They'd be very similar to missiles, but they would always be contact detonation, would take the speed of their starting speed plus the ship's speed (like non-targeted missiles but this would be the case for torpedos even when targeted) and would have little to no homing maneuverability. In most cases there would be very little ammo and each torpedo would do a large amount of damage and have plenty of fuel.

Most torpedo variants would be split into three categories:

Fighter to fighter chasing: taking advantage of the torpedos' low maneuverability and only being able to go fast if a ship is already headed at top speed in the firing direction, chasing variants would only be practical in chasing situations.

Fighter to capital ship bombing: these would always have no maneuverability and low ammo quantity (some variants might even only contain one torpedo) but they would do a lot of damage. These would make it a lot more difficult to point nuked because they add the ship's current velocity, but it would be rewarded if said skill was mastered.

Capital ship to capital ship bombing: same as above but really freaking big, basically replacements or counterparts for/of yellow snowballs.

Also, if destructible ordinances were added then I can't think of a better candidate than torpedos.

If we will eventually have player capital ship battles similar to submarine battles in the future then torpedos are essential! Also, you could equip lesser torpedos on non-Teradon capital ships to justify the current problem where capital ships line up nose-to-nose rather than side-to-side and basically just stare each other down.

Edit: I'm sure the vocabulary "torpedo" has been in past suggestions which is why I said "Different Idea." Elaborate/discuss.

I think we already have a fighter/fighter non-energy-based, self-propelled weapon. The current rockets provide ample diversity for that and eliminate the need for further variants. I also do not think they should be destructible.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "point nuked".
Fighter/Capital and Capital/Capital ordnance should always be destructible, triggering the device's yield when a shell/torpedo is hit. I agree with you on targetting/tracking. They should have very little, perhaps 10-30 MOA/s. For comparison, the Chaos Swarm has about 10-20 °/s, which translates into 600-1800 MOA/s, since they take about 5-10 seconds for a 180° turn. This is from memory, if someone could pass more accurate numbers, I'd be grateful. Make the people point and handle their bombers right, not fire & forget.

I do not think they should replace artillery (BGTWKOA, Teradon guns), since they serve different purposes. A torpedo tube is usually in-line with the ship's main axis of rotation, while the artillery allows articulation and thus constant bombardment while maneuvering. I'd be opposed to torpedo turrets.

As for ship tactics, submarine tactics are probably a good simile (albeit slower). They, however, do not include carrier and destroyer support, so VO's capital ship actions will most probably encompass (and most likely surpass) a mixture of these. There could be cloaked corvette class ships, which would operate as submarines did in WWII.

Point nuking is where you turbo tap to gain an average speed of say 80m/s (same velocity of geminis/chaos swarms) so that they all hit one point at the same time and is often the sole skill used by bombers (as they need to either do it by eye which can allow them to mix up their maneuvering a bit and evade A/A fighter coverage but is less accurate or do it by instruments, watching the speed of the ship rather than the position of the missiles: more accurate but as you're supposed to move in one direction at a very consistent speed this makes you an easy target).

What I meant by the fighter/fighter chase torpedos was that it would be something like the super stingrays fired by the border turrets except only practical in chase situation. Something leaning more to chasing power rather than one-on-one power as opposed to flares in the way that they would have better damage but wouldn't hit anything unless it were a chase situation (in which situation, I imagine they would look bloody cool too... like a sidewinder or something lol). It would sort of be the greyhound of the non-energy world. I suggested these ones be destructible, too, to give some more use for the new cargo ship turrets.

I think you're right about the Teradon guns not being replaced, I forgot that I have seen very good A/A on those things and that just wouldn't make sense if it were a torpedo. Considering that the other capital ships don't specialize in the same areas as Teradons but still seem to line up nose-to-nose, then I suggest all of them be equipped with some form of torpedo. And I can think of many ways it would be fun to customize a player-owned capital ship to specialize in either torpedo anti-capital ship ambushing or something like the Monitor that would line up side-by-side and unleash a hail of super gauss fire.

I'm not sure a return to late 18th/early-to-mid 19th century naval tactics would be smart. If the capital ships line up nose to nose now, it is (in my opinion) not a good choice, but perhaps one that makes the best of a limited resource, since AI programming is not exactly easy, and I guess making two AIs that battle each other and make the process seem like a 'real battle' would be a very difficult task.

We will see diversity in captial ship actions once players are allowed to purchase and steer/populate this ship class. Until then, discussions about ship tactics will remain necessarily theoretical. This does not mean we shouldn't talk about them (I like hypothesizing), but I'd say that we cannot have conclusive results on that.

I think I understand what you meant point nuking, and I agree with your assessment. I am pretty sure one could write acceleration/bombing scripts to make the velocity attain certain values at certain points in time, and fire weapons at that point. But, as you say, it would make one a sitting duck for interceptors (as it should).

I still disagree with you on the fighter/fighter weapons... but that might only be my personal preference.

Yes! Pursuit torpedoes! We already have something very very close to this, the stingrays. The launcher is idiotically light for the amount of damage they do (more total damage than chaos swarms, less mass than a neut2), so they are already great for an interceptor that needs to watch it's mass. Increase the mass to some reasonable amount (or maybe not) and make them keep initial ship velocity for instant chaser-torpedo awesomeness. Probably tweak the damage down slightly, too.. (ie from 2800 to 2500 or 2000)

Aye, that's the basic idea but the maneuverability would be downed a bit, so you would have to actually aim it somewhat. Then I would probably make it less ammo, but more damage (4x5000?). And with all the torpedos of course there should be a very extended firing delay so you can't just spam em all at once and kill an SCP instantly. A pursuit torpedo would be very awesome.