Novgorod with new sprites for weapons:
I`m currently desiding the standard wep layout for this ship. It has two central universal large mouts and two rear large energy mounts. I tried to use centrals for missiles and energy for powerful turbolasers as support weapons, but 5 weapon groups limit the available group types. So this current variant has no missiles and relies only on ballisitcs (with TLs used when ammo for main guns is spent).
Out of curiosity, what are you using as weapon groups right now? I'd think you could have the following:
1: fixed forward siege cannons
2: support energy weapons
3: missiles (as long as you have only one type of missile, or only two launchers, or can otherwise fit all missiles into one group)
4: offensive ballistic turrets
5: point defense
Where groups 1-3 are things the player is likely to want manual control over, and groups four and five are likely to be left on autofire (or occasionally turned off to save on flux or ammunition).
Of course, I don't know what your current flux usage balance is like, or what the weapon arcs are, so those groups may not make as much sense as I was thinking.