This might work as a form of flares on their (currently) systemless ships, or the ones where the systems need to be changed. I will check how well it works.
I *think* the AI for flares will only activate if there's missiles fired at them. A somewhat messy way around this is to make a weapon with destructible, slow-traveling projectile(s). Ships can have them mounted forwards as extra defense (Like the Pin, than one asplodes if anything with decent firepower gets close to it); while the larger ones can have them on large arcs and fire them in groups.
Armor repair would probably be really tricky so i do not think i can add that. Minelayers would be easy to make, but very hard for the AI to use. I could probably make some form of "close support area denial" drones, but other than that i do not know how. Will definitely keep this in mind though.
The big weakness of the Crystanite is that armor can't regenerate, compared to shields which can erase damage done in a few seconds. So the best way to win is to get right up in their face where your potent weapon package, low flux costs, and superior maneuverability gives you the advantage.
The problem is that a lot of the larger ships are slower and their weapons are limited to medium range, so they can't really control the pace of combat. Their frigates are fast, but tend to fly far ahead and get blown up easily, leaving the larger ships sitting ducks.
So I'm hoping the support systems will either:
1. Coerce enemies to close in.
2. Apply pressure to enemies that are attempting to flee to vent flux.
3. Limit what sections of the battlefield that enemies can flee to.
The Mercury will get regenerating ammo in the next patch. I am worried that a shield-destroying Reaper Torpedo will be too much for a bomber. Also, a beam weapon would need to have pretty ridiculous damage for it to work as an anti-shield weapon.
Well, as long as it gets something. The mercury projectile can ignore most bullets, but tends to get absorbed by striking a missile, wasting it.
For a mercury beam weapon, they could get a burst beam. A long charge up time dealing 1250 kinetic damage per second over 5 seconds. Still very potent, at a cost of forcing you to stay on target and expose yourself.