[Q]

In a game like SE IV I am not concerned at all about realism. My only question is therefore what would it add to the game: It would make repair more difficult and that IMHO would not be good. Already now it's a good tactic not to destroy enemy ships but to cripple them. Or to gift/trade crippled ships. Your enemy will have to continue to pay maintenance for them and even for a human it's a pain to send a repair ship to the location of the damaged ship. The AI does not do it at all as far as I know. So again IMHO I would rather try to facilitate repair (see my Borg modification) than to make it more expensive.