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[Golde]

Has the thought of implement a config param to CAP fleet size based off of total fleet points instead of total number of ships across all fleets ever came across anybody's mind(possibly Alex)?

Right now, the 30 ship quantity cap really do not do justice to the endgame fleet building experience when it just devolves into a race of cramming more bigger ships into the fleet with no tangible drawback (the iconic paragon spam problem).

It is fun to have ALL the toys to play with, but without any limit or denominator, it just gets old after a while when you assemble a kill-all fleet that absolutely has no competition and is able to push up to the edge of the map and kill off every enemy capital before they can even finish their entrance burn.

An argument can be made that one can simply avoid using more than a few caps in their playthrough to not cave into the problem, but that really doesn't help when its your 4th day alive and there's already 10 pirate atlases and 5 legions in the shitter list; it's literarily inevitable.

Having this FP cap, say 300 for example (basically tournament style fleet building made into a feature), would make things A LOT more interesting. Being a successful space captain would mean a few more things and a bit more added gameplay incentive.

1) Emphasis on understanding of the game and optimized loadout design,

2) Emphasis on a balanced fleet across sizes.

3) Frigates and Destroyers no longer being stepping stones and (Actually) having a use in late game.

4) Less linear gameplay / upgrade path.

5) Incentives to pick engagements wisely (wow!), opposed to leeroy jenkins spawncamping 2 defense fleets + enemy space station in a single two hour battle session while teleworking on the toilet.

5.5) Adds actual challenge/pressure while playing the game, now that you are neither gravitated to nor possible to be some invincible god.

5.75) Removes the need of some *** *** mod that add a free floating remnant ordo camping the starter jump point to spice up gameplay.

and probably would also have a cascading effect that fixes other underlying gameplay issues not listed here.

Any thots?

[SonnaBanana]

Needs a massive FP rework or at least, FP multipliers for anything not a frigate.

[Megas]

This was (sort of) the gameplay before 0.8a, with the Logistics system.  Fleet was bound by ships' cost and personnel.  Also, back then, fighters were ships instead of super-missiles.  Only problem with that is player needed to max Leadership (or play pre-0.53a Starfarer) to get enough Logistics to support more than a few frigates.  Unskilled, player could use only five frigates or lone Conquest.  With max Leadership, player could use about thirty frigates or three capitals (or about a dozen Atlas plus Hyperion for food runs).

My only gripe with fleets is the enemy fleets are too big.  PPT remained mostly the same since the 0.6.x days, but the enemy fleets have grown progressively bigger since, and it has gotten absurdly large since 0.9a (while skills were depowered and enemy AI became more cowardly to make fights slower).

[Tartiflette]

I'd love to get back to the supplies limit, but instead of a cap have an "inefficiency" tax on monthly maintenance. The bigger the fleet, the larger the tax, effectively making it a soft cap on the number of non mothballed ships in your fleet. Then skills and hullmods that reduce the maintenance would just raise the number of ships you can use before hitting the floor from which the extra maintenance cost kicks in.

Say, Maintenance cost = monthly maintenance + ( (monthly maintenance - 100)*1.5 )
So bellow 100 monthly maintenance you pay no extra supplies, at 150 you pay one and a half your cost, and at 300 monthly maintenance you cost is doubled. (Obviously AI fleet sizes would have to be adjusted)

But of course the main issue is how to explain that tax in simple terms.

[Alex]

Many of the new skills will work this way! E.G. "Elite Crew: +15% maximum CR at up to 180 deployment points", with the bonus dropping off as the total deployment points of the combat ships go beyond that level. I *think* there are enough skills like that - combined with also some skills that make having officers in frigates/destroyers specifically beneficial, and combined with deployment point distribution in battle being based mostly on officers (making bringing un-officered ships less appealing) - that it should have the effect of having that kind of mechanic in, without having it be a top-level fleet mechanic. Rather, it's a bunch of bonuses for having a smaller fleet, and less benefit from stuffing it with capital ships.

[SonnaBanana]

Many of the new skills will work this way! E.G. "Elite Crew: +15% maximum CR at up to 180 deployment points", with the bonus dropping off as the total deployment points of the combat ships go beyond that level. I *think* there are enough skills like that - combined with also some skills that make having officers in frigates/destroyers specifically beneficial, and combined with deployment point distribution in battle being based mostly on officers (making bringing un-officered ships less appealing) - that it should have the effect of having that kind of mechanic in, without having it be a top-level fleet mechanic. Rather, it's a bunch of bonuses for having a smaller fleet, and less benefit from stuffing it with capital ships.

Great work, Alex!
And thank you for the new info!