In the real would they are already proven against large ships, with Millennium Challenge 2002 proving the theoretical effectiveness of mobile weapons systems, suicide skiffs, and ambush tactics against a carrier fleet resulting in 19 ships and 20000 sailors lost.
This is obviously just theory-crafting, but it appears to me in Star Citizen that the exploration breed of ships, specifically the military variations such as the Carrack and Terrapin will be key for both early warning and tracking enemy fleet movements. It will be key to intercept these stealth bombers before they can stage or get close enough to capital fleets to inflict either mobility kills, critical damage, or destruction of the capital ships.
In other words, the vast amount of fighting will be done by screening ships while the capital ships are saved for hard punches utilizing capital weapons. The Hammerhead would be a must in these kinds of warfare with it's array of turrets to be used as a picket ship against small fighters and it's hopefully effective CIWS ability to intercept enemy torpedo's. The Polaris is going to be extremely useful as a first on stand ship with it's ability to launch a fighter to preform scouting, identify enemy hard targets, and strike with the ability to GTFO before being immobilized.
This leaves the other two capital ships we have as Command and Control with direct fire weapons saved for mission critical strikes to break the back of enemy fleets and capital ships.
If things work out like this it will be rather fun as it supports a wide variety of play. And of course this is theory-crafting while I daydrink so it's 100% factually accurate and well researched. Definitely didn't pull this out of my ass.
So, let me first thank you for referencing a US Naval exercise to start your theorycrafting. Tying this very realistic game to a real exercise will keep us grounded, long as we don't stray too far from the real in our theories.
As far as I can see, the Bengal and other capital ships will be vulnerable to two things: 1) boarding actions, and 2) snubs. The frigates and other larger "small" ships, such as Reclaimers, Hammerheads, etc will be large enough to target with the capital ship main weapon systems, whatever form those take. I expect these big guns to be railgun turrets, torpedoes, and maybe a large keel-mounted beam weapon or something.
1) Boarding Action. Small transports will be too small for capitals to effectively target with slow, small-arc weapons such as main guns or torpedoes. CIWS on-board those transports will do for missile and snub defense as well, though they will need support to fight through a picket. I will reserve judgement on how a boarding action will be implemented, but getting a squad or three on-board a capital ship will be enough to render it useless, by killing subsystems, spacing decks, and killing crew. This kills the cap.
2) Snubs. Again, the capital ships have large, slow weapons designed for massive single hits on slow-moving targets. Snubs of any kind will be able to dodge and swarm over a capital ship, and with torpedoes, mines, bombs, and just damage over time, break through shields, destroy thrusters, and eventually scuttle the larger ship. THe only limitation I see a squadron of snubs running into is ammunition. They will have enough for a few salvoes of heavy torps/mines/whatever, and then they will be Winchester on ammo, limited to repeaters and lasers.
Both of these threats necessitate the need for pickets, like you said. Massing frigates with CIWS and anti-snub missiles in a bubble around the capital ships will negate both threats. Capital ship crews, therefore, will have to keep in mind two main phases of any fleet engagement.
Phase 1: Recon & Disruption. This phase will begin with deployment and end with the pickets of one or both fleets neutralized. Essential to success in this phase will be identifying the enemy fleet's ship composition and disposition, and effective targeting of supporting craft such as anti-snub frigates. The highest priority targets (HPTL, for those military nerds out there) will be 1) Hammerheads and other turret-heavy frigates, 2) bombers and interceptors, and 3) recon/stealth ships. Stripping these out will leave the capital ships vulnerable to heavy capital ship weapons, bombing runs, and boarding actions. During this phase, DO NOT commit any boarding parties before space superiority is achieved. Risking the lives of marines and vulnerable transports without the proper CAP escorts in place is unnecessary.
Phase 2: Exploitation and Destruction/Capture. This phase will begin once space superiority is achieved in the disruption zone between the fleets. This does not mean 100% of the enemy picket and recon forces are destroyed; superiority is achieved when the remaining enemy are unable to effectively disrupt bombing or boarding actions against the enemy capital ships. In my opinion, two of three options must be simultaneously deployed during this phase to effectively defeat the capital ship threat. 1) Capital weapon bombardment, 2) boarding actions, and/or 3) bomber attacks. Reason for this is that each of these require different threat responses. #1 requires the enemy capital ships to maneuver, spread out, and roll in order to present undamaged shields and hull throughout the bombardment. #2 requires enemy pickets to focus fire on multiple transports and their escorts. #3 requires CIWS and interceptor deployment. If the enemy must manage multiple threat responses, this will cause confusion and allow at least one tactic, if not all, to succeed. This phase ends when the enemy capital ships are either destroyed or captured, and the threat to friendly forces neutralized.
I agree that server-side limitations could play into this. I will not be discussing those, since firstly, we don't know exactly how that will play out, and secondly, we should set up battle drills that fight the enemy, not the server. Metagaming and exploitation of game restrictions is usually punished or patched, so we should look elsewhere for our theorycrafting. InfinityCircuit out.