[MrLobster]

"...revamp for PA which wouldn't require monumental coding or investment."

I think thats a bit of an understatement, it would take a lot of coding and testing to produce the effect.

Another game did this (Plantia??) and it just turned out that the biggest alliances controlled 90% of the planets. They did have a limit of 6 planets though.

The structure of the PA Universe is sufficient, but only works if your in an active galaxy (of course you can exile).

Cluster alliances are pretty much non existant, with the current era of small player base. Might as well remove the bonus eta to cluster defence.

Many attempts at changing the universe have been suggested (circle universe with the bigger players closer to the center and small players at the rim, the closer to the center/edge you are the longer it takes to go the other way).