August 4, 2163, Rift System
The salvage effort of the destroyed Rifter and Terran ships is complete.  A total of 116 Rifter systems of various types were recovered, along with over a hundred Terran systems from the destroyed bases.  In addition, 27,000 tons of TN resources were recovered, including 5,500 tons of precious gallicite.  The salvage ships set out for Terra. 

August 24, 2163, 86 Cygni (Bob controlled Space)
Terran sensor buoys detect a barrage of nuclear explosions on the jump point to the Oct controlled system of HIP 84051, and then a new wreck appeared on the jump point. 

September 19, 2163, Terra
The fast salvage ships deliver their load of components and raw materials to Terra on this date.  The components are studied carefully, but none contain advanced tech, and although that is disappointing to the scientists and engineers on the examination teams, it is a relief to the naval high command.  The Rifters have so far not demonstrated any tech in advance of the current Imperial standard. 

 November 27, 2163, Sol
The last four warships scheduled to be refitted with the new solid-core anti-matter drives go into the yards.  The commercial yards are still working on the support fleet, in particular the troop transport squadrons, but the fleet is now in the final phase of the refitting program.  However, the Io labs recently finished development work on a new generation of laser weaponry, with upgraded capacitors.  Negotiations begin on targeted refits to upgrade some capital ships to the new standard before the fleet departs to Oct space. 

December 15, 2163, Mu Puppis, Bob Territories
Sensors left in the Bob home system of Mu Puppis detected a flurry of explosions in the outer system and the appearance of a wreck at the explosion’s location, in spite of the fact that there had been no ships on their screens before this. This information was relayed back the forward base at Upsilon Puppis, and then back to the Empire. 

The navy wasn’t ready to mount the planned Oct Pacification Campaign yet, but a squadron of newly refitted battlecruisers and carriers, supported by destroyers, was dispatched to bolster the forward base’s defenses. 

January 29, 2164, Sol System
The Empire calls a halt to the refitting program for the commercial fleet.  Stocks of gallicite are dangerously low, and stockpiles across the empire have been emptied to fuel the refit of the fleet and its support units.  Until those stockpiles can be replenished, no further refits will be authorized.  Similarly, plans to expand the fleet will have to be put on hold, at least for now. 

February 21, 2164, Sol System
Troop Transports begin loading Imperial Guard troops for transport to the forward base in Upsilon Puppis.  The first wave will consist of two corps of Imperial Guard troops, and the newly constructed 1st Super Heavy Armor Division. 

September 22, 2164, V577 Monoceri System, Shield Forward Base
At 0600 hours Shield Base Naval Operations Center received a distress call from a small civilian freighter crossing the Sigma Cephei system.  Sigma Cephei was an uninteresting system three jumps from Shield Base, on the route between Shield and the new colony in the Omega Pegasi system.  Sigma Cephei had no Terran naval presence, which meant that the small freighter was likely doomed. 

During the major refit and build up to the offensive against the Oct’s beyond Bob space, Shield Base’s squadron had been reduced, but as the attacker was likely a small group of raiders, Captain Feng wasn’t too worried.  He dispatched a strike carrier, jump cruiser, and a destroyer to investigate and hunt down any remaining raiders. 

The three Terran ships arrived in Sigma Cephei on the 27th.  During their voyage to the system the raiders had hunted down and destroyed a second small freighter.  The squadron immediately set out for the location of the wrecks. 

Just over nine hours later, as they were about half way to the wrecks, a third small freighter reported that it was under attack in-system of the previous attacks.  The Terran squadron was fifteen hours away.  It took the raiders forty-five seconds to destroy the freighter, after which they hunted down the life pods. 

At 0734 on the 28th the Terran Squadron picked up a Raider ship on their sensors.  It was immediately identified as a salvage class ship, and was at the location of the first ship to be destroyed.  Captain Feng ordered the Phobos to launch her fighters to run down the salvage ship while the squadron continued on towards the last known location of the Raider attack ship(s). 

