I was thinking of ways to get rid of the current clunky planet/base/ship system, and I came up with this. I've made similar suggestions before and I'm aware that this is too big to be done with GC2, but hey, it's just an idea.
The perceived problem: Planets, starbases, and ships are all severely and unrealistically limited in this game. It makes for a good game, but in my opinion it would be even better if these things made more sense. I was initially looking at ways to implement boarding actions, and I came up with this: Make planets, ships, and starbases functionally the same object, distinguished only by size and bonuses.
This system would be extremely flexible and not altogether difficult to balance. It would encompass pretty much everything we have now, plus allow for all kinds of quick and easy changes and interesting new things to do.
Planets would have beam/missile/bullet attack/defense numbers like bases and ships, but they'd be *really* high (starting defense around 1000 each and fairly easy to improve). Planets would have hit points, but they'd be even higher, making planet-smashing possible but only barely. Planets would have movement 0, of course. They would need new planetary improvements for weapons, sensors, repair, etc. They would even have experience, battle-hardened populaces well-versed in repelling invasions.
Starbases could hold colonies or run production, but they would be limited in the number and type of improvements they could make (there would be a list for planets, a list for bases, and a list for ships). They'd almost always have movement 0 and typically have a very low population and population growth. They could have ships protect them by being "in orbit." They could have an "orbit space" stat, and it could be lower than the stat for planets.
Ships could be "invaded" with effort and carriers would be easy to make by giving a ship an "orbit space" stat of greater than 0 and letting smaller ships move with it (maybe a stat specifying the size of ships allowed to orbit an object?). Shipmaking would be like it is now, but you could also build a couple improvements on them once launched (ship-specific tiles, of course, and easy to make a governor for since ships aren't as unique as planets).
Invasions could be slightly complicated, but nothing bad. Perhaps you'd need a special module to "invade" a ship or starbase (since fewer troops are involved). It doesn't seem right to have standard troop ships boarding a destroyer, but it would be neat if something could. Also, Soldiering could work like speed--each ship/base/planet has its own value, modified by its own construction with bonuses from your researched techs.
Constructors would probably need a change (though you could also leave them exactly as is and make starbase improvement tiles completely independent). My favored option is to make production on a world (or base or ship) something that can be stored up, with constructors adding a certain amount to the structures they're used on. So you might have ten hammers per turn on a low-production planet and be able to send a construction module there to give the planet an additional 20 hammers all at once that the planet can spend however it wants, say to buy a 40-hammer structure in two turns (20 produced + 20 from constructor). The obvious use of this is that a zero-production ship or starbase could be given enough supplies for two improvements on a base or 5 additional fighter ships on a carrier.
