Okay, look, despite anything anyone might have to say, a lot of people, even me, can agree that the space combat in STO is pretty good.

Since that seems to be the one thing the developers really got right why don't we push to have them expand on it?

Instead of having a single ship go against a fleet of enemy vessels, we just have battles between one or two, scaled up for fleet actions.

In this vein, space battles can actually be tough, and by tough, I mean tough. To aid this there should be a bevy of new starship functions. For example, electronic warfare, finer system energy control with more systems, specific firing port selections, faster ships, maybe raise the battle range to 15 km, add top and bottom to shields (I know I have a tendency to strafe my opponent's belly), more system modifications and selectability, actual crew assignments to specific technologies and tasks, maybe even the ability to partition out what the standard, non-BO crew members are to do in a given situation, the ability to force power into specific impulse thrusters, special maneuvers, etc., etc., etc.

If we're going to be WWII battleships in space we might as well have the actual capabilities of a real future battleship. If I could have a real serious, ba**s deep slugout with another ship where I feel like everything that goes on in my ship is my decision and my every decision will determine the outcome of the battle then I'd be willing to wait a lot longer for other, less war-like elements to be brought into the game.

I realize that this would mean each space battle would be way more serious, way more intense, longer, and more exhausting, but I think this is a good thing. Ship-to-ship battle was always a serious matter, is a serious matter, and should be treated as such. Instead of having a hundred ship battles a day, maybe we should have 10 really awesome ones.