It turns out that my laser-armed warships burn through maintenance supplies as fast as missile-armed warships would burn through missiles. If my ships fight a battle between an equal number of the enemy, they emerge with maybe half their maintenance supplies left from full. Heaven forbid they should engage larger numbers!
I need to design a maintenance resupply ship that my fleet can retreat to, to fill up before going back into the fray. However, it is not clear to me what those ships need to do this job. Do I need to add 200 Large Maintenance Storage Bays, or will a pair of Standard Cargo Holds do? I expect a Cargo Shuttle Bay is obligatory (more than one?). Is there anything else I need to add or perhaps flag so that my ships will be able to fetch maintenance supplies off this ship?