If all that happens is you let the enemy fleet continually pound on one ship, then yes, no amount of sane buffing of capital ships is going to stop that.

Repair and disable abilities are there for a reason.  At the end of the day though, you have to accept losses or leave those ships behind that you can't bear to lose.  A simple level up should not be adding inordinate amounts of armor and HP to any capital ship.  It's reflecting the added experience of the crew and finessing the shield and weapon systems to work slightly better.  Not the addition of ten feet of neutronium armor and weapons that make your old ones look like peashooters.

Bring lots of capital ships, restore their shields and hull, and use all the combat abilities you have to disable or destroy the enemy fleet.  That's about all you can do.

That, or download a mod that makes capital ships unkillable behemoths if that's what really floats your boat.

well, making them stronger on higher levels is not such a good idea I'd say, they are already good value for money. after all, if the enemy concentrates so much firepower on so few ships, that leaves all the more for the rest of your fleet. true, high lvl capships cant be replaced readily, but with a bit of training and presence in one or two larger battles, the usually gain quite a bit. and after all, 100 frigates + fleets are a big investment, much larger than 1 or 2 capships, so by all means they should tear them apart rightfully so.

that said, I do feel that in that stage of the game something else would be good to have. something a bit more expensive that can withstand even such massive assault at least to a degree. not uber-titan ships with 50.000 combined points, but something along the range of 2 - 3 times as powerful as a standard capship could be interesting. they could take up accordin capship slots too and such. it just feels so odd to be able to build the most powerful start right from the start.

btw, I may be mistaken, but at very high levels, current capships actually do come fairly close to those 10.000 combined points you mentioned. 'd have to check, but 9.000 should be quite possible.

Capital ships IMO are right where they should be. In a diverse and properly managed fleet, they will not be the primary target of any human player unless that ships abilities are turning the tides of a battle.

Think about it this way: assume ships are cannon fodder, how many LRM frigates worth of damage would they soak up before they are destroyed?

Armor and HP wise these things are the best bang for the buck. Also, I think an effort was made on the part of the devs to make the capital ships abilities compliment each other. Example: A lvl 10 Kol is a serious machine in its own right, but accompanied by an Akkan with its targeting enhancement and armistice abilities, as well as a Dunov or two with its shield restore and flux field, that Kol's survivability has just increased tenfold.

Personally, I grow very much attached to my high level capital ships. I feel pain and sorrow as if the Enterprise was destroyed but not in a time loop when I lose one. I go to great lengths to protect them.

Do they need more firepower? No.

Note everyone is good at strategy. Sometimes you just need to loose alot to get it.

agreed.... caps are very weak later in the game... for smaller battles they are fine but when you have 20+ enemy ships it just becomes a waste of resources to continuously try to rebuild them and bring new ones into battle. Earlier today, I had 4 caps (all Kols) and 40+ regular battle ships and an enemy (normal AI) with 1 cap and around 50-60 ships came in and destroyed my fleet because they concentrated on the caps first and then took the rest of the fleet out... I had destroyed their lvl 4 cap fairly quickly but they kept bringing in more ships about 10-20 at a time when I had trouble bringing in/building 4 or 5 for backup... there is some unbalance in beta 1.1 that allows the AI to have their fleet specs at the highest + ships built to capacity at that high level with half the resources you have and still fight you off.

For the capitol ships, I would say +1000 hp and use +10 fleet slots with each level gain to bring it more in line with the experience. This way a cap that starts at around 3000hp ends up around 10-11,000hp by level 7 or 8 but also takes up 130 capacity slots per ship (50+80). With the fleet cap and game setup, it would be very difficult to have more than 5 or 6 capitol ships with high levels to just rampage through the system/galaxy because the number of regular ships available would be lessened. If you have insufficient fleet capacity, then you can't go up a level.

I believe high level KOL actually has 8000ish total hp (including shields) and exceeds beyond 10000 at level 10. I am asking about 2000~3000 total hp increase for high level cap ships, and it is not unreasonable?

Caps are just fine the way they are, IMO.

Sure, at the start of the game they are lords of battle, but in the late game, they should have more of a support role. It's abilities make it more dangerous then it's guns. Armistice is a 'get out of jail free' card if i ever saw one. Akkan's range extender ? Kol flak burst. Marza Missile Barrage... need I say more ? A Marza can clean up a pirate fleet of 100's in 20 seconds ! Thats impressive. Under powered ? Hell no.  

But, a single cap getting hammered by 70+ ships using FF will get spanked pretty quick( and as it should be ).. unless you have a Dunov helping out.. or 10 hoshikos.. or both. If your caps are dropping like flies, there's something wrong with the situation. Either you didn't scout, got suckered into a losing battle, or something else.

