I dont really feel like hitscan cannons are the way to go, have more tanks on the field and the game turns from endless peppering into a game of who can focus fire faster, which seems like just another flavor of bad. If anything it seems like that should be more of a MG thing, since they are hitscan already, have not great dps and wouldnt outright gib tanks.
I'm still surprised by how little I see homing, they are amazing in long range fights but no one ever wants to bother with them for some reason. Guided is also a decent alternative now. Combine guided and a mg you got a great long distance tank with no recoil or anything. I know cannons don't have recoil, but it does bump your aim around.
Isn't that the HEMG? HEMG could definitely use a clipsize/reload buff, but I don't think that hitscan should be the primary weapon in vehicular combat. Cannons that shoot big heavy payloads of pwnage should always be primary (as in, BFG status).
MGs have been good in the past and not broken the mod, for a long time HEMG was one of the best weapons in the game (until you had to do the 30 second reload) and empires was as fun as ever. BE was going these super powerful absorbant HEMG APCs that swarmed grenadiers and crazy antitank hitscans and NF was fielding reactive superlights and the tank combat was fun as fuck.
