I actually am more inclined to agree with standing orders in principle -- but each standing order should cost one command point each at the start, for game balance, to reflect the inventiveness of the captain and tax the commanding abilities of poorer officers.
The UI for defining a standing order would be on the Fleet screen with a single button on the right general to the entire fleet (regardless of which ship is currently selected on the Fleet screen, in other words). The GUI is just a simple list box with a scroll bar, with the guts of the list box containing everything needed.
Spoiler
[-] Light Escort, ISS Demeter, Venture-class Balanced Cruiser (at start) [×]
Add Ship
[-] Retreat (at start) [×]
ISS Vigilance, Mule-class Standard Combat Freighter [×]
ISS Hell's Bells, Buffalo-class Standard Freighter [×]
Add Ship
Add New
The [-] button in front of the standing order simply folds the list. Clicking on the [×] for any ship in the list removes it from that standing order. Clicking the [×] button for any standing order removes it and all of the corresponding ships (if any are specified). Clicking the standing order itself allows changing the specific standing order (including specifying the friendly asset that will be protected or interacted with during the order), while clicking the parenthetical condition allows choosing the specific condition (explained below).
Without specifying a condition, this creates "Assignments", which are exactly what the player already does himself manually at the start of the scenario, intended solely to save the player the effort of having to punch in those commands manually every time -- for instance, assuming my force isn't large enough that I can simply choose not to deploy them, I
always order my shuttles and freighters to retreat unless ordering them to retreat would be a total waste of time (such as when attempting to roll over a wing of 4 fighters in a picket-defence frigate). Each Assignment costs a command point regardless of the number of ships that are given the assignment, just like issuing an order to multiple ships does in the command interface in actual battle. Assignments include all of the typical orders that don't require detected enemy targets, such as Escort, Retreat, etc. If no ships are specified for a Light Escort/Medium Escort/Heavy Escort, it follows standard rules and picks the escort ships automatically from unassigned ships. Otherwise, if ships are specified, it orders all of the specified ships to escort the asset in the order (and changes the order name accordingly from Light Escort/Medium Escort/Heavy Escort per how the battle interface normally determines the escort size).
It also creates "Contingencies", which allow the player to prepare his ships in advance of the scenario, but each Contingency
also costs a command point to establish. Contingencies are simply standing orders with the condition changed from
at start to something else. Example conditions are "when individual health <X%", "when combined health <X%", "when fleet health <X%", "when fired upon", "when an enemy is detected", "when enemy force outnumbers friendly fleet by >X%", "when enemy force outnumbers combined force by >X%", etc.
As shown in the GUI "text mockup", I could create a standing Assignment order that orders all freighters to retreat at the beginning of the battle (
i.e., by creating a "Retreat" standing order on the Fleet screen and then clicking the ships I want it to apply to, not anything specifically tied to unit class). Since it's one order, it costs only one command point, but it saves me the effort of having to do this manually every battle, as I do this manually all the time anyway. This particular element of the feature is simply a UI workaround, making things more convenient for the player without changing the gameplay balance in any way.
But I could also create a more complex Contingency order, like:
Spoiler
[-] Repair and Refit (when individual health <30%, repeat as necessary) [×]
Warthog Assault Fighter Wing A [×]
Warthog Assault Fighter Wing B [×]
Add New
...which would order both wings of fighters to retreat simultaneously for repair and refit
once during the scenario if either of the wings' fighters' health (each wing is treated as an "individual") dropped below 30%, for a cost of 1 command point. The
repeat as necessary flag in the condition also means that it should deduct another command point during the battle and re-add the same standing order to those ships every time they complete the order, so you could have your ships automatically return for repair-and-refit over and over again until your command points ran out. If you don't have any more command points, the order isn't re-added.
If you wanted to make it a little smarter (i.e., only make one wing retreat for repair and refit, it would simply require two orders (and thus 2 command points rather than 1 command point):
Spoiler
[-] Repair and Refit (when individual health <30%, repeat as necessary) [×]
Warthog Assault Fighter Wing A [×]
Add New
[-] Repair and Refit (when individual health <30%, repeat as necessary) [×]
Warthog Assault Fighter Wing B [×]
Add New
This would probably quickly haemorrhage your command points, so somewhere down the line it might be nice to get CIC officers that give us bonus command points only for fighters and so on.