Nice post. I agree with everything you wrote. I've always hated the Rock- Paper- Scissors system of GC. That was always the true weakness of the game to me, not lack of tactical combat. GC4 has so far went even more basic than GC3. This is not a good thing. Having the Battle Viewer back is step in the right direction.

I understand this is an empire building game first and foremost. And that combat is secondary, but it doesn't have to be a bad system. It's not MoO2, ISG, nor DW. I wouldn't want it to be. I play GC for different reasons than those games. I hope the devs make combat fun, that can use different strategies. You know instead of just the one or two loaded ships or a dozen small clones. Ship roles in GC3 were a good start, and unique to my playing experience. Weapon ranges, different recharge rates, shields that can affect all damage types, a better point defense system; are all good ideas imo. I hope the devs give us the best game possible. 

if missiles did more dmg, but were blocked pretty well by shields, there could be an added fleet tactic of trying to combine different types of weapons to have kenetic and/or beam ships take out the shields so that the next missile volleys would do a lot more dmg. if shields protected more against beams while armor protected best against kinetic there would still be the strategy of trying to mix up your weapons and defenses to counter theirs. 

right now fleets are often pretty simple, it's just go for one dmg type and try to get as many %boosts to them as u can, and maybe throw in a little extra hp and repair, because that's how everything usually works best. with changes like these players would have a good reason to mix up different weapon types and add basic and possibly specialized defenses in a fleet. i think it would add a lot to the tactics and depth of combat that many people are looking for.

just to be clear i wasn't saying kinetic should bypass shields, i was just saying that the other dmg types should have reduced dmg vs shields, more resistance vs missiles and a bit vs lasers.

I have hated rock/paper/scissors since it was first introduced years ago. People love the ship designing aspect of this series, but it is boring to me since defense has been almost pointless for many years.

It makes sense to me that each defense works somewhat against everything, but works really well against something. Shields get worn down and need to be recharged. Point defenses obscure the target (chaff or jamming) or attack the projectile (missile, mostly, but kinetic once in a while). Armor is spread around the ship, so it protects against everything until it weakens in some part of the ship.

So, a point defense should have a low value against projectiles (obscuring aim), a medium value against lasers (chaff reflects and distorts their energy and a high value vs slow moving missiles. 

Shield defense should have a high value vs lasers, medium vs missiles and moderate vs kinetic (concentrated mass and speed of the projectile).   Think of an direct fire armor piercing ammo round vs a high arced lob of an indirect artillery round. 

Armor defense should stop everything dead, allowing no damage unless the individual attack value exceeds the armor value.

So, what should take damage. Point defenses are usually not targetable, so they only take damage randomly and from all types of attacks. Shields get worn down each time they block an attack but can recharge.  All successful attacks reduce armor first, then hit points.

Finally, all defensive values need to be high enough to make them worth the cost and space they occupy. In a pure R/P/S system all values should probably be tripled since they only have a 1/3 chance of being needed. Perhaps point defenses can be placed outside of the ship, thus taking no space but being always vulnerable to being hit.

What if later in the game you could unlock a stealth/cloaking/jamming module that made ships immune to long range targeting. So your fleets would have to engage enemy fleets directly if they deployed stealth modules on their ships.

I also LOVE the idea of shields and armor being able to counter all damage types. 

Defensive modules takes up the same amount of space as offensive modules but defense gets used up while offense does not. It's time to even the playing field.

After any HPs are lost randomly remove the affect of one or more modules until the total number removed is equal to the integer calculated below 

                               (Original HP - Current HP) x (Original used Mass + # of upgrades)  / (Original HP) > or = to 1

Defensive modules would not take damage or be reduced in power or effectiveness in any other way.

So, weapons, systems and defenses would now be vulnerable to fire and battles could end in a draw if both sides lose all of their offensive weapons.  Also, keep in mind that defensive systems still may need to be upgraded if they continue to be effective only against one type of attack, since offensive weapons work against everything. There is no point in spending money on armor that only covers 1/3 of your body if the same price buys you a better weapon that works all of the time. (The best defense is a good offense.)

Yes DivineWrath, I remember liking GC2's system.  I can't remember if that was the square root system or if that came later, which was still OK, at least until offensive weapons got large. In linear vs square root, linear wins big after 2, especially if you round down.