It's built for a niche role, that is being a concentrated fire support for large capital ship battles.
Everyone here is talking about how awesome having 9 weapon slots facing one direction, but with 3 of them being small, 3 of them can't turn combined with the ship's poor turn speed, it's not really all that. Not to mention it's vent can't sustain constant fire from all 9 of its weapons if you actually equip them to handle big ships. Hell, almost no ship can sustain fire for its weapons if you give them big guns, so more than hard points, I would say that it's the flux vent that dictates a ship's firepower more than its hard points most of the time.
Doesn't mean that it sucks, but it's a support ship.