How about the pilot that lost the Cap ship is the only one to suffer?
They can't fly another for 12-24 hrs, but the points are not subtracted from the side as a whole....?
Same thing... You do nothing to rid the enemy of flying heavy metal. Why have a cap system at all if you cant keep them out of somthing for a short time... Makes killing a cap ship worthless. Makes checking out the kill page to see when your team lost one useless. Makes bothering at all to risk a killing a DN worthless. Who cares if it accomplishes nothing? The only thing not having a penalty benefits are nutters. They just get to piss away as many big ships as they want.
How do you balance "making the kill worth something" against a "shin" situation?
The "per player" penalty, we can make as light / harsh as we want. Only balance is how long to lock them out before they decide they missed too much server after being evicted from their favorite ship...
The "per side" penalty, is where I draw the line. Why should I (casual player) be penalized from flying a I-CCZ or L-BCHT on a Thursday night because (insert nutter / day shift noob player name) got lucky, bought the I-BBZ (with all our build points), and lost it in battle against 2 human-piloted starbases being guarded by the K-B10K that morning?
If this was a "Free BCH" server like SGO7, I have no problem locking up a whole side's cap ship points, because everyone has access to certain "capital ships", ie, the BCHs.
But in a "pay for any capital" ship environment like AOTK, we need to ensure that there's always a fair amount of capital ship points available at all times so that everyone gets a chance and feels competitive.
How about instead of locking points down, throw an extended fleet-wide "disengagement penalty" on the cap ship points, ie, if I lose an 8 point BBZ in 24,7, for the next 12 hours, the kitties can only have 2 cap ship points total in 24,7 or any of the 6 hexes adjacent to it. (this allows the different shifts the opportunity to defend the area in the same day while still putting some hurt on the team for the loss...)