Server scaling and sector generation suggestions

[Spacefaring_Guy]

Server Scaling:

 

It occurs to me it might be useful to be able to assign portions of the galactic map to different servers - possibly with as simple an interface as a paint tool for admins.  Obviously servers would have to have an additional channel to communicate over, a common authentication account, and the ability to migrate sectors when an admin moves ownership - probably not particularly easy to add in.  However, since the game already loads sectors individually, it strikes me it's not on the 'nearly impossible' end of the difficulty spectrum.

 

Sector Generation:

 

I know Safe Zones were a topic for a while, and I think they could be expanded upon.  If Safe Zones were the core of a relatively strong power - big military base, several other types of stations, a bunch of frigates, that would lead to having nearby systems (with gate links, depending on the wealth of the empire) with complimentary types of stations.  At the outer edges of these empires, you'd get the pirate attacks and bounties paid at the core. 

 

Given thresholds for defining what makes an 'empire' (total size/power of bases in core sector, number of sectors controlled) this would give a metric for determining when a player had managed to establish an empire of their own - or destroyed someone else's.