Re: How is it possible to raid without retreat ability?
 

Retreat would have to be carefully implemented so that warp point defenses could not be evaded too easily with speed 11+ ships (6+ tactical).

As for chasing single ships, if retreating was implemented, emergency propulsion would be a nice thing to have for getting away or for chasing. Too bad it does not work on fleets.

One thing that would really make raiding more effective would be concealment and more limited spotting of enemy ships. Add one level to the cloaking level of each ship for each square you are away from it. Problem with that is it would cause players to add a survelliance satellite to every square to detect intruders. I do not like the amount of micromanagement that would add to the game.

It would be nice if tractor beams could prevent an enemy from leaving a strategic square. (They cannot leave if they do not make it to the edge in combat). Along the same lines, it would be nice if you could evade pursuing ships by using a repulsor beam.

Personally, I think that leaving retreat out would be simpler as there are other things Aaron could add that would be more straight forward and would add to the game. There are lots of considerations for handling retreats. If it is implemented, it would be nice to make in a game option rather than a fixed change to the game.

A retreat component is hoaky in my opinion.

Re: How is it possible to raid without retreat ability?
 

The whole retreat thing is very complicated. For example if a fleets retreats do they end up in the same sector or is the fleet disbanded?

Besides, isn't the simultaneos turns supposed to work so that if an attacker can catch the defending ship the attacker has to be faster or their paths has to cross so that the defender has to make a big turn to escape. In reality the attacker would get very close to the defender and that applies to both cases.

I don't think that adding retreat to SE4 is a good idea.