Okay, this is going to show my background as a wargame geek, but here it goes.

There are generally two kinds of combat simulation models usually applied to something that can be extended to the kind of thing being played at by GalCiv2 ship combat.

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First there is the "tank combat" hard-target (armored, unlike say a truck) point-target (as opposed to an area effect like against a dispersed target like an infantry unit) model.

Here essentially you check for a projectile to hit the target and if it hits you check to see if it penetrates or defeats the armor. But usually any hit which penetrates results in a kill. This would apply to space combat if you presumed that the ships were small relative to the damage caused and/or the need to contain an atmosphere aboard the ship results in explosive decompression when the target's defenses are compromised.

GalCiv2 essentially follows this model for small ships but for larger ones there seems to be an effect where the ships are large anough to soak up the damage and seal off compartments or whatever.

Which takes me to the second model...

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The second model is naval combat, such as battleship gunfire. This is what you get normally where the target is a large enough vehicle that a single penetrating hit (even by a huge 18" AP shell weighing several hundred pounds) does not result in a kill such as it does for tank combat.

Now, here the norm has always been set by systems that use a target's displacement (hull size or hit points, hard to tell exactly but they seem to track roughly more or less) as a value against which to accumulate damage.

GalCiv2 kind of does this but interestingly does not carry it through in the way that most naval combat simulations do.

First off, there is the complication, seemingly unnecessary, of having both a hull size which you use to load modules and a separate but related hit points value (aside from armor defense). Partly, okay, this is to account for miniaturization.

Anyhow, the more critical difference is that most naval combat simulations apply the amount of damage taken, as a percentage of the displacement, to all areas of the ship's operation in and after the battle. So for instance speed, attack, defense, sensors, range, number of troops would all be affected by a percentage equal to the perentage of damage taken against the total hit points.

Some naval combat sims also allow for 'critical hits' that remove certain systems entirely like a particular weapon mount or engine or say a construction or mining module etc.

But the point is that in GalCiv2 ships which are sitting at 1hp (and very kewelly shown on the screen as smoking and sparking) are just as lethal in attack (and just as fast, etc, etc) as those at full strength. This is something that does not seem like a big deal to implement, especially if you ignored the 'critical hit' aspects. And I would argue that it would improve the game albeit making a bit of change to strategy.

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As one more note...

Man those starship types are some brave dedicated poor sobs! They never flee.

It really seems odd to me that a fleet of ships which is faster than the enemy does not break off combat against an enemy which outguns them when they can outrun that enemy.

Unless the player does this by avoiding combat in the first place, but that provides the sensor range exceeds the enemy movement so no suprises happen, and the AI certainly does not seem to act this way in any case.

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Anyway, maybe a "not gonna happen" but those are just my thoughts I decided to share based on my experience in things only tangentially related.