I have been reading the "Fantasy Mod" with keen interest. I like the idea of a total redo of SEIV as a new game. It got me to thinking about doing SEIV up as a Roman era style empire game. I would never do this, it would take too much work, but it's fun to think about. Let's call this a mental exercise into what kind of things could be done.
Planets would become cities, systems would become nations or "regions".
Ships as they exsist now I am thinking would become some kind of army unit. Call it a company, or whatever. Components in each ship would be smaller sub units of specific type, or perhaps individual men. Your commanding officer would be the bridge component. As components are destroyed that decreases the effectiveness of your ship/army unit.
Fighters/sats and mines I am thinking would have no place in this mod. Weapons platforms would do nicely as defensive armaments for cities. Troops could be used for taking and defending cities.
The thing I can't see doing at all is any sort of naval combat. But I guess that wasn't a huge part of combat in those days anyway. To do Naval combat you'd have to have a diffent kind of "ship" and someway to restrict it to only water sectors, and someway to keep the land units off the water sectors. I don't see any way to do that in SEIV.
So anyone care to contribute? All I need is ideas. Since this mod will never get done you don't actually have to do any work.
Geoschmo