When the fighter squadron reached its own sensor range of the salvage ship it detected two Raider class ships, and two light raiders, escorting the salvage ship.  The fighters continued closing.   

The raiders waited to the last minute to begin running, but it was far too late.  One light raider pulled away from the other four ships at full speed, while the other three armed-raiders limited their speed to that of the salvage ship they were escorting.  The fighters launched a salvo of Sparrow III ASM(L)’s at the three warships in close proximity to the salvage ship.  These were the Empire’s latest missiles, an improvement over the Sparrow IIb’s that had been used in previous engagements.  The Sparrow III’s were 10,000 km/s faster, at 52,800 km/s, had more range, and were equipped with the Empire’s latest development, laser warheads.  Eighty-eight ASM(L)’s roared away from the fighters, divided between the three warships. 

All three warships took multiple penetrating hits, and one was reduced to drifting.  Their missiles launched, the fighters turned towards the Phobos to rearm.  Captain Feng ordered his squadron to chase down the lead raider while the fighters returned to their bays.  The Jump Cruiser Destructor and destroyer Henderson took the fleeing light raider under fire at 1107 hours, scoring only one hit at extreme range.  The two warships relentlessly closed on the fleeing ship and pounded it to scrap, then turned on the group of damaged raiders still covering the salvage ship. 

The Terran squadron closed with the group of two raider warships escorting the salvager and opened fire at 380,000 kilometers range.  By the time they had closed to 200,000 kilometers the lone medium raider had been destroyed and the squadron shifted fire to the damage light raider.  It only took two salvoes to eliminate the light raider, after which the Terran squadron shifted to targeting the salvager. 

With the salvager gone, the Terran squadron set its course for the medium raider that had been crippled during the missile attack, while their fighters set out for the location of the most recent attack.  It only took two salvoes to eliminate the medium raider, after which the squadron turned to follow their fighters.  During the engagement a pair of raider ships had appeared in between the fighter’s location and the site of the last attack, a light raider and an Echo class ship, which was a suspected commercial ship of some sort. 

At 1303 hours the fighters launched twenty-four ASM(L)’s at the lone light raider escorting the Echo class ship.  The medium raider survived, but was left drifting.  The fighters left the drifting warship and the Echo class ship for the following warships and set out for the scene of the last attack.  Once there they found nothing except for lift pods containing twenty-one crew members of the civilian freighter. 

After destroying the Echo and the crippled medium raider with laser fire, the squadron set its course for the life pods, which were being watched over by the fighters.  Once the life pods were recovered the fighters had landed, the squadron set out for the inner system to determine if there were any more raiders lurking in the system.  When no more raiders were detected, the squadron set its course for Shield Base.

Back on Terra, the fleet is nearly ready to set out for Bobruisk space to confront the Octs.   

Name themes for all 21 Provinces (and the capital) of Mongolia, all of the uniquely-named Soums (subdivisions of Provinces), and the nine districts of the capital city

EDIT: I am considering creating name lists for each Province containing the Soums of said province, but that's 21 name lists and there are a decent number of duplicates between the provinces and I'm a bit too lazy for that for today

Big fan of the sensor changes, especially the vizualization of 100 IP ones! Could've sworn that already happened sometimes, but very far from always. Does the removed horizontal bar mean the Observed Weapons display is fixed as well? Because currently ROF is often not displayed in full, even if there is no scrollbar, on top of sometimes not making sense (screenshot attached, I'm guessing I saw the same ship fire in two separate engagements because according to the DB its RoF is 44578880, maybe a workaround against that as well?).

Also, since you're updating the alien class window, I can't help but once again ask that boarded ships would get a class summary there same way ship classes discovered from intel do. Or maybe let us edit the summary window so we could add notes too

There is an option to display sensor ranges now, but its based on race sensors not class, requires the sensor to be active and I don't think it is completely reliable. The new one displays sensor ranges regardless of activation (because you need to know the detection range even if it isn't active) and displays the actual active sensors next to the contact (as per 2.5.1).

