New Max ships Cap?

I doubt it will be changed, considering that's quite easy to mod as it is. People almost never get 16 capitalships as it is.

Unlikely.  The problem isn't your CPU or the game's engine, but the RAM limitation of a 32-bit application.  It's been stated definitively that Sins will not be going over to 64-bit, so bigger fleets are right out.

Maximum fleet size is pretty massive as-is, and if you're playing on "large" fleet settings your system is going to choke if there are more than 2 players who max it out.

I think he's talking about fleet command, not capital ship crews.  Yeah, 16 capital ship crews is really all you ever need.  Even with Mass Transcendance for Advent, there just isn't enough XP to go around for 16 capital ships.  Maybe if you never lose a single capital ship then you might build up enough XP, but if that's the case you've already got the game in the bag anyways, so why do you need more caps?

Non sense...

More capital ship on screen mean more GPU power needed... it become a RAM problem only if you increase the amount of type of capitalship...

Since people usually don't believe me, i will demonstrate it... below, a screenshot from my last model, a 50k poly starbase using 4 texture set and having the neutron star and rotating ( heavy on the particle side )...

Graphic card used is a low end nvidia 9600 GS 256 mb... now, the video link below show 125 starbase in a single gravity wheel... good for over 6.25 million poly on screen... and the iron engine seem to have no problem to render it in real time...

http://www.love-from-russia.be/g4_swarm-6.25_million_poly.avi

Memory problem will have appear if the 125 starbase was 125 different starbase, having their own mesh and texture set...

For now, the iron engine don't use all the power from the GPU but it will maybe change with rebellion since they move from shader 2.x to shader 3.x ... it will allow greatly improved fx effect ( shader ) at the cost of some GPU power...

That's an impressive model.

Can only agree since it is my model but it was not the point...

If a low end graphic card can show so much starbase on screen in the same time, without slowdown or memory problem... it mean that you can already have over 600 capitalship onscreen without problem...

Thoumsin,

Is this model apart of a mod your making?  Its a pretty nice model. reminds me of Bablon 5 ship styles.

I don't make mod ( unless micro-mod for testing a model count )... i am only a modeler...

Well, i have made some models for a B5 mod ( http://babylon5ins.blogspot.com/search/label/File%27o%27soft%27s%20B5%20Shipyard ) but this one is called g4 for Golan IV... it is a non canonical model for the Star War Universe...

Weapons count is somehow based on at least doubling the amount of weapons from the Golan III ( http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Golan_III_Space_Defense_NovaGun )... as for the shape, some fan will reconize the shape of the lucrehulk in the bridge command center, the shape of the force harvester in the two rotating ring, front gun is somehow based on the galaxy gun, front ring was loosly based on the haven class medical station, etc...

Model is not yet fully done ( buzy with particle and entity coding )... but once done, it will be included in 7DS and any star war mod who wish it can have it too...

Model was heavily optimized and use 66% less memory that a PSI starbase but UV optimization allow around 200% more detail that in the case of a PSI starbase ( can only see then when using the dev.exe for play and unlock the max zoom limit )...

Next model will have a bird or manta ray shape and will be used to show how to make animated model in sins via chained particle effect... goal is too show that the iron engine can make more that promoted by Stardock/Ironclad... that thing say to be impossible become possible if you think outside the box...

Send Dan that pic, he'll wet himself with glee.

Don't think so... today, a new life have appear in the Danman family... pic, model, mods will not be his focus point !!!

Alright, thanks for the info guys. I tried modding my ship count once, was going well, but over game time as the factions gained money and created growing fleets, the game started to loose its FPS...One by one... And it only seems to do so when there is quite a few ships moving around, even when not on screen.

Also Thoumsin, nice model. 

I am in full agreement with Thoumsin, the iron engine can use a lot major upgrades. For example, when it comes to back-face culling. Right now, with Sins every model is rendered onto the camera whether or not it is in camera. You can tell by this is when if you rotate to a side in which you look into the the galaxy you can see other planets and the buildings surrounding the planets even ones that are halfway across the systems. Also, if you look at a model, and the number of polygons being rendered, you can tell it is still rendering sides that you can't even see, right there you can reduce the memory usage and everything but like 25% bare minimal.

Also the destruction of particles (I might be wrong on this point), right now if you kill a fleet of ships the debris from the wreckage, doesn't go away. You have to wait for like 10-30 minutes for it to go away completely, if it ever does.

Texture mapping also could be streamlined. Instead of having 3 texture mapping for just 1 ship, why not improve the engine so that it can read in lighting baked, bump mapped texture. One texture, one ship. Just like how marriage should be (another topic altogether).