Stochastic fibre networks are typical microstructures of biological matter. In soft biological tissues, they are found at several length scales, from the cytoskeleton of individual cells to various networks of fibre-forming collagens. The topological analysis of such networks often reveals that they are sub-isostatic and sparse [1]. Also typical for this sparsity in biological fibre networks is some apparent 'excess' in fibre material, in the sense that fibres do not percolate geometrically through connections to next-neighbour cross-links but span longer distances, so that fibres can intersect without interacting. The relations between deformation behaviour and structure have long been studied, see e.g. Ch.6 in [1]. Recently, also fracture related properties were analysed for sub-isostatic networks stabilized with bending stiff fibres and weld-like cross-links, e.g. [2], but also for floppy central-force networks [3]. In the present study, we consider the latter type and analyse how a change in structure from near-neighbour to sparse, distant-neighbour connections affects the elastic and damage behaviour of the networks. Starting from cellular Voronoi networks, the latter are successively modified by replacing fibre connections with longer ones, thus generating increasing amounts of excess length. Kinematic boundary conditions representing homogeneous macroscopic deformations are imposed onto representative network domains. The resulting fibre deformations are computed by energy minimization employing methods from molecular dynamics [4], and homogenized measures of energy and stress are calculated. The study of elastic fibre networks reveals the effect of the network structure on non-affinity, non-linearity and stiffness. The analysis of networks with brittle fibres sheds light on the damage and fracture characteristics, such as strength and toughness. In addition to providing scaling relations between structural and mechanical quantities for floppy central force networks, the results of this contribution may help to understand the particular function-structure relationship of fibre network architectures found in biological matter. REFERENCES [1] Picu C.R. Network Materials – Structure and Properties, Cambridge University Press, 2022 [2] Deogekar S., Picu C.R. J. Mech. Phys. Solids Vol. 116, 1-16, 2018 [3] Tauber J., et al. J. Chem. Phys. 156, 160901, 2022 [4] Jakob R., et al. Biomech. Model. Mechanobiol. 23, 941-957, 2024