raiders to be flown the way they should be, in swooping high damage passes.

Anyway, this is off-topic now. Torpedos also need some love, I like the idea of a hardpoint dedicated to a fore and aft torpedo launcher, in fact I wouldn't mind if they required one fore and one aft and only allowed one more to be put on each end, so the most you could have is two. This would allow them to balance around the idea that everyone has a minimum of 1 torpedo fore and aft and maximum of two. It would be easier for them to balance and more in line with what we see on the show. You can make torpedos more effective/interesting if you know people aren't going to make entire ships with only torpedo slots.