Yes, Yes, I know, the Shuttle sucks, blah blah blah.

However, no ship is better at staying at Range 3 at the start of the game, and it has a lot of unique upgrade-slot opportunities. Also, it's the cheapest Heavy Laser Cannon platform available to the Empire, even after spending points to plug its holes.

That being said, the shuttle in question has 35 points, and is flying alongside

Captain Jonus

[22]

Bounty Hunter

+ Recon Specialist

+ Heavy Laser Cannon

[43]

And so, we have

Long Fall

Omicron Group Pilot

+ Heavy Laser Cannon

+ Advanced Sensors

+ Engine Upgrades

[35]

Sudden Stop

Omicron Group Pilot

+ Heavy Laser Cannon

+ Advanced Sensors

+ Saboteur

+ Anti-Pursuit Lasers

[35]

Both Long Fall and Sudden Stop are designed to mitigate the admittedly abysmal maneuverability of the Shuttle, which lead to the de-shuttling tactic of "Get behind it".

Long Fall does this by letting you do a large-base boost before doing a red maneuver: the only way for the shuttle to do a 2-turn About Face (2x Green Bank + Boost Bank or Boost Bank + Red Turn + Green Bank + Action).

Sudden Stop does it by using Saboteur as a finisher at Range 1, and to use it's Stopping Power to reliably cause Anti-Pursuit damage. Advanced Sensors mean never having to lose an action to a collision or to a red maneuver, and Saboteur definitely benefits from the ability to be used before or after an action.

A third option is to lose the Recon Specialist on the Firespray in favor of doing a combo build (Saboteur with Engine Upgrades, and no Anti-Pursuits), and a 1 point co-pilot on either large ship or a 1 point Elite Pilot Talent on Jonus. However, I am pretty sure that the Firespray's going to be the far bigger threat than the Shuttle (or at least that my opponents will think so), and so giving it the survivability of the dual focuses is very important to me.