Its easy enough to change the gauss to anti fighter. Theres a one line command where you change false to true and it will then fire on anything that moves.

Shields can also be specified by changing the 0 to a value.

You could probably do these in the existing research parameters if you wanted.

I upped their hitting power, range and ability to hit fighters and bombers. Didnt bother with shields though, and havent actually lost a lot of them yet either.

When the gauss hits with about 90, and you put 20 of them around a planet with a gravity well range, nothing much sticks around long enough to kill many of them Nothing short of a major fleet action anyway !

TEC do have two types of turret (essentially). Causs Cannon, Hangar Defense. Give the Hangar Defense some fighter squadrons, and you've got anti-fighter defense. Sure, the hangar defense isn't a 'turret' per se but it performs the same functions, and that's all that matters in a tactical sense.

First, you need the Forge Tools from the downloads section. (Or a mod that already changed the files.)

Second, open up the files that go like PlanetModulePhaseMissileDefense.entity / PlanetModuleTechGaussDefense.entity / PlanetModulePsiBeamDefense.entity (Something like that.) using notepad. (If you see only random letters all over the place, those are the binary versions and you need to get the Forge Tools.)

Third, the line that needs to be changed should be something like "CanFireAtStrikecraft". Change it.

Fourth, copy the entire Gameinfo folder into a folder with the name you choose for your mod into the Sins mod folder. (Check the options - mods screen - show mod path in the game to see where to put it exactly.)

Note that this won't work with 1.09.

Perhaps they wanted to just try something different. Doesn't mean they're not good at it.

Whoohoo! I added FlakBurst ability to my turrets! I gave the turrets 100 anti-matter and a recharge rate of 1. So they should be effective vs ftrs while concentrating their main guns on enemy ships. Thanks Kitkun!