I support the "environmental hazard" system effects.
Maybe an algorithm could be devised, maybe you can just cheat it and say "every 5 seconds deals X damage to a ship" .
But I think the key would be to have stars have more impact then just colony costs, but to actually emit EM/thermal signals. So around larger stars sensors become harder to use. I don't think "ghost ships" are the way to go, but I do like the idea of it cancelling out lower thermal/EM signals.
So if you have a "stealth" ship orbiting a sun, it should be impossible to detect while it's thermal sig is < the thermal sig of the sun. This would need to be balanced by having damage delt when in close proximity.
So normal stars would emit thermal, Quasars could emit EM/thermal, while black holes would kill all sensors, even active ones.
