More rambling feedback not worth its own post...
Played around with Conquest. With more durability, it feels more like a fast battleship than a battlecruiser, especially if it uses Hardened Shields. It can easily go toe-to-toe with the SIM Onslaught and win (thanks to Onslaught's bad anti-shield configuration). SIM Conquest is also not too hard to kill. Paragon is hard unless I give my Conquest Gauss Cannons and pilot it myself. (AI has some trouble piloting Gauss Conquest well enough.)
Odyssey is weak now. 1.0 shields made it more fragile, and if I use two decent 8 OP fighters on it, Odyssey is OP starved. Now, if I want to brawl with Odyssey armed with short-ranged weapons, it almost needs two Claw wings to maybe shut down the enemy then smash it fast while enemy is paralyzed. Otherwise, Odyssey will go down. Unlike Conquest, Odyssey cannot go toe-to-toe with any other capital. Odyssey cannot afford to fight fair against enemy capital; it must outrange or paralyze the enemy somehow.
I like the new Fighter Strike command. Even so, it seems the AI can sometimes hold back some fighters instead of sending all to kill the target. Main problem with ordering fighter strikes to pick off everyone is it eats a lot of CP, which means I either need to invest in Command & Control and/or install Operations Center hullmod.
I am not sure if having a carrier-based fleet is such a great idea if my ships will just hold on to fighters or have them always escort some ship when I want all fighters to swarm enemies and pick them off one-by-one. Not sure ordering strikes constantly may work well without me wasting more resources (skill points or hullmod) for the job. Also, sometimes, it seems carriers can be suicidally stupid (by driving up to enemy ships) if I give them short-range PD weapons (to defend against missiles), and the only way to stop the aberrant behavior is to remove all weapons so they act like proper cowards. I suppose I could use Timid officers, but then I cannot use that officer in other combat ships, and I must use that officer for that carrier.
I wish there was a long-range medium beam that does better armor and hull damage. Currently, if I want 1000+ range beam to put in medium mount (to compliment Conquest's Gauss Cannons), Tactical Laser works at least as well as Graviton Beam, and costs less OP. Conquest with Gauss does not need Graviton for anti-shield, and Ion Beam is unwanted due to flux cost and low damage. Lately, I wish the classic Phase Beam was back and upgraded to 1000 range.
All the small beam PD (aside from Mining Laser) is useful. PD Laser for cheap and/or emergency short-range defense. LR PD for generalist use. Tactical Laser for long-range assault, and burst PD when you need better PD and can afford the OP cost.