I just finished two games of GC4 and I will say the game is in a pretty good state as it is. There were a lot of fun moments in these games. The A.I. fleets had a pyramid scheme that made them feel varied, and more complex.  (Pyramid Scheme: A few large ships supported by greater numbers of smaller ships.) Exploration and colonization felt good. I like the addition to wars so that you now can extend them, but pay a price in return. I like the new options that gigamass can be used for, and that it is a very limited resource. This game is one of my favorites of all time as is.  I have a few things I would like to see added to the game or improvements I would make to the current combat systems.

Fleets and Combat System

0. Rebalancing abilities that reduce weapon cooldown: Currently the best abilities and doctrines are ones that reduce the weapon cool down. It makes it very easy to build fleets that are near impossible for the A.I. to destroy due to an extremely high rate of fire.  These doctrines skirmisher, assault, and barrage as well as the command ship really need to be looked into. I like the idea of higher fire rates, but they really need a heavy downside to them as well. Lower damage output, extremely low accuracy, ect. Skirmisher which has the downside of reduced the range is extremely unbalanced.  It easily is one of the best doctrines in the game. Meanwhile accuracy doctrines have little use as base accuracy is pretty high with most weapons.

1. Fleet Production-New Mechanic:  Single ship production often means producing fighters, bombers, and corvettes, and frigates becomes a highly inefficient form of production preventing their use later in the game. Allowing shipyards for produce fleets of these smaller ships would increase their use. Balancing would probably need to be done afterward to further improve how they are used in supporting or assault roles. There are a lot of improvements that could be made to the doctrines and ship classes systems, but they really hinge on being able to produce a lot of these smaller ships at a worthwhile rate.

2. Ship Classes and Doctrines-Rebalancing:  If full fleet production was added to the game making producing swarms of smaller expendable ships a viable and even preferable strategy, I feel that ship classes and ship doctrines would need some retooling. I would argue that all of the necessary components are in place to make a complex and fun system, and all that's needed are some design goals, and then adjusting the doctrines and classes to meet those goals.

For example a design goal could be: Fighters are fast and light so they are very likely to evade enemy fire. Because they are difficult to hit you have two real options to deal with them. Units with high accuracy can knock them out of the sky with targeted, but slower firing weapons, or you can use a high fire rate with low powered weapons to shoot them down.

I then make it so fighters are very likely to dodge base weapons if no accuracy bonuses have been applied. I also take abilities like skirmisher, assault, and barrage and decrease the damage done by weapons if these doctrines are applied.  The other option is to reduce their accuracy.

3. Ship Loadout:  With new doctrines, classes, targeting order, weapons, and other parts being added in the last year, I've noticed ship designs have become very unique and more niche. Many of my ships outclass A.I. ships because I know what I'm trying to build. A system that allows the A.I. to select a loadout (the doctrines, class, targeting order, weapons, and other components) I previously created for my ship and use that for its own ships in the future would be a really cool feature. Especially if the A.I. kept a running database from game to game.  Then the A.I. would actually feel like it's learning from me and building better ships over time, selecting which ones seem the most powerful/useful.

Thanks for all your hard work on the game.  I hope to see more as we get into the New Year. I have some other thoughts, but I'll break them up into parts.