Previously: Science! Now it's about space stations 

Ring worlds and Dyson Spheres.

Space elevators, I can't image what practical in game use we can make for those. Once you have anti gravity on spaceships, elevators aren't very viable anymore. I did have an idea of Military bases allowing ground units to make a "Moon Shot" and jump to a neighboring moon. Not sure if thats very useful either.

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I was really trying to think of some kind o mechanic that makes taking territory worth something. Like you can militarily go into a city and somehow hold it for cash. Give military guys some kind of war game to play that isn't simply kill everything. I might make the Pirate factions do something like that. They walk into towns and hold them and extort some kind of tax on everyone. Perhaps make ruler elections run mainly on military power at the location. Just ideas.

Ohhh.... warp gates....

To be honest that is probably the only way to have any kind of meaningful commerce if the galaxy really starts to open up. Even fast scouts will take significant amounts of time flying around the corners of the galaxy.

You mentioned making orbital structures capturable. I'm assuming that Capture would be a new order type or a modifier to the Attack order. I suggest making ground units a requirement for capturing Orbital structures. And that only foot soldiers, like Infantry and Commandos should be good at it. (By the way, if your not already locked into by the art you have commissioned, may I recommend Combat Engineers and Cyber-Commandos instead of Commandos and Cyber-Assasins, given that that unit type specializes in attacking structures).

This might justify a new Marine unit. (For the benefit of anyone that doesn't already know this, prior to the twentieth century Marines were ship's soldiers whose primary mission was to fight and repel boarding actions. The emphasis changed to establishing beachheads during WWII, but the term marine would be acurately applied to soldiers specializing in EVA and corridor to corridor fighting).

The way I see it, you should be able to blow up or soften up a station with your fleet, but you'll need boots on the hull to capture it.

I'm thinking of some kind of "Capture Progress Bar" Almost like another Hit Point bar that if you deplete then you capture the installation. But that gets tricky with multiple players trying to capture. Perhaps you can attack "To Capture" just like you can attack "To Raid" and it puts your Corp damage against this Capture threshold. 5 corps can try to capture at once. Once the capture threshold is reached the Corp with the most "Capture Damage" takes the place. Attacking to Capture causes half damage....

That's getting convoluted, Scrap that idea...

To capture an installation you have to attack with "Capture Flag" which doesn't reduce any damage except maybe against the installation, and after you clear all enemies out then your attack on the installation becomes a capture that takes some time based on how much firepower you have against it and the size of the place....

Not sure about that either.....

Hmm so how about this Whatever units are set "To Capture" do not add anything to the combat itself, although they take damage, they are effective damage zero, there damage is instead applied to a capture threshold, which can be literally be another gauge of the units max hit points.. Once captured it changes sides immediately(?) I would go with that IF we made it so the amount of Capture damage you are doing is reduced by how healthy the installation is. If its 100% then you are 10% effective. if its at 20% hit points you are probably 90% effective with your capture damage. That makes it 10x harder to "Capture" a healthy station but viable to capture one that is almost destroyed, but you have to essentially attack all its hit points again. You can switch your orders on other units to "Capture" as it gets lower If you're going for a capture. You can also send in a huge fleet of commandos doing zero actual damage and try to Take a healthy installation but it would have to be quite large, take a while AND you're gonna get pounded by any other forces there the entire time. Once you actually take a installation like this, its probably badly damaged and any other corps in the fight can probably take it back from you pretty easy also.

Perhaps the units you are using to capture get "destroyed" to man the place. how many units you lose in this way determines how much Capture Damage is immediately replaced. If you capture with a single level 1 commando in the end. You will lose that commando but have only 100 Capture Damage left on the installation, someone else can take it from you easily until it "heals" . If you use a level 10 commando and take it. The Capture Damage will be restored by their hit points which is probably thousands. Ships can be used to capture but not actually take the place. If there are no commandos or infantry to "absorb" to man the station then you cant actually take it even though the Capture Damage is at zero,.

To avoid the "Take and Salvage immediately for 2 billion" problem, capturing an installation is not a permanent thing(?) . Its still owned by the original corporation and salvaging it will give them the money. Also, perhaps you cannot salvage the installation outright you literally have to salvage back all the levels to 0. That will take some time?

With some refinement I think this might work. Sounds fun fighting over a station which then goes to a capture war. =)

Yes to taking multiple turn to dismantle the station. Maybe even multiple turns for each level. I think that's a better solution than the old Corp retaining ownership, for the repair cost reason Vulpex mentions.