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Firstly, consider three 'classes' of ship: (1) Built and in service - all the ships in your fleets; (2) Designed but not built - ships on the drawing board, including those under construction; (3) Not yet designed - these exist only in your imagination, probably pending a tech advance(s).
Now, consider the automatic upgrades: (1) Instant upgrades (Drives and Fuel Cells) - these are applied instantly and automatically to all classes of ship, primarily to save the program the bookkeeping of remembering each ship's strategic speed and range independently; (2) Free upgrade (Armour) - this is applied to ships of classes 2 and 3, but not to those already built. Thus, gaining an armour tech does not require you manually to upgrade ships being built or on the drawing
board, but you will have to refit ships already in service; (3) Optional upgrades (Shields and Computers) - these are not applied to classes 1 or 2, but will be applied to any new designs you create after the advance is gained. Since these both have costs based on their level of sophistication relative to your level of advancement within the tech, the option exists to select older (and hence cheaper) versions when designing your ship.
Now, of these, only shields take up space, and, like any other system, the space taken by a shield reduces as your knowledge advances beyond its level. Therefore, if you have a design using (say) Class III Shield, and you then research Personal Shield, Warp Inderdictor, Gauss Cannon, Planetary Flux Shield, and Sub-Space Teleporter (as you might), you'll find, when redesigning or refitting this class of ship, that it has more space, because the Class III Shield has 'shrunk'.
However, this doesn't affect ships in service, in the build queue, or designs on the board - the new, smaller shield only gets fitted to new designs, and thereby to anything refitted to that design. Thus, ships built to an older design don't gain any free space from subsequent advances, but new designs do.
Both shields and computers (as well as all weapons and optional systems)have costs, which reduce as your advances cumulate. The costs of weapons are simple - each gun costs X, so 10 guns cost 10 * X. When the cost has come down to Y, those 10 guns will cost 10 * Y. Optional systems, shields, and computers have their costs based on the hull size they're being fitted to. But the costs still reduce at much the same rate. So if you have a ship designed with Computer C, Shield S, Weapon W, and Optional System O, it will cost its hull-size cost plus C+S+W+O. If you put one in the build queue, that cost is now fixed for the ship under construction. If you then research one tech level beyond each of the components, the cost to build another of these ships will be reduced to the hull-size cost plus (75% of C)+(75% of W)+(75% of O)+(75% of S).
You can add this ship to the build queue at the reduced cost, but if the previous one isn't completed yet, it will still have its original cost. So, both old and new ship designs do benefit from cost reduction due to advancement, but ships already built or building do not.
Now, consider the automatic upgrades: (1) Instant upgrades (Drives and Fuel Cells) - these are applied instantly and automatically to all classes of ship, primarily to save the program the bookkeeping of remembering each ship's strategic speed and range independently; (2) Free upgrade (Armour) - this is applied to ships of classes 2 and 3, but not to those already built. Thus, gaining an armour tech does not require you manually to upgrade ships being built or on the drawing
board, but you will have to refit ships already in service; (3) Optional upgrades (Shields and Computers) - these are not applied to classes 1 or 2, but will be applied to any new designs you create after the advance is gained. Since these both have costs based on their level of sophistication relative to your level of advancement within the tech, the option exists to select older (and hence cheaper) versions when designing your ship.
Now, of these, only shields take up space, and, like any other system, the space taken by a shield reduces as your knowledge advances beyond its level. Therefore, if you have a design using (say) Class III Shield, and you then research Personal Shield, Warp Inderdictor, Gauss Cannon, Planetary Flux Shield, and Sub-Space Teleporter (as you might), you'll find, when redesigning or refitting this class of ship, that it has more space, because the Class III Shield has 'shrunk'.
However, this doesn't affect ships in service, in the build queue, or designs on the board - the new, smaller shield only gets fitted to new designs, and thereby to anything refitted to that design. Thus, ships built to an older design don't gain any free space from subsequent advances, but new designs do.
Both shields and computers (as well as all weapons and optional systems)have costs, which reduce as your advances cumulate. The costs of weapons are simple - each gun costs X, so 10 guns cost 10 * X. When the cost has come down to Y, those 10 guns will cost 10 * Y. Optional systems, shields, and computers have their costs based on the hull size they're being fitted to. But the costs still reduce at much the same rate. So if you have a ship designed with Computer C, Shield S, Weapon W, and Optional System O, it will cost its hull-size cost plus C+S+W+O. If you put one in the build queue, that cost is now fixed for the ship under construction. If you then research one tech level beyond each of the components, the cost to build another of these ships will be reduced to the hull-size cost plus (75% of C)+(75% of W)+(75% of O)+(75% of S).
You can add this ship to the build queue at the reduced cost, but if the previous one isn't completed yet, it will still have its original cost. So, both old and new ship designs do benefit from cost reduction due to advancement, but ships already built or building do not.
you hadn't had the right anti-tech. That was a thing far more balanced in part 1. Tech - Anti-tech. OK, except the combo High-energy-focus/Repulsor-beam. The AI seems never be using it
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