Could it use a few more ships where it works well? Yeah, probably. But I'm not entirely sure what those hypothetical ships would look like. Maybe something kindof like the shrike but with a more general-purpose mobility system and extra small turrets instead of the medium? Maybe? I dunno.
Just spitballin a quick idea even if it's not super related to the thread.
Something with a similar setup of the Odyssey could see use of IR Pulse Lasers, Gigacannons and Paladins. So bunch of small energy mounts, zero mediums and then a couple of large energies so that it makes low flux weapons more desirable.
Odyssey is seriously nice with a bunch of IR Pulse Lasers but it kinda switched to a semi-missile ship with a few changes. Switched large energy to synergy, removed the tight convergence point, much more speed potential but also weaker shields. It wants to use missiles. And it also has fighters. So something without all of those boons should be ideally motivated to have a unique setup of weapons.
And for the love of god please no more "move only forward" ship systems, half ot the roster has that ability.
Back to the main topic now: IR Pulse Lasers have good DPS for their size but horrible damage per shot, you know what's the complete opposite? It's Gigacannon, bingo! Match made in heaven yet there isn't a single ship where this loadout makes sense.