the ships are made of wooden planking something slamming into the side of a ship at high speed 10+ knots will crack, and destroy the planking of even a SOL. the littler ship will probbably be completely unable to be sailed at that point but the SOL would be taking on water as well.
as for cost effectiveness, it just doesn't make sense unless you know you are going down.
i wonder what Nicholas Audet would do without ram physics