Why that didn't continue and how Confed conceivably countered this threat; I don't know.. does Loaf have an explanation for how Confed dealt with this 'horror' and why the Kilrathi didn't destroy every Confed ship in this manner?
Despite what the games seem to imply, cloaking ships are a real rarity until Prophecy - and then the bugs can detect cloak ships (as witnessed in an unfinished, unused level early in the game)
For instance, I would prefer if carriers didn't manufacture fighters since this didn't happen in the game. New shipments of fighters and capships could simply be jumped in conceivably from other fronts or from industrial centers.
What you suggest is impossible. Not only does the game not allow ships to jump on and off map at will, but it wouldn't make sense to allow a supply ship onto the map. Why would anyone send the ship other than their HQ? Sending it out anywhere else is just asking to have it blown up.
What you're asking for is an unnessessary level of complexity that would probably hinder more than help gameplay.
Resources could still be used and units "purchased", but they would simply be a measure of the areas strategic value, warranting the shipment/relocation of other military assets... Resource shipping could occur over the map so it was possible for fighters to intercept a transport or new shipment from a jump point (which might be a completely different area than the resource patch) as in the Wing Commander games.
I can safely say that some if not all of the things you suggest here are impossible within the confined of either Homeworld game.
Random spawn points are common in multiplayer levels of HW, though.
I still prefer the old fashioned Wing Commander way of finding units, where you have to fly a fighter into their vicinity.
What, you mean you never used "Autopilot"? That usually brings you right to the waypoint you need to be at.
Seriously though, with few exceptions like the jammer missions in WC4, you're sent out to find ships that Confed/ConFleet knows are in the area. Otherwise, why would there be fighters deployed on a "seek and destroy" mission?
I prefer commanding units and spending more time using military tactics and strategy rather than building units, buying research, and ordering resource collecters.
Anyone I've played in an RTS - be it Warcraft 2 or Homeworld 2 or Dawn Of War- would crush you within minutes. The secret to all these games is the speed in which you harvest/mine resources.
As for "military tactics" - there is no such thing in HW2, lest you mean the FOUR fleet arrangements you get. And even then - there were several more fleet arrangements in the first Homeworld that didn't make it to this newest game - claw, sphere, box, etc.
This may throw the whole project off on a tangent, and might not be as fun for other people
Then why are you still talking?
On another note, IIRC some people have commented that bombers are too powerful and destroy capships too quickly. IIRC, it takes a bomber about 12 seconds while within firing range of a capship to lock and fire a torp. It only takes a fighter about a second to fly on it's tail and fire off an IFF missile to blow it up. If this 12 second timespan at close range and this missile power from fighters could be implemented, I think we would find it quite a challenge to take out a capship.
That would be nice but would do nothing to change the fact that a player could build dozens of bomber flights and just torpedo any craft into oblivion with a single strike.
While the bombers do fire a torpedo every X number of seconds, it's not possible to allow them the 12 second delay for a "lock on".
I'm sure czacen can elaborate.
Of course lasers and standard missiles can still destroy capships with relative ease in Wing Commander games- so THIS could be a problem, but I don't think we'd find the bombers to be overpowered if they're easier to take out and are forced to expose themselves for so long.
You haven't even played the mod yet, have you?
couldn't it be done in a way that random jump points are placed on the map, which have to be captured by space marines boarding craft.
I had a similar idea - that since the game allows only "player specific" jump points that marine landing craft could "steal" them for another players use. Sadly, the game does not allow this for reasons I cannot explain. Perhaps czacen could?
Needless to say though, capturing them wouldn't do much good, unless you linked it to a previously existing buoy. And even then, czacen is looking into preventing "on the fly" buoy link changes.