The rigging. A bit tough?

[Elmar Bijlsma]

Am I the only one that feels that the chain shot is a bit feeble?

Especially lighter ships have real trouble disabling an opponents sail. While I have no beef with smaller gunned vessels having trouble shooting away a mast (those things are massive) even repeated salvos through the sails does very little to slow an enemy down. Even a full broadside of a frigate has little effect, needing repeated salvos to take the sail damage bar a single notch. And that's even with raking broadsides where shots go through multiple sails!
If you don't get lucky and bring down a mast you are just not going to impede movement to any noticeable degree.

[A Very Super Market]

Don't bother with broadsides. They are clunky, inaccurate, and FAW does a better job at damaging enemies.

[Elmar Bijlsma]

I used broadside in the manner of all guns on a side able to fire, not the firing mode of ETW.

[Gaiseric]

I've noticed the same thing. Multiple small ships attacking the same, larger target, seems to take out the rigging quicker.

[antisocialmunky]

Your guns all become synced if you use broadside once. There's no reason to do one manually after that.