Thanks for the news! Good description and good campaign! 
These Oct heavy cruisers are a hard nut to crack, but anyway the outcome of this engagement was clear at once.
No signs from other Oct ships/fleets approaching the jump point, alarmed by your arrival?

May I ask you which graphical mod you are using (if you do)? the blue check boxes on the left options selection are a good sight help, imo.

No mods in use.  The Octs are higher tech than I thought at first.  The outcome of the battle was clear from the first, but in the end an easy win for the Empire.  Perhaps Admiral Paglinawan should have paid attention to all of those wrecked Bob warships on the jump point, tho. 

Stewards and Strategists

In the Federation’s early years, leadership had become more than a title; it was a test of vision, temperament, and the delicate balance between ambition and restraint. Aura Valance and Konrad Wilder had each shaped the state in distinct ways, their presidencies casting long, intertwined shadows throughout its recovery. To understand the Federation’s trajectory, one could not examine its eras in isolation; they were best read side by side, as contrasts in style, philosophy, and consequence.

Valance’s tenure began in crisis, a time when the remnants of Civilization teetered on the brink. Every decision carried the weight of survival, every vote in the House of Representatives a line drawn against entropy. She moved with urgency, unafraid to assert authority, leveraging both reputation and political capital to shepherd the Federation through its most perilous years. Forty-two motions passed under her guidance, seventeen were rejected; the numbers told one story, but the narrative of her leadership told another. It was a story of relentless intervention, of a leader willing to bear the burden of decisive action. Her crowning achievement, the rediscovery of Trans-Newtonian technology, was not only a scientific triumph but a symbol of her refusal to accept limitation. Under Valance, the Federation reclaimed lost knowledge, restored infrastructure, and rebuilt confidence in a state that had seemed irreparably fractured.

Yet her leadership was not without friction. Valance’s aggressive style, her insistence on driving the House and coalition along her chosen path, occasionally alienated moderates and provoked resistance among former allies. Her power depended on loyalty and the perception of necessity. Where she moved boldly, she sometimes left the House untested by compromise, leaving political muscles strong but unpractised in the subtler arts of governance once survival was no longer the only goal.

Wilder, by contrast, inherited a Federation that could breathe. He faced no immediate existential threat, no pressing collapse demanding unilateral action. His presidency was one of calculation, patience, and negotiation. He governed not by asserting authority, but by preserving the fragile coalitions that kept the House functioning. Where Valance had dominated, Wilder contained. His decisions emphasised incremental progress over dramatic leaps: conscription and research expansions, careful management of engineering companies, and a measured approach to the ruins’ extraordinary treasures. Even the discovery of the Jump Point Stabilization Module, potentially the Federation’s gateway to the stars, was handled with meticulous caution, reflecting both political foresight and strategic restraint. Wilder understood that even the promise of progress could fracture the fragile coalition, and he wielded compromise as deftly as Valance wielded power.

The contrast between the two leaders was perhaps most evident in their relationship to ambition itself. Valance acted first, reasoning later; she saw in every crisis an opportunity to expand the Federation’s reach, to reshape its trajectory, and to prove that survival demanded audacity. Wilder acted second, reasoning first; he saw in every discovery the potential for political fracture, and sought to transform opportunity into stable, manageable advancement. Valance’s bold moves built the foundation; Wilder’s cautious stewardship reinforced it, expanding infrastructure and scientific capacity while maintaining fragile political equilibrium.

Even in restraint, Wilder left his mark. Under his management, the Federation completed the systematic recovery of pre-Fall ruins, built industrial and research capacities at a scale Valance could only begin, and integrated discoveries into operational systems. His incremental victories, the passage of capacitor and engine power reforms, the careful allocation of laboratories, and the preservation of strategic assets testified to a philosophy that valued endurance over brilliance, coherence over charisma.

Viewed together, their presidencies formed a dialogue across time. Valance demonstrated what was possible when a leader refused to yield to caution; Wilder showed what could be achieved when audacity was tempered with strategy. One ran to the edge of history, daring the Federation to leap; the other built the bridge that made the leap sustainable. Neither was superior in isolation; both were necessary to the Federation’s survival and evolution.

