Good article on "Aircraft Carriers in Space"

[McKitten]

The idea to take along a mobile base is pretty good. Since there's lots of resources in space and distances make transport expensive, it makes a lot of sense to manufacture supplies in the star system you're operating in if operations take any amount of time.
Still the same questions remain about this carrier as about any other carrier no matter the size of the carrier and the fighters: what exactly is being achieved by launching a swarm of smaller craft instead of simply putting the same (or rather: larger) armaments on the carrier itself. Or possibly just a handful of independent ships that are in size somewhere between the carrier and the fighters. (The one drawback to a single big ship is obviously that it can't be in two places at once)
When talking about space, there is a lot of intuitive notions we have to get rid of because space functions so very differently from anything on a planet. For example, small vehicles in space are not faster, rather, they're likely slower. Scouts make no sense at all in space, since there is nothing to obstruct line-of-sight that would require a scout to fly around, and for a scout to get the same effect as simply a twice as large sensor lens, it would have to be halfway to the target. All drives work essentially the same, so a small vehicle does not have appreciably more range than a missile. And that there's no friction might seem kind of mundane, but is probably the most important and weirdest difference off all, causing many things from "vehicles don't bank when turning" to "a vehicle that needs to return to it's carrier has only one quarter the range of a disposable one".

The only truly rational thing to do would be go back to the rates system. In the age of sail the functions, configuration and methods of combat of all major warships were basically the same, the difference was purely one of scale. The same thing is basically true of modern multipurpose missile ships, and would almost certainly be true of ships in space since all space is more or less the same. You don't even have differences brought on by shallow water. So whatever is the biggest and baddest ship around is a 1st rate, adjust the ratings downward as need be.

Sounds like a pretty good idea. Since space is the same everywhere, there's no real purpose for differentiated or specialized ships, so a simple rating based on size makes sense. I suppose something like planetary bombardment ships could make sense if normal ship weaponry isn't suited for that role, and it also happens rare enough that it's inefficient to put a couple of anti-planet weapons on all ships.

[Sea Skimmer]

If you needed really specialist ships, you'd just give them a specialist designation, such as the age of sail bomb ketch which mounted two or three heavy mortars for bombarding coastal towns and fortresses. Any designation system is going to have stuff like this. Its just the fleet tactical designations like destroyer and frigate that cause problems from lack of meaning.

[lPeregrine]

Indeed, in X Wing SOlo Command we see full-spectrum jamming being used against droid fighters to spectacular effect, athough since those were slaved to living wingmen it is likely that autonomous droid fighters woudl be less affected.

This probably has to do with bad memories of the clone wars, when you've just had a war against droid armies on that scale you're probably going to have a lot of people who insist that droid weapons be kept on a tight leash with deliberately crippled AI to ensure their destruction if control is lost. It's an irrational design choice in terms of effectiveness because of that jamming vulnerability, but an understandable one in that context. However, in another universe without that lingering paranoia jamming isn't really going to be an answer. Once you trust your automated weapons it should be fairly easy to give them combat AI capable of fighting without much loss of effectiveness.

The only real way around this is to come up with some kind of jamming that disrupts only high-level AI, but somehow doesn't disrupt the computer systems that a human-piloted fighter would require, and that's getting into "a wizard did it" level plausibility.

[Batman]

Wars arguably already is at 'a wizard did it' lack of plausability. The jamming routinely deployed not only affects communications but it does affect targeting for everybody involved, through shields that laugh at GT level weaponry, affecting visual sensors despite no visible effects, yet curiously doesn't do beans to any other shipboard systems the way an EMP would. (Ion weapons do, but they're apparently purpose built for that and at least so far seem to have been clearly visuably noticeable upon firing).
Wars jamming seems to be seriously selective about what it does and does not affect, and given the very paranoia you mentioned it's entirely possible some of it was specifically designed to interfere with droid level AI.

[Sea Skimmer]

EMP like effects can be isolated to only systems which have exposed unshielded antennas like sensors, and you can isolate the computers from the antennas, this is why EMP protection is possible and all. It is not in any way some magic force which must affect all systems equally, even when completely unshielded this is not the case. Which all means nothing anyway since EMP and deliberate jamming have about as much in common as crumpled ball of paper and a living tree.

[lPeregrine]

Wars jamming seems to be seriously selective about what it does and does not affect, and given the very paranoia you mentioned it's entirely possible some of it was specifically designed to interfere with droid level AI.

Except we see it NOT interfering with droid AI, since the droids in the back of the fighters seem to be operating just fine.

[Batman]

That is a depressingly correct observation.

[PainRack]

With regard to scouts, you could still need drones and the like to provide multiple sensors for effective triagulation. Especially if you're using visual sensors.

Of course, those scouts might also be your destroyers so.......