A picture is worth a thousand words ... Instead of jumping from one battle to the next without have the "big picture", I think we need a new UI that allows the player to basically have the big picture and jump in when they want.
Advantages ...
(1) Can review each sector that has a battle.
(2) Command TF from this panel (give orders).
(3) Slowly advance each round step-by-step and jump in the battle when needed.
The image below was created by taking screenshots of various UI's and pasting them into the new Diplomacy Report screen. I figured this might be a cool idea and simple to build since it doesn't use any new assets ...
Now ... I want to explain how it could work ... (reference the image)
In the upper right you have the galactic view where (in this case) the blue squares show battle sectors. Clicking on that sector will show the small radar view (upper left) with your fleets in that sector on the bottom left. The galactic view could also show all your fleets which you could direct to a sector if they are adjacent to the battle sector. Image your fleet exiting your system when an enemy fleet arrives in that system. You could re-order your fleet back into the system with a few clicks and advance the round a few times then jump in when the shooting starts.
At this point you can give orders to your fleets, such as Attack, Hold, Move, etc. You could even change their original orders as the battle develops. Don't you hate it when you have large fleets? Well, I hope this idea makes it less pain full and minimizes all the clicking.
On the top bar, you can advance the rounds at your leisure (even pause but I couldn't find that image!). I didn't add a Comm Button but that would allow you to jump around into the battles like it does now.
Again, this whole idea gives the big picture whereas currently we just have tunnel vision and sector numbers to jump around and it's quite frustrating, IMO.
Thoughts comments, speak up!
Rob
(it takes me a moment to get my bearings!)
