The exact amount of flagship skills you can get doesn't really matter - the point remains that it is way better than simply +1 officer.
Well, I admit was trying to do an on average estimate of the skill in isolation. Neural link, by itself, with no other skills selected, feels like 1 extra officer (on a capital perhaps) to me. Sure, if you optimize it with other skill selections, it can be far more effective, but that's true of many skills (multiple armor tanking skills comes to mind). Neural link also comes with some minor disadvantages (25 less OP on two capital ships if you want to leverage the "officer" bonus portion the most, no +15% CR from Combat Endurance, no +100% missiles from Missile Specialization). But at that point it comes down to comparing full builds and opportunity costs.
The problem I have in evaluating it is a huge portion of Neural link's potential strength is tied up in player skill, which is something I can't really account for when discussing general benefit. Some players just hit auto-pilot on their flagship, at which point they're getting no benefit from jumping between ships, and some players can probably use it do some disgusting maneuvers (perhaps with phase ships or coordinated missile strikes).
Having used it in my current run, it's fun, but the delay when jumping between capitals kills a lot of potential of well timed coordinated maneuvers for me. You have to already been in the ship if you're trying to do anything at all that has delicate timing. I get no real benefit from the skill when jumping between Odysseys, for example. At least the way I fly Odysseys which often involves plasma burns followed by short vents. I can kind of dance against a 5x Autopulse Radiant that way, but if I need 4 seconds to transfer, the Odyssey in that case is dead by the time I arrive. I'd rather have the 25 OP back on the ship, and be better on that single Odyssey.
I've started a General discussion topic on Neural link, and would love to hear about how people have leveraged it in actual play there. Or discuss the value of the skill, to avoid derailing this announcement post too much.
You really, really underestimate how important officers are. Support Doctrine only gives the 3 least important skills to ships. It's much better to just field larger ships and fill all your DP with officered ships. Support doctrine is only good for full degen spam strategies, in which case you will combine it with Derelict Ops and enjoy your 50% discount on fighter bays and missile slots.
There is some value in simply having more ships on the field than the opponent. Depending on fleet composition, it may or may not be worth it over converting a bunch of frigates into a single capital, for example. While I haven't used it, it looks mostly like an escort frigate support skill to me. For frigates, it gives two solid skills (Combat Endurance and Helmsmanship). Depending on the ships, a +50% maneuverability can reduce actual hits on small, fast frigates. Damage control admittedly is less impressive, but does have some minor benefit against things like Thunders and Ion beams, which can be problematic for frigates, as when they lose their engines, they're basically dead.
I do find the AI really starts having issues when it is significantly outnumbered locally, as it often makes it hard for it to retreat and vent. A squad of 4 capitals can have a lot of trouble with 30 Scarabs/Tempests, as an admittedly extreme example.
In 0.95a, in my low tech run, I was ended up running 6 unofficered Lashers to act as escorts to my officered capitals and carriers. That fleet had 8 level 6 officers plus player piloting 2 Onslaughts, a Legion XIV, 2 Mora, 4 Enforcers. I also had unofficered 2 Condors and the 6 Lashers. The Lashers did a ton of work keeping flanks clear, especially against phase ships. I was actually struggling in some cases when I didn't have frigates deployed, so they certainly felt like they were pulling their weight, more so than perhaps an officered Legion that I might have replaced them and the Condors with.
Would I take Support Doctrine over Best of the Best for such a low tech setup? Probably not, as Best of the Best feels like +1 skill to me for all ships I spend the extra story point on. But I might imagine doing it if I were a zero personal combat skill build, and had already gone 7 deep in Leadership doubling up on the two officer skills. Only 3 DP for a triple s-mod, fully restored Luddic Path Lasher with Combat Endurance and Helmsmanship sounds good to be honest. Slapping 20 of those as filler in a fleet at that point is only 60 out of 240 DP. Then 10 officer ships hits 30 ship fleet cap, at an average 18 DP per officer ship. Say two Onslaughts, a Legion XVI, and 6 SO Hammerheads. Or 6 Furies and 4 Hyperions.
It's certainly not a general use skill, but I can see there might be some application to wide fleets. As everyone points out, you can hit 240 DP with 8 officers. 4 Capitals and 4 Cruisers, 240 DP is no problem. But, that's not a wide fleet. That's the same number of ships everyone else is playing, 8+1 or 10+1. The skill looks to be trying to enable a different play style which explicitly plays differently than what everyone seems to be used to. I mean, what if a player wants to have fun by putting 30 ships on the field? Which skill should they take to do that? They take Support Doctrine, as no other skill is going to help the 20-22 other ships (most likely cheap frigates) as much.
Is it balanced enough for that, I dunno, as I haven't tried it. But making it apply to ships with officers or simply saying you should only ever use 8 or 10 ships with officers, I think is missing the point of the play style the skill is trying to enable.