I don't know, but ( and I'm not bagging on you personally here ) it seems like there are a lot of posts about "Hey, I get stomped when I arrive with my fleet of <insert here>, so obviously the game is broken and needs to be fixed !". Yeah, and my SPAM and uni-functional fleets got slapped down too. The game is about adapting, using different techniques, and fluid strategy.

Capital ships are fine if you know  when to retreat with them. The abilitys are really what make them strong and thats what they are suposed to be.

On the other hand if your enemys only focus on your capital ships there could be an option for your own frigates to get in the way of some of the firepower to kind of shield your capital ship while it uses abilitys or retreats.

Dunno what you're doing, but I'm not losing caps in late game battles, and I usually play against 4+ hard AI's. And I use caps as the center of all my fleets. Marzas usually, especially since 1.09 ..

You can't charge a cap into the face of 70+ ships and expect a different outcome. It has to have some type of support, and I'm not talking about HC's. I use Hoshikos rather than Dunovs since shields don't help all that much against phase missiles... A high level Kol/Marza with 10 hoshikos will stand up for quite a long time. Considerably longer then alone. And hoshikos are CHEAP.

Try segmenting your fleet. Divide into two sections, one for caps, LRM's and repairs, the other for direct combatants ( HC's and Frigates ). Jump in with the HC's first, then follow with the caps. The AI targets the first ship it sees, usually. This also allows you to see whats in system right now, rather than jumping blind. 

Bombers ? Who worries about strike craft ? Where is your own cover ? Flaks suck, but you should have had a few carriers with fighters. At the very least a Kol has flak burst. Two pops pretty much clears the skies for a bit.. If the enemy had 70 carriers and you didn't scout and prepare.. you got what you deserved.

Cap ships do need....something.

I build what I call "luxury cap ship fleets", but I only do so because I'm in love with the huge brutal capital ship, I turn a blind eye to the fact that this game's cap ships are made of marshmello.   I only bring my caps out when I've got the required huge support fleet of Hoshikos/Cielo/Kodiaks to baby sit them (unless playing Advent then it's the support fleet of Guardians/Subjugator/Crusaders).

In SOASE cap ships are fluff.    Pound for pound you're better off with an equlivient fleet cap's worth of heavy cruisers.  All things being equal as TEC for instance when built around a proper support fleet you'd get more damage (and milage) out of 5 Kodiaks.  If you lose 5 kodiaks nobody cares...they're disposable.    You lose a cap ship later on and it's painful when you factor in the initial purchase and cash outlay to make it usable (again unless advent).

This has been espically true in the latest beta...it takes decades to get a cap ship level'd up now (even after "buying" it to level 4...don't even get me started on the fact you have to do that by midgame or you've got a 3,000 credit parade barge).

Cap ships need something...everybody knows in a serious battle cap ships are great targets, but otherwise they're pointless.

I'm still gonna build a huge fleet of 'em; but I only co-op comp stomp so I get away with it.

/facepalm

AI is just terrible enough to not used for the arguments of balance discussion.....

If you face a decent human player, he will be going to pick your capital ships in the beginning of the battle. Even if you have same size or bigger fleet than his, you just can't make your capital ships survive in late battle; the only best thing you can done is to make sure his don't survive as well. No amount of repair vessels and support frigates can prevent this. You really need to play against human player to see how capital ships are fragile as hell.

AI does not focus fire, human players do.

I'll give you that the AI isn't all that smart, and maybe can't be used in a discussion of balance in regards to multi-player games. Two totally different techniques. But, that being the case, what are you doing building caps ? In an MP game, you don't really have the time or resources to build more then one.

Efficiency rules the day in MP, and that means HC's and frigates. in a DPS vs Cost ratio, caps blow chunks. Plus, with a standard maximized build order once you get the first few planets/roids your cap is done ( except as a fleet damage magnet ). Most hard core MP folks scuttle the cap factory after they get the first cap.

I do agree that capital ships have enough hp as it is about 10,000 give or take a 1,000 is enough.

The only thing i think they should do though is atleast moderatley increase the damage of the capital ships. For instance the main cannon on the Kol or any battleship in that manner should tear threw a frigate in a few shots not a 30 to a minute duel.

Also i think that there should be a little more reliance on capital ships in the game as a good source of power. Most people in the game or multiplayer only get capital ships early in the game and its usually the colony ship. So back to the point that Capital ships should keep the same amount or about the same amount of hp but have there damages bumped up to anhilate frigates quickly and effectivley.

I mean they are Capital ships there suppose to be big and bad, maybe not invunerable fortresses, but surley floating powerhouses.