If you are after the bounty money or materials forget small ships. If you want to rise your combat rank then small ships are the way to go because to combat rank just counts number of ships and their rank. It doesn't matter how big they are and small ships die faster.



Yes, straight line meaning a big trip. Don't forget you have to unlock 3 engeneers first before you can go after prof. Palin.

Two of the best engeneers for combat you can unlock right away are THE DWELLER for lasers and power distributor and TOD "THE BLASTER" MCQUINN for multi cannons.
On laser use "EFFICIENT". It increase their damage and deacrese their power and distributor draw by alot and also their thermal load. For power distributor use CHARGE ENHANCED and on multi canons use RAPID FIRE. This would change your ship by far. Not only your guns will become much more deadly but you can also keep firing them by a lot more time.
And both these engeneers are unlockable right away with small costs.