My point is... Its doing exactly what I said we should avoid, smashing everything up, waiting for it to grow again then smashing everything up

Why cant we travel across galaxies now, was there some cataclysmic event that made it impossible with the tech we had been using and we haven't worked around? Why did we get reduced in size? Extra-universal or Extra dimensional invasion, or just word of god? Were the other galaxies also devastated, destroying our holdings or are they cut off (and as a result are the home worlds of any extra-galactic species destroyed?) How did we survive the destruction? Do we still retain knowledge of each others languages (Are we allowed to decide this?) What happened to Faust during this time, why did she allow such devastation to the universe, surely a being of peace and harmony would try to stop this, was she defeated by the threat?
Potentially this good be very good... But can we get some more exposition other than "You shrank, something happened, your fleets were destroyed"

Oh, and everyone should have to keep track of their world and ship count. The reason for this is so we can say no to unrealistic booms in size, and also when we have finite ships and resources, it adds more to the battles. Right now there's nothing to lose, if the Collective goes to end game and self destructs on of their planets, boo boo they had tonnes of others to go to. Now imagine the situation if they only had a handful of other planets. If we have to track them, we wont be able to reach several million planets.