Since letting this lay fallow there have been two main ideas I've had about how to make this system work. 

1) Action Points and Phases
Instead of having set phases of movement, combat, etc.  each phase will be one boat performing all of it's actions.  The two exceptions to this (as of now) would be defensive fire against enemy torpedoes during that enemy's phase and damage control attempts at the end of the round.  Also as a way of limiting what a crew can do each boat is assigned a number of Action Points.  They use these to attempt to move to a different area (see below about areas), fire a weapon offensively, use sensors to develop a firing solution against one target or perform other actions during their phase.  So the advantage of going first would be the ability to damage or destroy an enemy boat and/or its systems before it can respond.  The disadvantage would be having to make the call on how man APs to reserve for defensive fire/damage control and the chance of not having enough APs or in losing APs held in reserve, but not used at the end of the turn.

2) Cat in the box
The one thing that's really been giving me a headache is how to maintain the uncertainty  of where the enemy is without resorting to a double blind game or having the system be so complex that it spawns its own headaches.  The idea that I've come up with are what I'm calling "Heisenberg Areas".  In short the enemy can be made uncertain about your exact location if you're not sure yourself.  What I'm doing is ditching my beloved hexes for an area movement system.  The knowledge you (and your enemy) not have is what general area you are in and what other areas you have the potential to move into.  They way I'd see this working for movement is you spend an Action Point and then you roll a d10 add your Drive system rating and if you have a 10 or more you move into the new area.  If not then you can spend another AP and try again, adding your accumulated total, or abandon the move if you're out of APs. 

That's where I'm at right now.  Just trying to distill my thoughts into something that can be used to run a scenario and see how it all hangs together.

It's working out ok so far.  Although I've only used it in 3 battles.  I'm using it in a setting where the Soviets and Americans did more space exploration and the Soviet Union still survives.  I'm using Iron Stars as a base with missiles and anti missile defense.  Largest battles has had 3 frigates in the screen and a cruiser in the battle area on each side.  I've played through it twice.  So far I'm happy with it, but I'm thinking that maybe the Area Movement would be better if it became a grid with a Left, Right and Center for each Area.  Right now it's very easy for the entire task force to pick out one ship to hammer on.  Although the Grid idea would probably only work for larger battles.  More ruminating required.

Sill me, I was thinking it would be a chi chi.  And who needs a chichi frufru kind of ACW game anyway?  And what the heck are Gauss cannons doing in a civil war game anyway?

Looks like good news to me.  Dug around on the Star Fleet message boards and looks like this is still kind of early going.  Klingon Armada followed by Romulan Armada and then who knows?  ADB controls the setting and MJ12 the mechanics side for this version.  I'm thrilled.  Got into Fed Commander when it first came out, but I just never fell in love with the system.  I like it better than SFB, but the reason I played SFB and FC was the universe.  Was hoping someone would do a nice conversion of that background to Starmada and now looks like I get my wish.  Can't wait.  I've always liked Starmada and it keeps getting better with each incarnation.  I predict this is going to be a wedding that causes many starship combat gamers to cry for joy.

I'm not sure.  I'm just using whatever counters are at hand.  I even had some time at work and used coke bottle tops :roll: . 

The funny thing is I just realized that I was looking at this from expectations of how the rules would work versus any issue of game balance.  I'd say table it for now until more games are under our belts. 

Although another solution might be an option for Countermeasures that works against fighters/strikers/seekers instead of ships.  Close In Defense System (CIDS)?

I've always wanted to see this kind of setting.  And when I heard about Admiralty Edition and the new vector movement it brought it all to the forefront.  And when I got a chance to read the rules all I could think was "HECK YEAH".  The fighter/striker/seeker rules just rock.  That's the kind of customization for those systems I've always wanted.

Coolness... Christmas comes early.   

Just sort of thinking out loud, so to speak.  The Launch Maximum is how many torps you could launch in a turn.  And launch tubes would raise that number.  Shouldn't there be a "negative launch tubes"?  I'm having a block on a good name for it.  Something like "Inefficient Launch Deck"?  Perhaps it would limit launches to the recovery maximum.  And would obviously not be available to Hull Size 1-3 ships.

I've already given up the idea of clockfaces for firing arcs.  Still I find the current arrangement kind of clunky.  Also having the the arcs listed left to right, top to bottom is counterintuitive for me.  I would expect them to rotate clockwise.  I'm sure time will take care of that, but for now it's annoying.