At the Game Options screen when you are making a game, (right there by Pirates-active/inactive)
add in an adjustable bar to increase/decrease the amount of neutral ships around planetary gravity wells.
Having more things to kill would make early game planets more of a barrier. At the same time it mixes up game strategy and encourages more early game capital ships as there is more XP to go around.
The default level would "normal", and this would have the regular planetary allocation of neutral units.
Gives players yet another control over game speed, as rushes are more viable with fewer ships to deal with, and become less viable with more ships clogging gravity wells.
I consider more ships clogging gravity wells as more "multiplayer noob friendly"
I'm sure there are those among the single player community who would enjoy having more neutral ships to blow up to feed their early capital ship spam as well.
Thoughts?
