I listed a few shortcomings. To address one or some of those might be a good way to buff EMP, so I added suggestions to some.
EMP:
- does not influence shields in any way
That makes EMP weapons particularly useless against 360° shielded ships. If their shields are down they dont have the flux to do much damage anyway, and you'd probably rather want to deal hull damage.
Suggestion:
Spoiler
how about a delay in shield reactions if it's hit with EMP? Turn speed and deactivation time could be servery hindered as long as it is under EMP fire, heavy EMP bombardment like from Ion cannons could make turning and deactivating impossible
- can only influence sprite area that’s facing it
That doesn't sound too bad, but considering EMP damage is the only kind of damage that is limited by this it's a major drawback. For example, a support ship that managed to flank an enemy cruiser and deliver EMP damage to it's side does little to help it's allies fighting the cruiser from the front. Salamanders don't have this problem.
Suggestion:
Spoiler
a ship-wide effect could make it a good choice to keep firing. If for example hard flux was induced with hull hits, or the flux dissipation rate were diminished.
- damage can’t exceed a certain maximum
Once a system is out it is out and will be online again after a few seconds. Further EMP damage has no influence on this. For other damage type weapons it is always an option to keep firing and deal damage, even if it's not the optimal type.
Spoiler
For this the solution would be the same as for the area problem: a ship-wide effect.
- can not inflict permanent damage
System are disabled for a brief moment (~ 10 seconds for medium slots I think), so EMP damage generates at best a window of opportunity, not a permanent tactical advantage. I don't think that's a bad thing or should be changed, but it is certainly a important difference to other weapon types.
- Can not/hardly damage weapons near the sprite center
So theoretical a ship could be EMP immune because of its turret and engine placement. That's not so much of a problem because the vanilla sprites don't feature many center weapons. It could be bad for mods though.
Spoiler
I see no real solution for this one, but at least a ship-wide effect could reduce the theoretical immunity to a theoretical resistance.