That is, before you counter, you have to scout and know what your opponent is up to. I believe that this is impractical in a competitive, high pressure RTS. You don't have time to do effective scouting, what you must do is have an initial plan that you start executing as quickly as possible as soon as the game begins (for instance, drop 1 weapons lab, research assailants, and start pumping them ASAP).
Or you could send your scout to his homeworld(by microing it of course) and check if the enemy's massing LRMs or Light Frigs or going for 2 cap-ships or going flak-heavy or something else, and you should have the counter procedures for the possible early game strategies from beforehand.
The TEC scout would be the best at espionage since it can drop Probes in a hostile gravwell and, later in the game, place Timed Explosives on a building before making it's escape. Scouts can even harass the enemy by destroying an unfinished structure and sending all that cash & resources down the drain.
One thing I missed in my previous post is that 4 Advent Fighter Squads are enough to take down a Javelis in a single go if their passes are spaced by 1-2 seconds so as to fool shield mitigation into dropping. No time would be wasted since the first squadron would just move on to a different target and the rest would follow. The details make a ton of difference.
In fact I no longer build more than my free cap ship
You are right in that cap ships (IMHO) aren't worth building.
One capital ship also has an advantage in that, if it doesn't get killed, it will level up much faster than if you have multiple caps leeching off experience points. One Level 8 carrier with 200 supply worth of support cruisers and heavy cruisers would be a lot better than 5 Level 1 battleships.
