Dear Amplitude,

I am a big fan especially of Endless Space.
I played Endless space 2 for a couple of hours now. It looks great and plays ok.
However there are some features severely missing in Endless space 2, design features that made Endless space 1 stand out: Customizability, relating to ship design, faction design and combat.

Ship design:
In Endless space 1, I had a lot of freedom to load up my space ships the way I wanted. I could go for 'kamikaze' ships fully loaded with weapons, or full defensive ships or a mix.
However in Endless space 2 I noticed that you have fixed amount of slots for weapons, defense, etc.
Which limits the freedom I have to design my ships.
As a game designer you have to make choices, but why limit one of the best features that Endless space 1 had to offer, namely 'free' ship customization?

Alternatively I would like to have maybe the same slot system you currently have in Endless space 2, but no restriction regarding what you want to put in that slot.

Combat:
Endless space 1 had a card system, some hated it, some loved. I liked it because it offered me some control over fleet (more than the usual turn-based game like Civilization), but on the other hand didn't force me to do some serious micro like any other RTS game.
Since you had three types of weapons: long-medium-short. You could throw a card for each phase.
If you would observe the battle, you can change your cards, for example to 'retreat' if you were losing.
This kind of control is currently missing in Endless space 2. There is a card system, but it's for the entire combat phase. So there's no way you can pull your ships out, if the battle goes to sh*t. It's almost as automated as a Civ battle.

Alternatively for the combat phase I would like to have my control back during combat. So at least the old card system of Endless space 1 or better. And with better I mean more intervals I can control my fleet. However I think three intervals are enough. Ideally I could change cards also during auto-resolve, during each phase. So you would auto-resolve: long-range. Check results, maybe change cards. auto-resolve: medium. Check results, maybe changes cards, and so on.

Faction/race design (speculation):
This is not implemented yet, but I can already predict what's coming: You're going to restrict customizability of faction building.
In Endless space 1 you could build any kind of faction with the traits you offered the user, as long as you stayed beneath a certain amount of points.
I predict that you're planning to restrict this freedom in the future, by enforcing a maximum amount of traits. Just like you did in Endless Legend.

I think that's a bad idea. The freedom you offered for Endless space 1, is where a lot of the fun is. I spent hours of building, testing new factions. Mixing and matching, inspecting other people's factions. In order to come up with my ultimate faction with 20-30 traits.
If you're going to restrict this, you eliminating a lot of creativity and variety that can come out of Endless Space 2.

So there are some core features missing regarding customizability in Endless Space 2. In my opinion those features made Endless space 1 a great game. I think most of the old online multiplayer Endless Space 1 community might feel the same about this, or it could just be me.

It'll be very easy to mod out some of these restrictions, I imagine.

I strongly disagree. I like that they force a degree of limitations on ship hulls, it actually gives you a reason to choose one hull over the other. As a player you want to have more freedom, but you should also be willing to accept that sometimes that freedom has to be restricted in the name of balance.

Regarding hull, Endless space 1 had no limitations, you could fill your ships how you want. I played many (thousands) hours in Endless space 1, online vs others. Depending on the situation, you want to make 'Kazimkaze' ships fully loaded with weapons to thin out a huge enemy fleet. And then follow it up with an sustainable balanced fleet governed by a hero, before you go in.

These tactis are currently wiped clean. I think this is a severe downgrade from ship design from Endless space 1 to Endless Space 2.

Again, I think this change is more than reasonable. I don't mind a 4X game focusing on empire management over combat management; that's kind of the entire point of the genre.

I have played many 4x games. And this combat management system is what set Endless space 1 apart from other 4x games. To have some more control over combat, but not too much.

This was perfect, but now they're going mainstream just like the rest.

If you're not confident you can win, and you can't afford to lose that fleet, then retreat; if you want to let the battle play out, you have to accept that risk. This one's on you.

There is a difference between thinking, making decisions beforehand and making decisions while your doing it. Sometimes you will need to test/experiment, go in. This kind of experimentation is now lost.

I have played many different 4x games and a lot of features that made Endless space 1 stand out form the rest are being removed. 

Combat:
Endless space 1 had a card system, some hated it, some loved. I liked it because it offered me some control over fleet (more than the usual turn-based game like Civilization), but on the other hand didn't force me to do some serious micro like any other RTS game.
Since you had three types of weapons: long-medium-short. You could throw a card for each phase.
If you would observe the battle, you can change your cards, for example to 'retreat' if you were losing.
This kind of control is currently missing in Endless space 2. There is a card system, but it's for the entire combat phase. So there's no way you can pull your ships out, if the battle goes to sh*t. It's almost as automated as a Civ battle.

Alternatively for the combat phase I would like to have my control back during combat. So at least the old card system of Endless space 1 or better. And with better I mean more intervals I can control my fleet. However I think three intervals are enough. Ideally I could change cards also during auto-resolve, during each phase. So you would auto-resolve: long-range. Check results, maybe change cards. auto-resolve: medium. Check results, maybe changes cards, and so on.

I agree 100% on this point. The combat looks good tho i feel I have no influence on it.