Weapon

This is the stat that determines the maximum damage per shot one ship can deal to another.

maximum damage = (Your modified weapons) - (enemies modified shields)

Therefore you can do 1 to max damage but if your weapons are not as strong as your enemies shields your minimum max damage is MAX(4,Level/5) (before Damage Modifier) and therefore you can only do 1 - MAX(4,Level/5) per shot. I.e. at level 25 your minimum max damage is 5, at level 30 it is 6, and so on...

Examples:

Weapons > Shields

max damage=(Your weapons)-(enemies shields) max damage=(1000)-(800) 200=(1000)-(800) Therefore on any your shots you can do 1 to 200 damage.

Shields > Weapons

max damage=(Your weapons)-(enemies shields) max damage=(800)-(800) 0=(800)-(800) Therefore on any your shots you can do 1 to 4 damage because 4 is the minimum maximum for damage - for levels 24 and lower, see above.