Yes, weapon display is slightly narrower now to allow scrollbar. I've seen the weird ROF occasionally too, but haven't nailed it yet.

I've added class summary to the other information you gain when capturing an enemy ship.

A few decades ago, my scouts discovered a very strange system, one ideal inhabited planet inhabited by two races at once. These two races live in peace. I was very interested in it, I didn't know that such a thing is possible in Aurora. I called them Alpha & Omega aliens, so with Alpha I have some progress with establish communication, but Omega refusing any my attempts for communication.
The ships of these two races use very strong shields, at that time their shields were 2-3 times stronger than those I used to use at military stations and orbital fortresses. This was very alarmed by the entire scientific world of our state, given the fact that a lot of resources were spent on the development of our own shields, each of their ships is equipped with such shields that we could not afford even for a large and well-protected orbital fortress. It seems that I encountered a race that placed a strong emphasis on shield technology, because the speed of their warships was not high, about half the speed of my fastest destroyers.

After some time, communication with Alpha aliens successfully established and they demand me to leave them or they will open fire. Omega aliens still refusing any attempts. I understand them and fulfilled that demand immediately, my scout also have gathered valuable data about them, so they must be very nervous. And I leave them for decades, because I spotted swarm nearly to one of my important colonies..and the war has begun, I stopped every civilian research program for military research, because after first military fleet to fleet encounter with swarm I understood that my fleet is smeg
I lost two strike fleet groups: 2 kinetic cruisers and 4 heavy destroyers, but they at least have kill one swarm 20t vessel. It’s just a big lucky that two other of NPRs was busy by each other, and don’t try to attack me when I was busy with swarm. Aurora really can make fantastic stories.

So, the war with swarm ended (I conquered their system where they came from, and tracked down the escaped queen and kill it) my empire returns to peaceful life, and I finally build my first diplomatic vessel with commercial drive, no active sensors and with mass less than 10t. I send that vessel to the Alpha & Omega aliens with transponder turned on for all, and park it to their world with distance at 5m km, why they are still want me to leave their system? But at least for now, they use a standard demand (without opening fire )

I’m discover that Alpha&Omega aliens have no one stabilised jump gates at their system, and all neighbouring systems are free, so they looks like a simple minor race isn’t it? Does this mean that I cannot establish diplomatic contact with them?
My admirals, inspired by the recent victory over swarm suggest me to invade in their system or at least send diplomatic vessel with solid military escort in case if they try to attack that vessel, but I’m do not want to do this, i want try to establish contact with them and be allies, they looks very similar as humans, because their home world ideal for humans too, and in case of success I will have good buffer zone which will allow me to forget about protecting this direction, please help

I apologise if this has been brought up before, but would it be feasible to implement a system where commanders also have a chance of losing efficiency bonuses once they reach a certain time in service?

I tend to treat my civilian administrators as abstractions of an entire government apparatus, and hence I assume the efficiency bonuses are tied not to a particular leader but rather to the entire colonial administration of thousands of civil servants. I find this better from a RP perspective because this leads to certain colonies being better than others at certain functions (which I RP as resulting from local expertise, incentives, and infrastructure), hence my colonies feel more real and unique. And it sometimes forces me to make sub-optimal decisions - like building up a new naval base not at the local warp point nexus, but one system over at a colony which is actually good at shipbuilding.

The problem, of course, is that immortal (story character) leaders tend to universally end up with sky-high bonuses of everything. I've been solving this by periodically randomising leader bonuses, but this gets tedious as the game progresses and I would really like an alternative. Essentially, past a certain time in service (say 20 years), I'd like to have commanders start rolling for a small reduction in their bonuses in addition to the usual rolls for an increase. Does this seem reasonable?