I've been playing FS2 with the Open mod and have been loving it. I have a couple of questions about how the rest of ya'll play this game. So far i haven't changed any of the defalut ship assignments or loadouts before starting a mission. Is this usefull? and how does it affect the game?
I can't figure out if it is me or what but I can't seem to get a missle lock esp when I really need one. Some of those missions where you have to destroy the beam weapons on the super capital ships are a real pain when the missles will not lock. Are there any tricks to get them to lock .... faster? Or am I just missing something completely.
Anyway I am just curious how the rest of ya'll play. Thanks.

I often load with only the non-homing "dumbfire" missiles. You can typically load a huge amount of them, especially in the later ships, which means that I can fire away with my missiles at almost the same rate as the primary guns... I like to hang right on the tail of enemy fighters and fire missiles and guns like there's no tomorrow. Great fun.

For primaries, I prefer the Prometheus, or if it's not available, the Subach. The Kayser is also sorta cool, but perhaps too epic. And it loses to the Prometheus in terms of range.
For secondaries, you can never go wrong with the Harpoon. If not available, I'll use Tempests. For bomber missions, usually Hornets to the smallest bank and whatever torpedoes available to the other bank(s).