I have been studying the battle behaviour changes a bit, here are my thoughts (basicly theory crafting so far):

What I think is the intention behind the ship roles:

Capital Ships:
- achieve strategic objectives, e.g. destroy starbases to deny movement range, destroy capitals to keep starbases alive, destroy supports to do maximum damage to enemy fleet combat capabilities (e.g. no carriers which have replenishing fighters)
-> implications: good balance between fire power and defense needed (life just long enough to fullfill strategic objective)
-> targets have high hp; therefore lower importance of attack speed and combination of multiple weapons
-> large or huge hulls

Escort Ships:
- protect capital ships by shielding them against everything but other capitals, guardians and starbases
- shield assaults against capitals, assaults and escorts
- can stay with supports but not shield them effectively
-> more focus on defene than on offence
-> focus on attack speed and different weapons in order to minimize overkill against small targets

Assault Ships:
- go after sqishy targets, i.e. support ships and starbases before fighting the capital/escort group
- I am not entirely sure about this, the target priorities are odd to me (see later)
- shields interceptors against everything but supports

Guardian Ships:
- artillery ships/ capital ship hunters. Prevent enemy from fullfilling strategic objective
-> low defense, high offense
-> balance between high attack speed and high first strike damage depending on enemy composition and role (huge capital ships -> high first strike damage; medium assault ships -> reduce overkill)

Interceptor Ships:
- they have movement type attacker, will have to test if they actually do escort assaults
- escort assault ships or protect starbase/ support ship
- do not shield assault ships but assaults shield them
-> preference for offense over defense

Discussion:

Capital Ships:
- I love the concept of capital ships essentially being a strategic weapon.
- I was wondering about why they shouldn't beeline for supports after starbase and other capitals, but this is reasonable due to guardians role as capital hunters

Guardian Ships:
- again, I like the concept of them being capship hunters and them focussing on removing the enemy high damage ships
- I would consider changing the starbase upgrades to contain guardians instead of interceptors and possibly assaults too

Escort Ships:
- basicly fine in its role I think

Assault Ships:
- I like the idea of having some ships going after the soft targets and therefore being different from capitals
- they would be the best candidate for plantary defenses due to attacking transports first and possibly preventing an invasion that way
- I am wondering why the attack order is not: Starbase, Support, Guardian, Escort, Capships, Assault, Interceptor, Upgrading
-> Guardians as artillery ships would make sense as higher priority target; also the Assault/Interceptor squadron would stay near the Support/Guardian group until it is cleared out that way except if there is a starbase (maybe even reduce starbase priority behind escorts or even capitals, since you would use capitals, if removing a starbase was a priority)

Interceptor Ships:
- the main problem I see here is the lack of specialization. They are a little bit of escorts to Assaults but don't shield them, they are a little bit of Assault/Interceptor hunters, but will follow their own asaults while available...
- I don't think they have to escort Supports, since you can use Guardians for exactly the same purpose
- if the starbases use guardians instead of interceptors, they don't have to escort those either
- what I would consider is making them escorts to Assaults, meaning they will shield assaults and prioritize the Assaults objectives if those are destroyed, I am nt entirely sure how though
- the alternative would be dissolving the Assault/Interceptor group and have Interceptors hunt assaults all over the battle :/ not sure about this yet... maybe try to add another ship role...

Spacing:
- I dont like the spacing so much, it means you divide your fleet. Letting the enemy fight 3 small instead of one big fleet is just never a good idea.
- would put the Capital/Escort fleet in front of the Assault/Interceptor squad in order to to have the latter bypass the enemy fleet when it is allready occupied with the other Capital/Escort fleet
- I like the starbases being in the thick of battle

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Will leave it at that for now, I am sure I forgot something^^