Even a point of armor or a little more hull trauma wouldn't quite be enough to fix this problem. Its just putting a bandaid on the issue.
Ultimately, the problem isn't the fragility of fighters, its that they get hit too easily(and thus die)
Even a fighter should have issues hitting another fighter.
Maybe if ranged difficulty in vehicles wasn't a comparison of Sil, but with flat Sil being a modifier to the distance. Sil of the firer doesn't matter.
This has been a major issue for my players. In particular, piloting skill doesn't seem to matter other than making maneuvers easier. I've kicked around making the difficulty to hit be equal to the opposing pilots piloting skill but modified by Sil somehow, maybe it adds boost or setback dice for the difference or actually upgrades/downgrades the difficulty.
Has anyone tried this?