What's is the point of certain weapons in SE:IV?

[Renegade 13]

Personally, I love the Computer Virus Weapon. In the late game when everyone uses Master Computers, they can be devastating if you toss them into the mix. Only take 20kT of space, go through shields and will take any master computer out, effectively giving the stricken ship a movement of 1. Negates any speed advantage your opponent may have.

Hard hitting but slow firing weapons, such as the Wave Motion Gun, the more powerful organic weapon (can't recall the name) and the Mental Singularity Generator(?) that Psychic can give you can all be great for warp point defense against an opponent using lots of Crystalline armor. With the ability that Crystalline has, you need powerful weapons that can do enough damage in a single shot to penetrate the shields that are generated from damage and also to do some damage to the actual armor. If you can do 500+ damage per shot, that's the trick.

Null Space Cannons are also great (though prohibitively expensive) weapons against any opponent, but especially one that uses lots of armor. All internals, including weapons and engines will all be destroyed before the armor is touched, which cripples the enemy in only a couple shots. Also remember, penetrates shields as well. Slow firing rate, but they can work great.

You have more options than just APB's with a few PD thrown in.