If you are going to base the score on real estate controlled, do you think it would be better to add up the total number of facilities on all planets and use that number instead of just the number of systems and or planets?
One correction. I really meant that the firepower would replace the component of the score which is currently based on just ship/base count. I don't know why y'all can't read my mind.
Really, the point I want folks to think about is how much more powerful your empire is in reality vs. what the score indicates when you have tons and tons of units which aren't affecting the score.
Regarding mothballing... certainly *most* folks mothball stuff when they are running low on resources. But sometimes, I'll mothball ships just so I can get 100k to 150k extra resources coming in to rebuild my reserves before retrofitting a bunch of ships. Another tactic to use is to build so many ships that you can afford to maintain ALL your ships but do no construction of new facilities or new ships. Or, you can mothball one-third to one half your fleet *AND* build facilities on various planets. Then, when you go to war, you just put all those queues on hold, unmothball your ships and go to war. Alternatively, you could only unmothball the ships closest to whichever front you are fighting on at one time.