[Campeador]

The 'auto-firing version of the cannons' is a good idea for the rear cannons. Especially since beam weapons do not do friendly damage like torpedoes and ‘point defense cannons’ (which are 'bolts'). But I would have preferred a setting witting the game so that it would have been player selected.
Pros: If set to auto-firing, they will fire automatically at the closest ship, you do not have to think about it, a good thing.
Con: If you are low on energy the rear weapons may be firing at a ship on your rear while you have little power to maybe deal with the ship you want to kill in front of you. Also usually you fire the front weapon then pass your target and hit it again with the rear weapons. The problem is when there are many enemy ships where auto-fire may attack the closest enemy instead of the most dangerous or the one you want. Also if your front is destroyed you may want total control of the weapon on the rear.
By the way the Hood Battlecruiser (which the player got to use on Multiverse 1) did have a special weapon on its rear (ABC high speed missile launcher) set on auto; a heavier version of the point defense cannon.
It is an excellent idea but I would have preferred a toggle button to be able to switch at will while on battle. Still I will do a practice scenario to see how it will behave on a battle.
Tech issue:
About the light shock cannon being superior to medium ones: On that one I actually lost the initial train of thought. For example the light cannon from the Argo being a battleship should be greater in size than maybe the heavy cannons of a destroyer, do more damage and have far longer range. My screw up is that I forgot about it and give them a linear progression from small to medium to heavy without making a distinction of ship class. Therefore without going into making too many changes I will simply reduce the light shock cannon so that it will be slightly less the Dmg/s of the medium. The same thing will happen between the medium and the heavy. For sure the heavy shock cannons will keep their present value; just the medium and light will be decreased accordingly.
In case someone notices, there is a weapon on the game where I was experimenting. That weapon will cause the greater damage at maximum range while at close range it will do little. (Not for the player to use, sorry)
Interesting thing to note: On the Multiverse you will find ships that are for example cruisers (300m in length) on their universe, yet they will be larger than the Argo (266m in length) a battleship. So there will be an apparent discrepancy in that respect, but each universe does its own scaling. But I did make all the ships of the game to scale (except the fighters). Thanks to Jeff Russell’s ‘Starship Dimensions’ comparison chart, great tool for comparing all the science fiction ships ever made to scale.
Thanks for the input, my update is growing, and so will the one for Multiverse 1 since they are all linked.