The new ability to stabilize Lagrange points for large bodies is great. I love making shortcuts throughout all of my systems to improve the operational efficiency of my freighters, colonizers, and tankers, and of civilian shipping.
But, since LPs move along with the orbit of the associated body, an LP hop that shortens a given route today might actually lengthen that route at some point in the future.
The shorter the orbital period of the LPs, and of the solar body that is the final destination, the more frequently a given LP hop will alternate between being a shortcut and being a...longcut.
Which means I have to constantly update my order templates and the cycling paths of my fleets to use LPs appropriately.
Can we instead let fleets use LPs dynamically?
In this mode, LP shortcuts are not added to the ships order list as we give the fleet orders.
Instead, every time a ship begins to move towards the next order location, it first checks if a shorter route is available via LP hops.
If so, it makes use of that hop (or hops) and inserts the order(s) for the shorter route at the top of the order list, so we can tell why the fleet is moving that way.
In this mode, the "All Orders Distance" displayed at the top of the fleet window should account for all anticipated LPs along the path.
Therefore the distance displayed would be an estimate. Optimal LP shortcuts may change while the fleet is in transit; the estimated distance would change to reflect that.
To save processing, perhaps a fleet checks its remaining path only whenever it begins moving towards a new location (instead of checking every sub-pulse).
The order list could indicate any orders for which an LP shortcut is anticipated, and perhaps also the distance saved. For example:
Earth: Move to Location (-1.1 b km via jump LP1-LP2)
We probably want to preserve the per-fleet option to not automatically use LPs, for those rare cases when traveling the longer route is needed.