The counters i speaking about are like the capital ship crew. You have an allowance limit to how many of a specific game thingie you can get.
Capital ship crew has a custom interface to increase it, but a custom counter could be in the research tree.
I imagine something like this:
NewCounter SpacePoniesClass {
Description "How many OMG Space Ponies! you can have in your fleet." // show up on research desc
MaxMessage "You must increase your research level before you can build more OMG Space Ponies!" //show up when you are at the max allowance limit and triy to build one more
InitLevel 0 (could be 1 - or anything else below maxlevels)
Maxlevels 10 // how many times it can be increased
Level 0:
Value 0
Level 1:
ResearchCostCredits 1000
ResearchCostmetal 100
ResearchCostCrystal 100
CostCounter IgorYessMaster 100 //dependency on another Counter 
Value 1 //you get 1 allowance point - the game will track how many you have, how many are used etc.
Level 2:
ResearchCostCredits 1500
ResearchCostmetal 150
ResearchCostCrystal 150
CostCounter IgorYessMaster 200 //dependency on another Counter
CostIncomeCredits 0 (absolute value)
CostIncomeMetal 0
CostIncomeCrystal 0
CostIncomeCreditsPercent 0 (percent value)
CostIncomeMetalPercent 0
CostIncomeCrystalPercent 0
Value 1 //you get 2 more points at this level
Level 3:
etc. // You would not need to define one level for each up to MaxLevels. The values of the last level defined would be repeated for the other levels
}
It would be useable on structures/ships by adding a CostCounter n (n is an integer) to the item definition.
I believe this system can model exactly the progression of the fleet allowance and capship allowance.
It could be used to model other restricions in game for modders.
for example, if people want Starbases to have crew cost too, a StarBaseCrewCounter could be created.
Or, if a modder wants to create a super ship with a limit of 1 per faction, this could be used to add that limit.
Another option if for folks who desperately want to have ships from other races. An 'AlienFleetCrew' counter could be created...
