This is a reason why Polarized Armor, among other things, is a must. Resistant Flux Conduits and Polarized Armor will make the ship highly resistant to EMP.
Ships without shields need the following hullmods: Armored Weapon Mounts, Heavy Armor, and Resistant Flux Conduits.
Ships without shields also need the following skills: Impact Mitigation and Polarized Armor.
A good alternative to this build is the Damage Control skill plus Automated Repair mod. You can still add any of the extras mentioned above, and they'll work great, but with this, the ship can survive most fights, even if it isn't technically effective. Plus, Support Doctrine skill will give you damage control on ships without a captain, so you could field a few of these to stuff up the battle space.
Also, I wouldn't use missiles on this thing without ECCM. Neither Annihilators or Breachers are going to hit frigates without it, so let that OP be used against the ships most likely to be pressuring it. I mean, if you have to, take off one missile rack and drop cap until you can fit ECCM. It makes that much of a difference. It's better than Expanded Racks for small missile slots.
As for the rest, the Vanguard has two primary flaws : the primary ballistic weapons are all flux hungry. You can't fit them onto this ship and expect any longevity. Needlers are still king here, but with a brawler like the Vanguard, it's questionable whether the god gun can save it. It's more likely to miss in close quarters combat, as relative velocities increase fast, so it can waste its shot often and lose the deterrent value of the weapon. Conversely, all the other small ballistic weapons need massive arrays to be effective. There's just no winning here. Secondly, the point defense setup of the ship doesn't genuinely work. When fielding this ship, I have to fill three turrets with point defense weapons to provide effective protection. The two on the sides are needed for Salamanders, but they will commonly fail to swipe reapers or hammers fired at close range, so you need one on the nose, just like the Lasher.
That's three weapon slots just to keep this ship from being crippled in a basic engagement. And it works! However, it's kind of silly and belies the apparent weapon variety advertised by the slots.
Giving railguns base point defense behavior might help and make them worth their ridiculous flux costs. I would also like to see swarmers work more effectively against
fighters, as most are too nimble to care and heavy fighters just burn them with pd weapons. I would also like to see a small missile rack that fires flares or decoys. Salamanders and extreme range missile barrages make going through life without an omnishield a pain.
All this said, the Vanguard is my kind of ship. I like it. I don't use it very often because I end up focusing on surviving rather than fighting, just like I do in larger ships. I usually have a pair for their cheap logistics, clearing out that last Pather Dram so it doesn't mob me and drag the Battlestation into a fight before I can raid it for supplies. It's useful.
The primary flaws of the Vanguard are flaws of all low-tech ships. The price of the Vanguard just makes that even more painful.
