TheSagaContinues

A possible "distinction" that you see in many stat blocks is that Proton Torpedoes are pretty much always written up with 9d10x2 damage but quite often you see "medium concussion" listed at 8d10x2 which puts it between the 7d10x2 Light Missile and the torpedo.  Now why is it we see missiles written up as 8d10 and 9d10 I have no idea but if they could get some consistency there then it'd be easier to make judgments based on that.

SotG does list "Armor-Piercing" missiles which ignore the first 10 points of SR/DR but are also at -5 to hit.  In some ways this is your "more effective against heavy targets" but deal "less damage" because that -5 would cause them to miss more often.

I know I've done some work on house rules concerning the systems as presented in the SotG.  I reduced the size of a light launcher down to that of a Torpedo Launcher but added an EP cost as magazine sizes increase.  I also reduce the size of the Medium launcher but because of it's magazine size it's still bigger and here I see two different missile types with the more damaging system also taking more space.  I've always HATED it when someone believes they can strip out the Concussion Missile System (not a "Light" system despite the system matching that perfectly because it's not called a light missile) for a ton of EP and then replace it with a Torpedo Launcher with a maximum size magazine which of course only costs more; after all PCs really don't care about money but they may care about EP cost.

I always thought that the missiles should have an easier time to hit the target, even on the second try.
Torpedoes are slower and should be harder to hit with.

Here I think part of the issue could be that many of us knew the X-Wing game and in it we generally has missile or torp.  The missiles maybe were a bit more accurate but certainly didn't hit as hard.  I want to say X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter then allowed you to change the load out on some ships which allowed then showed that you could carry a lot more missiles that you could torpedoes.  On top of this then you get the issue of "advanced missiles and eventually torpedoes and how awesome they were."

Now I know SWSE has attack and damage figures but we may need to keep in mind that "average damage" is a function of both such that "being more accurate" but with a lower damage code may not translate to a higher average damage.  I guess we see this more in things that trade accuracy for damage (or number of attacks) and a lot of time the number for them just aren't that great in terms of average results.  How does this relate to the "missile vs torpedo" discussion I'm not entirely sure but in the interest of keeping thing simple perhaps they is why they have similar damage codes.

Thinking on it more because it seems most everything in SWSE is your BAB but a modifier that is the same across the board for a certain category of things the idea of missiles dealing the same damage as torpedoes is using  the idea that missiles are more accurate but deal less damage giving them an equal average output to torpedoes.  I know WEG gave different weapon systems different Fire Control numbers even on the same ship.  How can that be represented simply with the minimum amount of work in SWSE? You give those high attack but lower damage weapons the same damage as a lower attack but higher damage weapon and in the end both end up with the same average anyway so everyone win but with no end to confusion.