You just said that indeed its a leftover and it was pushed into the new system for no reason apart from keeping already existing assets. First version after infinte ammo was a straighforward balancing attempt (no cheating) and who would guessed that it wouldnt work. Cheating worked because sure it did. Thats all.
I don't know what you mean by 'leftover' but it is not the conventional meaning of the word. A system would be leftover if it was balanced around a previous state of the game, and the rest of the game changed while the system stayed the same. This version of AAF never existed while limited ammo existed so it can't be left over. It's only ever been balanced around infinite ammo. It was implemented because the hammerhead was too weak to compete with other destroyers without it, not for 'no reason'.
I never said anything about current version of AAF being in existance in the times of limited ammo. The whole system (doubling the rate of ammo spending) was invented in those times. And it was balanced by the ammo being limited. You can destroy something faster but you cant destroy more than you have ammo. When it became infinite, AAF became a leftover. And the diffrence of the current realization is limited to flux reduction. The very thing that is supposed to balance unlimited ammo.
AAF was introduced in 0.53a.
Also, calling it 'cheating' is silly. Does the aurora cheat when it doubles its speed? Or does the paragon cheat when it reduces incoming damage by 90%? They are unique ship systems that make the ships more powerful. The ships are balanced around having those special abilities. It is likely that the hammerhead is a bit over tuned and should be balanced, but there is no reason why a ship can't be balanced while also having systems that don't follow the normal rules.
Aurora pays for its mobility in DP. Same goes for the Paragon's system. However its more like Paragon trades its FS for its lack of mobility and its DP is a price for the sheer amount of flux and mounts.
Any rule breaking system will only result in inevitable tactical exploitation. You cant balance it. You either follow the rules (by paying the universal price for the given combat capabilities) or you dont. What makes you simply stronger. No amount of blah-blah-blah in the system's description can hide that simple fact.
This is exactly why AC is too strong in SO loadouts. It already has 450 range so the downside of SO doesn't effect it at all, but the upsides still buff it by a huge amount. AC fits well into the range/flux balance of normal ships, but SO gives it a huge dissipation boost with no range reduction (since SO reduces all weapons range to 450) which breaks the flux/range balance. SO also gives a big speed bonus letting the ship close range much more easily. AC is too strong in SO loadouts, but fine in normal loadouts.
SO doesnt buff guns. It only ails them. SO gives you extra dissipation to spend. You can utilize it by mounting more guns. Or by shooting for longer periods of time. AC already gimped to 450 range. By design. SO doesnt make it any stronger. All guns with the range below combat standard have higher dps compared to op costs.
Why it even should be a problem? HB, mounted on the Medusa, can get that extra dissipation
without SO. HB has
more dps against shield and the
same dps against anything with noticable
armor.
Generally speaking, AC is the lowtech version of the HB.
Its the AAF what makes a difference.