It doesn't make much sense to remove the Annapurna's ability to zoom. You have now made it entirely defenseless against pirates, as it's a transport but is forced to use normal view, making it impossible to hit the target. I think you were trying to stop it from being used offensively, but that failed; against larger targets, it is still plenty effective without the zoom. All you did was make it useless for people who used it legitimately as a mining transport and who would need to be able to defend themselves against pirate bombers. Return its zoom so it can actually have a chance at defending itself. It only has 800 cargo; it's not like it's some kind of overpowered megatransport powertrading tool. At least let it defend itself.
============== AI Drone ==============
I don't like what you did to the AI Drone. You weakened its weapons, and you removed its zoom. What is it now? Take a Nephthys. Remove a bunch of hull. Remove a gun. Remove its torpedo slot. Slow it down so it steers like one of the heavier SHF's. Now you have the AI Drone.
There are a few ways you could make it useful again, choose one or two, but of course don't do all of them or then it would become overpowered:
1: Increase the strength of its guns up to what they used to be, dealing between 2700 and 2900 DPS. There are alread codenames that deal this amount of damage, it should at least be able to keep up with codenames, considering how slow the AI Drone turns.
2: Give it a torpedo slot with an AI version of the Tartarus, which of course would be weaker, dealing around 15,000 shield damage and moving at 680 m/s. If it's going to have VHF stats, it could at least have a torpedo.
3: Give it more hull, increasing its hull from 11,000 up to 15,000. Considering that it turns as slow as a heavy SHF, it could at least have more hull than VHFs.
4: Increase its turn rate so that it matches that of other VHF's; up from 57 degrees per second to 68 degrees per second, where it would be about average. At the moment, such a hideous turn rate for something so fragile is ridiculous.
5: Return its ability to turret zoom. If it's going to be weak and slow, it could at least be able to turret steer (even though its turrets only fire forwards).
As I stated above, choose one or two of these, not all five; that would just be overpowered.
============== Salvager ==============
With basic gunboat turrets being weakened so drastically, the salvager is now unable to properly defend itself against fighters and bombers. Its power core is too weak to use anything other than basics effectively, and basics are absolute crap.
It should either:
1: Have its turrets removed, and just be given 12x transport turrets
or
2: Have its turrets removed, and just be given 6x cruiser turrets (not as overpowered as it sounds, most of a cruiser's firepower comes from its heavy slots, a mere 6x regular cruiser turrets would actually render the salvager still having significantly less firepower than most transports, although still effective)
That is unless gunboat basics are improved to not be absolute crap.
============== Pelican/Armored Transport ==============
The Pelican is still a great ship, but there's a bit of a problem with it. Since it can no longer equip missiles, as it does not have class 10 slots, it suddenly has transport turrets and then fighter guns, which don't mix together very well. It would be nice if the two class 9 gun mounts were removed and it was given just one class 10 mount that a player could place a missile into.
It also needs to be given more cargo; its current cargo is ridiculously tiny for a transport. At least increase its cargo up to 900. It would still be useless for people who want to profit, you don't have to worry about people "powertrading in battle pelicans", but at least it would have some sort of function as a transport.
============== Bottlenose ==============
With the bottlenose being so significantly larger, I believe it would be appropriate to increase its hull points from 55,000 up to at least 65,000.
============== Transport Type 3 Turrets ==============
I know they're not called that anymore, but I'm talking about the 800 m/s transport turrets, and all variations of them. They are weak; they do pretty much the same damage per second as Dulzians, except they're way slower. Please increase their damage per shot up to 1,240, giving them 2,480 DPS. If it's okay for people to have Charon Turrets which are 600 m/s and 4,160 DPS, then why does 800 m/s have to be so hideously weak?
I understand that you were trying to balance gunboats, but this is just ridiculous. Gunboats are supposed to fight other gunboats, fighters, and bombers. Why would you weaken the turrets designed for that job until gunboats become nothing but small versions of cruisers, using heavy turrets that are for killing other capital ships instead of fighters?
Please, at least increase the projectile speed of the basic turrets (and the house variations of them) up to 1200 m/s. They'll still be slower than they were in 4.86, so the one or two people who thought they were too fast will still have their way with them being slower, but the current 990 m/s is just way too slow, that puts them at the point where they are almost as slow as Cerberus, except with not much more than half its DPS.
There are lots more things that need to be fixed, but I'll leave it there for now.
