Understanding Gunnery

Next in my series of guides for new players, I'll be writing about the things that affect whether your guns will hit or miss a target.

Range
Range is one of the most important factors that will influence whether you hit your target or not, if you're within optimal range of your target you have a 100% chance to hit (excluding other factors such as tracking which will probably influence this). Beyond this level, falloff will determine you chance to hit a target. At optimal range+ falloff, you will have a 50% base chance to hit your target. At optimal range+falloff*2, you will have a 6.25% chance to hit your target.

You can see a ships range and falloff by clicking on its information. For example this turret will have a 100% chance to hit at 6KM, a 50% chance to hit at 14KM and a 6.25% chance to hit at 22KM (depending on what ammo type is used).
In general, larger calibre guns will have longer range, and the long range variant of each weapon system (Artillery, Railguns and Beam Lasers) will have more range than their high damage varients (Autocannons, Blasters and Pulse Lasers). Optimal range can be improved by using long range ammo or by fitting Tracking Computers or Tracking Enhancers to your ship.


Tracking
Tracking also plays a key part in whether you will hit your target or not, and unsurprisingly it is based on your speed. Each turret has a tracking speed, measured in rad/sec. Each ship also has an orbiting speed which is also measured in rad/sec and is the result of some complex maths equation I can't remember, but this is called angular velocity.

You can display angular velocity on your overview by opening your overview settings then clicking on the red circles on the picture above, which will add an extra column to your overview as shown below:

If your target's angular velocity is higher than your turret's angular velocity, you'll probably miss, if it's the other way around you probably won't. High damage short range turrets will have better tracking than their long range variants. You can improve tracking by fitting Tracking Computers or Tracking Enhancers to your ship.

Applying this
What can you take from this post? Multiple things, one of the key ones being spiralling. Spiralling will allow you to approach an enemy in a large ship while taking minimal/no damage. If you click approach you will die. You will literally die very quickly.

When orbiting a target, you ideally want to be within your own tracking range while safely out of theirs, which means it would be a good idea to find an ideal orbit for your ship. If your turret's tracking is superb, set your orbit to 500 metres. Although it's likely your ship won't be agile enough to keep to that range at top speed, your target's AV will be irrelevant to you but your own AV to your target will be as low as possible. I think that makes sense.
If you're having trouble tracking things, try fitting a stasis webifier and using it on your targets or fit the modules listed above. Be aware that none of the things listed here will affect missiles, which I will post about at a later date.
I hope this has helped, fly safe.