Trace's post reminds me a bit of Aurora.
That said, it's far enough removed it may as well be an entirely new system. Not sure I like simplification, because it actually changes a lot more.
Regarding the now sadly deceased game:
It was a blast for the little time I was in.
As to the rules, I'd be in favour of establishing a firm framework that everyone can look up and know, because it just doesn't have any loopholes to be exploited by min-maxing.
This would require some minor changes to the base rules of the game, but probably for the better. If, then, half the outcome is roll of the dice and artistic freedom of the Gamemaster, maybe with stratified randomness where a faction that got hit bad the last turns "has learned from past mistakes" and gets limited protection from very bad rolls, the game can still stay balanced.
Of course, this wasn't possible. Only after having this experience have we gathered enough data points to worry about that effectively.
Feedback on how it was done:
I actually thought it great that we didn't have all the choices in hand. We were Naval High Command, and if the Head of State orders an All-Out Assault, we do it. We were also just most of the people in there, and we couldn't simply control all the forces as we saw fit.
I think something that would have helped, long term, is to get a secondary writer to fill out minor events, so that the Game Master, in this case Alsadius, can concentrate on the broad strokes, of how he wants to universe to go on.
Lastly, let me give a flaming plea for complexity:
... ok, maybe not really. But I'll argue for it.
Basically, I believe that, in a game like this, that is mostly between highly interested parties that are already willing to spend multiple hours a week filling spreadsheets and many more hours debating over it with strangers on the internet, complexity is ok.
And it could be higher than it is now.
Point defense could be a mathematically challenging system of diminishing returns tailor-fit to the game we're having (see the thread about that, and how what we sort of agreed on in the end was focused on making it playable on a real table).
Maintenance could factor in design complexity, logistics, and the bureaucracy of the faction.
Individual weapons could have strengths and weaknesses against specific types of enemies, and every faction could very well have their own fighers, dropships, and favourite grub on board.
"But", I hear you ask, ", ..but why?".
Simple. (No pun intended)
"Complexity" does not mean "complicated". We work with digital tools, and f.Ex. maintenance could very well be calculated for a single ship based on everything that ship is comprised of, then multiplied with the factor for that faction. Indeed, a player could play around with that and see what he/she gets out of their spending, without even grasping the intricate underlying rules.
The base game is a board game, and we run with that, but the background we've built could go deeper. And if well designed, it wouldn't overwhelm the game master.
Of course, this might indeed require additional tools that someone would have to create.
I still intend to try myself at something like that, but it may well be a year until that happens. I plan on spending the next autumn in Asia.
All in all, thank you for both the idea and the organization, Alsadius.
Lastly, a little bit of faction background:
The original FWL plan (not mine) was to boost a yard up to 2 Megatonnes, then create a massive battlecruiser armed largely with NACs and build as many as possibly. Those pesky neighbors wouldn't leave him alone, though.
My idea was, over the course of the next 2 turns, to get IFA and LF-Batteries asap, and then build a new, 1 megaton battlecruiser that would basically be a better heracles - I planned for 3.3 base speed with a mixed armament of N-Gauss, NPPCs, and NLs. They would serve as a highly mobile, highly trained cavalry fleet to be employed where needed, with the base fleet staying the way they are, but uparmoured and augmented by 1.5 mt ships used as anchors in battle.
I even had plans on how to survive the numberless fighters.
I also believe strongly in fluff, and would have ordered a few Heracles to just generally patrol border worlds, including towards the periphery, and I would not have just created massive balls of structure - that little bit of fragility, by now, was actually part of the factions character.
Had I taken over the RWN, as originally planned, I would have for minefields and massive boarding parties.