There's gotta be a thread on this somewhere...

[Condottiere]

The capacitors degrade if they hold a charge too long.

Otherwise, they could be precharged and you can jump whenever you feel like it, not that i would advise it in close proximity to a gravity well.

 

[mike wightman]

The capacitors degrade if they hold a charge too long.

Interesting conjecture but not in the rules as written

Otherwise, they could be precharged and you can jump whenever you feel like it, not that i would advise it in close proximity to a gravity well.

The rules preclude this - it states that you can charge the capacitors from a black globe but you can only jump if you have the jump fuel to do so...

If a ship absorbs enough energy to make a jump, and is supplied with sufficient
fuel, it may jump at the end of the turn.

Another potential use of the capacitors is pre-combat charging of them and using this energy during combat to power screens and weapons, thus having more energy available for agility.

Which reminds me...

 

[mike wightman]

The High Guard 80 rules allow for EPs to be transferred from the capacitors:

Stored energy may be removed from the capacitors by using it to power the ship. Energy may only leave the ship, however, when the black globe is off (or during the off intervals of its flicker). During a turn, a ship may dispose of its energy from its capacitors equal to the number of points generated by its power plant, minus 10% for every 10% of flicker rate of the black globe screen. For example, if a ship's black globe screen is operating at 60% and its power plant has an output of 1000 EP, 400 EP may be removed from the ship's capacitors that turn.

This strongly suggests that EPs are transferrable through ship systems.

Shame the EP system is a bookkeeping nightmare in actual play... (has anyone actually tried a combat between fleets whose ships have black globe? It bogs down really quickly due to having to check how many EPs weapon batteries inflict etc, a crib sheet mitigates this but it is almost like an additional game in itself)