Even as the Federation approached new elections, the legacies of both were clear. Valance’s era had instilled urgency, resilience, and the audacity to reclaim lost knowledge. Wilder’s era had codified discipline, political nuance, and the machinery to convert discoveries into sustainable advantage. Yet the shadow of Valance lingered. The coalition Wilder painstakingly maintained the compromises that had kept the Federation functional, through paralysis and factional brinkmanship had come at a cost. Opportunities seized in Valance’s era, bold, decisive, and transformative, had been catalogued and safeguarded, yet none were pushed to the brink of transformative action. In striving to balance ambition with survival, Wilder had inadvertently restrained the Federation’s momentum.

In quiet corridors and hushed cabinet rooms, whispers began to circulate. Valance, still unbowed and revered for her audacity and record of action, had not announced her retirement. Her base remembered her decisiveness, her ability to turn crisis into opportunity, and the fractures that had emerged under Wilder’s caution only strengthened their argument: the Federation, capable though it had become, yearned for leadership willing to take bold, unambiguous steps.

As the calendar ticked toward a new election cycle, the question lingered in every conversation, in every debate chamber, and the quiet calculations of House representatives: could the steady hand of stewardship endure, or would the call of decisive leadership, embodied in Aura Valance, once again reshape the destiny of the Federation? The answer came hours before the deadline to announce running for President of the Federation expired.

Members of the House of Representatives,

I stand before you today not as a figure of the past, but as a voice for our future. Years ago, when the Federation teetered on the brink of collapse, you entrusted me with the impossible: to rebuild what was lost, to reclaim the knowledge buried beneath centuries, and to forge a state capable of standing among the stars. Together, we did not simply survive; we rose.

But survival alone is not enough. In the years since I last held this office, we have seen the Federation grow stronger, its engines hum with renewed vigour, its laboratories light with discovery. Yet I ask you, has our ambition kept pace with our capabilities? Have we dared to leap as boldly as the challenges demand? Or have we grown comfortable in the safety of incremental steps, letting opportunity wait for the slow rhythm of compromise?

We must recognise the truth: this administration, under President Wilder, navigated the treacherous halls of factional politics with caution, patience, and skill. There is no denying the value of such stewardship; it preserved the state from collapse, stabilised our institutions, and allowed the machinery of governance to continue running even under paralysis. Yet, in preserving, they froze. The Federation’s greatest treasures, from the Jump Point Stabilization Module to the genetic laboratories, were catalogued and protected, but they were not seized and wielded to their fullest potential. The bold leaps our history demands were deferred in the name of compromise, leaving our momentum smouldering, restrained by fear of dissent.

I will not apologise for boldness. I will not apologise for the courage to act when others hesitate. The Federation is more than a network of factories and laboratories; it is the sum of our dreams, our audacity, our willingness to shape history rather than merely respond to it.

We have the knowledge, we have the resources, and we have the ingenuity. What we need now is the resolve to use them fully. I am ready to lead that charge once again, not to preserve, but to build; not to settle, but to reach; not to follow, but to define the path forward.

Let us embrace the challenges ahead. Let us reclaim the boldness that once defined us. Let us show the stars that the Federation does not wait for destiny; it makes destiny.

I am Aura Valance, and I am running for President of the Federation. Together, we will take the leap that our history demands.

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I'm enjoying your campaign, Steve.  I have a question, though.  In the strategic maps you posted, there are four systems with no jump links to any other systems.  What are those systems?

In the View Technology window, when missiles are shown, is it possible to add the information about retargeting capability?

A base station mounting some Maintenance Module, placed at a Deep Space Population, i.e. far away from a body, will it anyway operate as a maintenance point? E.g., will the module(s) be operative, or not?
And what about decoys? Can I transfer them to the base? and load them from the base into a ship?
I need some support bases scattered around, as the inhabited planets are becoming more and more distant from the outskirts.

Moreover, a ship/base with Maintenance Modules in orbit around a colony without population, can it support the ships also in orbit, having the necessary minerals at hand? These minerals must they be on the colony, or could they be also in a transport ship also in orbit, or in the cargo of the maint ship/base itself?