5 branch ship upgrade isnt worth the effort

[modern panther]

thankfully ive just read the fine print that says unlocking this upgrade reduces durability, hold and maneuverability by 5%.
why would anyone grind for months to research all 5 branches, if unlocking the upgrade is more of a penalty than a reward?
i get that there must be balance but 3 different penalties for 1 upgrade slot is idiotic and actually puts the user at a bigger disadvantage than not even unlocking it .
please re balance this, because there is no scenario where any ship used for any purpose in the game, is worth losing durability, hold and maneuverability by 5% for an upgrade slot, not in any combat use or transport use.
if it changed to 7% loss of either durability, hold or maneuverability that would be reasonable, but 5% to all three is a waste of time to unlock and is not even worth the effort to grind all 5 branches of ships.

[vestal merlin]

There are definitely ships and builds that can utilize the extra slot

[steel ermine]

Can you give an example please?

[terse haven]

Boarding Savannah ftw

[vestal merlin]

Arena is a good place to trade some stats off, I can definitely see builds utilizing in the open seas

Mortar ships, transports

I even use it on my brawling carronade Santisima

[torn pivot]

I'm pretty sure 7% to a single stat is still too good. That can even gain 1% on Manuverability with the slot equipping manuverable helm
I don't know how they should do it but i think adding this upgrade was a mistake to begin with

I rather use structural expansion than this slot due to this