George Lucas actually said that Star Wars ships were actually envisioned to fight like age of sail battleships, ie, sailing (or flying) at close range to each other and exchanging broadsides... actually very like we see in both The Return of Jedi and the Revenge of the Sith.

...although, curiously, not here - all ships we have data for, at the moment, has slightly more attacks forward than to the broadsides.

I'm not an expert on naval warfare, but it occurs to me that if you approach at an angle rather than flat from the side, you can bring all your guns to bear on an enemy while reducing your own target profile as much as possible, making you harder to hit.

Approaching from an angle also seems at first glance the best way to fire all your ship's weapons in Armada.

Star Destroyers attack frontally if they can, because all main gun turrets are able to fire into the front arc - while broadsides arn't that effective.

So its just perfect for me.

Seems to me if we agree on the OP's statement then the damage and arcs seem to fit perfectly.

If the wedge was purely to allow broadsides to also fire forward then one can assume there would be much less weaponry dedicated to just the frontal arc. Thus if the broadsides were NOT assisting a front arc barrage then the dice would be LESS then the broadsides. This is not the case... the fact the front arc seems to do more damage could be FFGs way of representing the advantage of the wedge shape.

Either way imo this discussion is going down a rabbit hole of overblown expectations of thematics in a game. Especially when we know little of how the game works.

My friends and I way back when came up with a rule: Don't talk rules to a game without at least one person having a copy of the rules to look up. Rule discussions without the rules is just an arguement and not too much fun is to be had there.

This discussion, to me, is like trying to guess what the picture is in a jigsaw puzzle where all you are given is one piece.

Umm. Easy fix and I'm pretty sure it's already worked into the rules.

It seems that ships only get one shot per turn.

This means that the VSD forward firepower approximately equal to it's two side arcs combined.

Source: the part of the article that says that a ship firing at star fighters isn't firing at something else seems to imply that you only get one shot out of one arc per turn (including point defense)

That fix things?

No. The article specifies that a ship can make 2 attacks a turn, out of 2 different arcs. However, if it wants to use its anti fighter point defense system, that is 360 and prevents it from making other attacks. So if it is shooting at fighters it can't shoot at other ships.

Actually, the paragraph seems pretty clear that a ship performs up to 2 attacks, and each attack consisting of choosing a firing arc, then deciding if you are shooting a capital ship (Only that ship is affected) or using your anti-fighter weaponry (In which case every fighter within that firing arc is affected).

After you resolve a ship’s command, your ship can perform up to two attacks, though each attack must originate from a different firing arc. Each attack can target a single eligible ship, or it can target every fighter squadron within range of your firing arc.

My friends and I way back when came up with a rule: Don't talk rules to a game without at least on person having a copy of the rules to look up. Rule discussions without the rules is just an arguement and not too much fun is to be had there.

This discussion, to me, is like trying to guess what the picture is in a jigsaw puzzle where all you are given is one piece.

Well, yeah. But that's the fun part of speculating.