Instead of linking engine tuning to a time limit, have it trigger a higher failure rate for engines. If the failure rate of an engine was increased by a factor of 10 or 100, then there would be a serious trade off. If tuning was a flat speed boost, I am sure Steve can figure out what kind of increased failure rate for engines would be sufficient to prevent it from being abused. If the tuning level is variable, then it could be a scalar for the increase in the failure rate.
This means ships fleeing could escape but run the risk of engine failures and detonations if they run out of maintenance supplies..
It could of course also prevent weapon firing while active.
I agree with Steve and Father Tim 100% about the micromanagement hell that would arise if SFB-esque energy management were introduced in Aurora.
OTOH, I really like this (and Bughunter's) "engine tuners" idea as something to contemplate, where tuning leads to very high risk of engine breakdown (or explosion). A few observations:
1) It instantly brings to mind the scene from one of the Hornblower books (Hotspur perhaps), where
he's scouting for the Brest blockade force and a French frigate comes out and pursues him in a long stern chase in heavy weather. My recollection is that they both pile on too much sail for the weather until someone's mast breaks, which is analogous to an overstressed (from tuning) engine breaking down. From this point of view it's a really cool idea.
2) Steve is intimately familiar with the "engine-tuning-chase-leading-to-breakdown" scenario - there are a bunch of these in the Rigellian Diaries. So I think he'll have a good feeling for whether he thinks it's a positive or negative game mechanic.
3) One of the things I remember from the diaries is that both sides essentially
always tuned. IIRC this was because the pursuing force was usually a (bug) swarm, and the only bad thing that would happen was non-catastrophic, i.e. and engine breakdown. So this kind of takes away the ability to make choices - tuning is obviously superior over not tuning in the pursuit scenario. So if Steve did put this in, I would advocate having the breakdown penalty include a significant (e.g. 50% of the time) risk of explosion. That would make the decision a lot more stark, and add to fiction possibilities (especially if it were technobabbled that when tuning goes bad the engines run away and there's e.g. a 15 second window where the crew (not the player) can recognize this and try to shut tuning down with a 50/50 chance of explosion vs damage. Just enough time for the engineer to say "Captain, engines are destabilizing. Attempting to [BOOM]")
4) There are two scenarios: 1) small tactical advantage in combat, i.e. closing to beam range 2) long term running away (where you have to get all the way across the system to get to the warp point/out of sensor range). This means that for it to be a useful mechanic the failure rates would probably need to be fairly low; on a timescale of 1 week mean time to boom. OTOH, if you just need to stay out of beam range, or if you're just a little inside the enemy's sensor envelope they could be shorter. In other words, I'm not sure the coolness factor outweighs the coding work.
5) I would put the flag at the TG level, and I would have it increase the max possible speed. This is because some ships in the TG might be able to go faster, and should not be penalized as badly. In other words, it's only that slow BB (or whatever) that needs to tune to keep of with the rest of the TG while running away.
John