Well, you could make it so that the drain on resources of new colonies is connected to loyalty (ie. how far away it is from your capital planet).

Thus you would not slow down the early game but would create a higher resources drain in the later game when the planets you colonize are farther away.

THAT is a very very good point.

TBH i preferred beta 1's upkeep system. The more ships you built, the more drain on your economy.

I think everyone here is in agreement that they want some kind of economic warfare implemented. Be it directly by raiding economic structures, or indirectly perhaps through espionage, or some form through the diplomacy menu. Perhaps a way to sabotage what a person has researched so they cannot use it until it is "repaired". So if someone researched refineries, and your spy managed to sabotage it. They cannot build refinery's until it can be re-researched. Iffy idea, but its just a thought.

I understand both sides of the point here, and Yarlen has stated that the infinite resources are here to stay. So i guess we will have to make due.

They do go interstellar

your all idiots.

all of you

the infinite model has nothing to do with anything. if it wasnt infinite it stil wouldnt effect gameplay you *edited*. stupid u suggesting reinferinties that will replace the problem duh!? noobs.

the biggest problem with sins , is the whole idea that theres nothing to do with ships other then steamroll , and because of this , people are so damn reliant on just having economy or fleet advantage. The whole idea of micro is disrgarded yet micro is the ONE bloody thing that isnt dependant on fleet size or economy , its dependant on the players ability to knuckly down and conentrate. which is exactly the thing which allows people to come back in a game. steamrolling sucks ass . those who think otherwise are in dreamland and they can shove metal rodds up their arses with peanit butter for lube.

ps - drunk post , so foff.

ps - drunk post

You should really have been on IRC for the last 10-15 minutes. And even now a little bit.. he just keeps going and going and going

Much like the energizer bunny, if it was trashed like he is

Ouch, somebody is in for some rebuking in the morning, me thinks....not to mention puking.

Yeah, drunk posts are fun, but only when their funny.  I tend to cut people some slack in their comments, but there's a limit. 

Let me make this a general pronouncement that posts containing personal insults or vulgarity in a like vein won't be tolerated. Things have been getting rather heated since Beta 4 came out and it's getting out of hand. If we see any more then people will start to lose their posting privledges.

nice phrasing -- with respect to to supcom?

You have valid points, but three of the main problems I can see with removing the fleet point system are:

1) It would de-value capital ships fairly considerably. Of course, there are people on both sides of the fence on this, some would love to see more capitals and some are happy with the way it is. But essentially, right now the number of capitals is balanced mostly by the fleet point cost and research. In small-medium sized games, the fleet point cost is a much bigger concern than the research. This forces the player to diversify the fleets somewhat, and have capitals mixed in with frigates and support cruisers. With the economy in its current state and the ability to hoard resources infinitely, removing the fleet point cost would allow a player to put out considerably more capital ships and greatly reduce the value of each one while at the same time reducing the need for fleet diversity. Why build light carriers when you can just get 5 Sovas and get 15 squadrons out of them right away (training to level 3 with credits), as well as their other abilities. Why build cobalts when you can build a bunch of Kols that can cover a much larger area with weapon fire and have improved shield resistances..

Research would still limit how many capitals you can have out, but in small/medium games I would expect to see a heavily disproportionate number of capitals vs support ships. Again, some may like this, but I think the current way is better.

2) It would also devalue expansion somewhat. Same as the above, there are people on both sides of the fence on this one. The main main problem here is that Volcanics specifically provide greater fleet points, which makes them desirable contention points, as well as desirable strike targets as losing a fully developed volcanic can really set a player back on military production. You would still need to expand your empire for logistics and setting up the economy, but the fleet point system right now plays a large role in it, also.

3) And this is probably the main one. Currently, the Vasari are mostly balanced by their higher need of fleet points, in the late game. With resource hoarding and rates of increase in large games, the difference in building costs between Vasari and TEC ships becomes pretty neglible--it's the fleet points that limit Vasari military production and maintain balance between the ship-to-ship weakness of TEC ships vs the Vasari ships and the greater maximum number of TEC ships vs Vasari ships. Taking away the fleet point system would allow the Vasari player to potentially produce the same number of units as the TEC player, and each of them would be individually stronger. It would take quite a fair bit of rebalancing to straighten that out, and the Advent is in the mix also though we beta testers don't know how

No clue, aside from not needing anywhere near as many refineries there isn't any difference between asteroids that run dry and asteroids that don't. Either way you have a sustained, limited income based on your territory aquired.

Before, your resources went up, capped out and maybe dropped as resources started running out, and then expanded again if you built enough refineries to more than offset the losses. Now, there is no drop off from them running out, and you're probably only building one refinery for every two or three trade ports instead of more along the lines of 1-1 or better.

losing 3 capital ships is still a big deal, even late game. the amount of resourcesyou spend is still large enough to make you regret losing your ships or entire fleet.