Range. Plain and simply, your LRM's can attack from a standing distance that is further than your other ships. Since ships on AI mode have a tendency to attack the closest ship that is of the right armor type for their weapons, your weak-hulled/shielded LRM's are generally left alone for a while and pound the enemy into the ground.

To see this, next time take a look at the garrison defenders on a Desert or Terran world that you're expanding to. The LRM's sit out a bit further and blast away while their other ships soak up your damage.

Note - range was nerfed quite a bit in 1.04, but still has a benefit.

1) Don't know, but the wiki says "DPS" for Advent capships.

2) Only a percentage of Vasari missiles can, and you need to research it to increase that percentage. TEC and Advent do not.

Ah, thanks for the info guys. So it is definitely damage per second that is listed. About the LRM, wouldn't it be targeted first due to its (relatively) high damage and weak HP when you're playing a human opponent? During my fights with the AI, I evaluate target priorities for all encounters.

Oh, sorry I wasn't reading the usernames. I don't recall seeing any of those weapon and armour classes described in-game. They just give a generic good against and bad against

I don't see the reference files on the downloads page, just products for the pc desktop. Got a link for them?

retroboy I reaalise there are multiple wikis , what wiki do you reccomend?

It's because LRMs are the best generic combat unit around. They are surpassed in combat prowess only by heavy cruisers, which are FAR down the tech tree. Carriers aren't really great for the front lines, or for countering LRMs. They also get countered HARD by flak. Flak frigates can counter LRMs, but they get countered HARD by anything else. So the progression of all purpose combat units goes this way:

Light Frigate
Long Range Frigate
...
...
...
...
Heavy Cruiser

That's not saying that all the support units are junk. It's just in pure combat LRFs are difficult to counter for a very long time. That makes them an excellent unit to spam.

It's not as though you only have to worry about basic frigates though. There are capital ships to worry about. LRFs are your best option to kill capital ships efficiently for a long time.