S3 Series

I don't know MuskieZZ, I managed to do it somewhat successfully for 6 years flying on a satellite connection. Maybe this is different somehow though.
I had to test the no fly zone with ships myself as I seemed to be hitting them more than others in the Group. You just have to figure it out for your connection...and it was big when approaching from the side for me back then. Try a higher angle of attack for starters, it seemed to help.

What I would suggest is trying bomb or rocket attacks and see how you fair hitting the ship bubble. We press gun solutions much too close against ships, treat them like an AI bomber formation. Start firing from outside the effective range but pull away just within effective range. This helps avoid collisions that you have no control about(ie net lag).

Then is it worth considering turning off collisions with boats altogether, at least until this is sorted out? Kind of sucks to be a few hundred yards off the boat and suddenly explode like I did in frame 1. I've been around long enough to know that at least on my FE that I was well clear of the boat.

It's not the boats that are getting you guys....

I'm not sure it is lag, but something to do with a flaw in WB's programming. I dropped a couple 1kers on a transport during frame 2. It was still afloat so several of us made strafing passes on it. When I went in on my third pass, the boat made the familiar sinking noises and explosions. I pulled up and away and Jman gave a WTG on sinking the boat. I answered on TS that I had finished it off. Then, my plane exploded in midair well clear of the boat. I hadn't even been close to it while strafing because I pulled off as soon as I saw the sinking explosions, which was early in the run. Jman also saw that I was well away from the boat. Unfortunately, I wasn't filming, but I did grab a screen shot of the buffer. No mention of a collision or anything else.