These are the biggest changes made by the mod, the things that are made to change gameplay the most.

Hyperdrives have a much larger 'Accuracy', or the distance from destination that they will drop out of Warp.  
    This is to ensure that long ranged weapons and fighters get a chance to actually be used with their intended range advantage, rather than every engagement starting at medium or short range.
    Now, ships will start quite a ways outside of weapon range.  Tactics and Fleet formations will matter more.  Engagements should be less 'messy' at long range.  
    

Hyperdrives have a much long charge time.  
    This is to reduce the occurance of engagements where a ship retreats in mere seconds.  Should result in small engagements being more lethal, with less 'slippery' ships jumping in and out of combat.
    This will also punish jumping into a location that you don't have eyes on, giving a use for scouting missions.  Ambushes and unexpected encounters will be more deadly, even before the advent of HyperDeny. (which comes later in the game, when Jump Initiation times are closer to Vanilla)


Expanded Hyperdrive tree.
    Many more techs for a PreWarp start to slowly work up to galaxy-level drives, rather than going from 10k speed to 200k speed then 400k speed, then stagnating.
    The Early and Mid and even Late game will see far more interesting Hyperdrive choices than in Vanilla.  
        In the Early game- Three levels per Drive rather than 2, 6 Drives instead of 4, each with their own strengths and weaknesses.
        In the Mid game- Three Universal Drive techs, and 2 new Racial techs, each with 3 levels.  
        In the Late game- 2 Universal techs and 3 total Racial techs, each with 3 or 4 levels.  Capped of with some Endgame goodies.

    Randomized techs enabled- If Random tech tree is selected, there is one Drive type always available to research, with the others having a chance of being available to you.  
        With 5 total randomized options in the Early game, each Empire will have a very different set of tools.
        Unlike Vanilla, where a line can end after its first entry, in this mod it's all or nothing.  You can either research the whole line, or none of it.  Hardcore variants will be created for those who like dead end play.


Research Thresholds are more varied and interactive than Vanilla.  These 'Gates' as I call them slot in with Faction preferences and use a cross-disciplinary approach.
    For example, to research Kaldos Hyperdrives, you require 20% Sensors Bonus.  To research the Mid Game group of Hyperdrives requires having other non-Hyperdrive techs, for example certain Reactors or Shields, in order to prevent tech-rushing a particular branch.
    These also function to make Empires more varied, even in non-randomized games.  You might want Equinox Drives, but if you find yourself with High-Tech and not Reactor Bonuses, you're going to have to take Calista-Dal or stick with Warp Bubble, gambling that you'll find what you want if you wait.


The Construction tech tree is streamlined.  (for now?)
    This does a few things- 
        It massively helps the Ai by force feeding it things it needs at a pace that won't overwhelm it.  
        In vanilla, every Empire ends up using the same 'Models' of ships anyway- ever seen an enemy 'Patrol'-type Cruiser?  How about an Escort that isn't 'Heavy'?  For each Ship Role, the Ai will only use the 'Model' with the largest 'Level' number.
            So, Heavy Escort, being 'Level 2' will be the only Escort used once it is researched.  Escort '0' and '1' will never be used- in fact because '1' and '2' are in the same tech, '1' CAN'T be used by the Ai!!!
            So, this mod strategically breaks up the introduction of these models, such that Escort 0 will be used for a while, then 1 and finally 2 near the end of the game.  
        Which leads in to the next change- instead of starting with Escort and working your way up the size chart one Role at a time, you start with Escort and Destroyer.  Allowing more interesting Designs and Tactics at the start of the game.  With larger, costlier Destroyers performing a flagship role.
        Which leads yet again into my ultimate plans for this part of the tree-  
            A much more in depth system where each Empire has a Naval Doctrine, which dictates the Hulls it gets, and how far into the tree it gets them.
            For example, Carrier Supremacy starts with... Carriers.  Whereas the Big Gun tree won't get them till much later.  Additionally, the Carrier Supremacy's Carriers would be larger than a Big Gun Carrier, while the Big Gun Battlehips would be bigger and better than Carrier Supremacy Battleships.
                But this feature is basically a whole mod in and of itself, and more importantly, requires a completely modified tech tree to build itself off of.  Hence it has to be the last part of the mod to be made.
                So for now, changes to Hulls will be limited to the Vanilla offerings, and adapating them to the component changes in the mod as they are made.

Various Component Size Rebalances.
    Working with the somewhat limited, eclectic and mysterious tools that we have, some workarounds have to be created to achieve my goals.  Additionally, Size is used as HP, so some components have adjusted Size for combat purposes. (Bridges are larger and therefore harder to destroy)
    Fuel is set to size 50.  This allows me to limit the number of Fuel Cells that can be put on a Hull by reducing the number of General Slots that are size 50.  This is the main workaround.  I can limit the number of x-type components, by making them a certain size, and limiting the number of slots that they can fit into.
    Reactors are set to a max size of 49.  Reactors are now large (slow down a ship more) and expensive.  Meaning it is a trade off to use components that use a lot of energy.  A less powerful component will use less energy.  Each Race will have it's set of preferred Weapons, Shields, Engines and such.  Races with more Energy-hungry component choices will have more slots available for Reactors.  However this will make their ships slower and more expensive.
        Some Races may even have limits as to what Reactors they can use, by having a smaller size than 49 for their allocated Reactor Slots.
    Certain specialized components will have much larger sizes, to limit their use to specialized Slots on specialized Hulls.


Energy Economy Rebalance-
    Static Energy is pretty much abolished.  Energy Collectors are sized too big to fit on ships- only Stations can fit them.  Energy usage will mostly consist of two things- Hyperdrives and Combat.  Combat usage massively increased- ships now have a much more limited amount of time in combat compared to Vanilla- especially after a long transit.  Camping an enemy colony with a Fleet will now require capture of a Caslon source nearby, or judicious use of Tankers.
        

Resource Economy Rebalance-
    Resource costs completely rebalanced.  Many more resources required for building- costs will 100% reflect the cost of the resources used to build them, without artificial padding. (currently a not-insignificant amount of cost is artificial through Hulls having a 'Cost' parameter)
        This requires increasing Minig Rate and Cargo Capacity, and lowering Caslon and luxury resource consumption.




















