Now, that said, occasioanlly we'll pop in a special type of missile, mass driver, or beam weapon that goes against the trend such as the "Nano Ripper".  And there are some evil weapons technologies that buck the given trend was well such as the Psyconic Missile.

Looking at the above:

The Black Hole Eruptor is pretty usless on fighters.  But it's absolutely devastating for the player who has capital ships and lots of money to burn as they could have ship that maxes out at 100 attack (in theory).  Of course, it would also cost over $1000 (and $30 per turn).

At the other end would be the Black Hole Gun -- a little gun that shoots quatum black holes.  One could stuff 2 of these on a late-game fighter for 40 attack (when all Minit techs have been used) and crank them out for $300.  So you could build 3 fighters in the time it would take to build that single capital ship and have 120 attack.  Those 3 fighers would use 6 logistics to the large ship's 5 logistic ships (capital ships here are using large hulls, not huge hulls).

But moving the battle later -- Player A could crakn out 5 fighters while Player B has only cranked out 1 of those capital ships.  Now that capital ship is attacking on a 2 to 1 disadvantage.  But then again, the capital ship has a lot more hitpoints.  The tiny fleet would have 30 hitpoitns total (6HP x 5 ships) while the capital ship would have 20 all by itself. And each blast of its canon would take out a fighter.  It would be an interesting battle.

It would be interesting to see someone make a little VB program that simulates outcomes.

was wondering (yet again) whether size is more of a constant for individual tech types (making an auto upgrade style governor for each tech type more viable) and the new variable is *quality* which negates, has no affect, or increases hit points and also directly impacts on cost. but den i iz crazy az a loon.....

Each component uses its own size which is based on a base size + a modifier based on the size of the ship.

There definitely won't be some sort of governor to auto upgrade ships.  At some point, the player needs to actually play the game.   We really don't want to put in governors that have their own AI in them.

Wait, damage has been figured out on doom rays? Are they implemented yet? I researched Doom rays but did not get the weapon.

Size, I think, is the more important factor.

You can always generate more cash to give to your military (even if it is robbing Peter to pay Paul), but you can't make your ship hulls any larger.

Also, the time it takes to build a ship is important; for example, two ship classes in my game right now:
Laser Boat II: Size Small, 1 beam attack; 33 weeks to build.
Destroyer: Size Medium, 1 beam attack and 2 missile attack, 49 weeks to build.

There definitely won't be some sort of governor to auto upgrade ships. At some point, the player needs to actually play the game. We really don't want to put in governors that have their own AI in them.

i'm finding at this stage that there's a lot of work involved in keeping ship techs up to date - i realise you haven't balanced yet - but it'll probably still be possible to go from Laser II to Laser V before your ship's built, meaning that you have to keep going in and out of ship design to keep your ship up to date (never mind the engines, defences, modules etc) - what i meant by governor, was something similar to the planets, allow an auto upgrade of the same tech type (eg Laser) but obviously *not* to another tech. Strategic decisions such as tech changes, and new ships obviously require a player input.....just me 2 bob's.......

So uh, what's the point of capital ships then ?? If you can crank out these uber fighters ?