With the wonders of warping technology, some kind of travel log may be useful in order to understand how the fleets did move.

I was thinking that it would be interesting to create a sort of third party to spice the game a little more.

Could we imagine creating the possibility of joining the earth cult? it could work like a secret society that grants you advantages and disadvantages (under the form of warp/clover bonuses, or secret places you can hide in even when the game is not in the "rebel mode") Members could know each of the other members of the Earth Cult and play against their side...

Or the Earth Church is an independant, non playable entity, but that affects somehow the course of events and make them less predictable?

Why don't give a bonus (skill in fight, money, more experience or something else) related to the number of place occupied by our side ?

Strategically it could push people to do small fleets or do not allow staying large fleets in one place.

And it could give an occupancy level of the Galaxy.

Sounds interesting, but In this case I don't know how to manage bonuses: they appear on empty squares (if they appear on non-empty square that would be less funny); so if there's no more empty squares...

EDIT: I cut/paste my previous comment concerning the Earth church suggestion in order to make a separated topic for Iserlohn/Fezzan:

Earth cult: I like the idea of joining Earth church when you're already member of FPA or GE.
But as you said, it should have disadvantages too... we have to think more about it.