This gives me a cool idea, but it would have to be hardcoded, and likely a pain to implement.
You meet this ancient race. They explored the galaxy and retired to their homeworld millenia ago. They are happy to share the information they found.
But their map is also millenia out of date. Warplines have closed, stars have gone nova, other races have stripped worlds and destroyed systems in genocidal wars before going extinct.
You don't get the "true" map info until you actually go there to verify it. For a really ambitious implementation, add a switch in game set-up for how much of the ancient map is wrong.
Another possibility would be finding an old map in ruins somewhere.
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Cap'n Q
[This message has been edited by capnq (edited 28 April 2001).]