How about we make fighters more powerful but have a lot less of them. And while we are at it up the crew/energy/hangar space requirements?
Fewer fighters would mean less micro management and better FPS
Say drop it down to six squads of six. Then increase the fighter damage 3X and increase the hangar block requirements 5X Then increase hangar block/engineer Energy requirements by 300%
A carrier should need to be big to get the destroyer/carrier designs/tactics to be more distinct.
It would be interesting to see fighters used earlier in the game, but with smaller hangars.
So an Titanium carrier could have one fighter per slot, Titanium two, etc... with an Avorion carrier up to six fighters per slot.
Hopefully scaling back the fighters this way would make it possible for pirates, or some other new factions to start using fighter carriers.
And to further specialize the destroyers/carriers have ship systems that buff the fighters, say more bays or more fighters per squad...