How fast are those armored assault boats? If they're not too lacking in performance, they're probably better as the standard rather than an extra. I strongly suspect single armour layer assault boats would make the D-Day para-drops in BoB look like a picnic if opposed. Six armor layers should see them survive to make the drop, given their speed and small TCS, since they'd only take a few volleys before reaching the planet. Whether they survive to return to base is largely irrelevant
Yes, I'm planning to use the armored versions (armor = 6) as the standard. They are 8,800 kps instead of 11,000. That can be improved when we tech up engines.
The reason that we have two models:
Our Mountain-IIs have 4,000-ton hangar capacity. A standard Brigade of ground units is five units, four combat units plus a Brigade HQ unit. That requires five Assault Boats, which in turn... if carried in Mountain-IIs... requires the boats to mass a maximum of 800 tons each, in order to fit five of them in a hangar.
Hence the unarmored Bayonet-Is.
We are currently upgrading the Mountain-IIs to Mountain-III Assault Carriers. This upgrade includes an expansion of the hangar capacity to 5,000 tons. That increased capacity will in turn allow us to use 1,000-ton Assault Boats instead of 800-ton Assault Boats.
... so I've built just a handful of Bayonet-Is (ten of them, just enough to fill two Carriers and carry two Brigades) to support operations while the Mountains are being refitted. All the rest of our Bayonet production will be the armored model, to be adopted as soon as the Mountains are refitted to hold five of them.
In other words... the unarmored Bayonet-I is intended as a temporary stop-gap.