A favor...

[jRides]

I would loved to see added:

15. GROUND COMBAT that looks good and is effective.

Ground Combat, it's something I've always felt is missing from SEIV, hell, any 4X game. If you do make a 4X, the addition of ground combat would make me a happy bunny.

Also,
Leaders, (with rudiamentary stats at least) who would step in when you hit that Autoresolve button, for good or bad. Would be nice if they just care of themselves, but you could move them around if you had a better place for them (leading this task force or that diplomatic mission).

Expand the max Universe size, I would love a game with 1000s of stars.

Expand the Solar system size. I liked how you could expand the sizes of the solar systems in SEV (by modding), made scanner ranges and cloaking more important, playing cat and mouse with fleets and forcing design and use of scouts.

Also, one of the best thing about Space Empires is it's just so moddable, we see spectacular stuff from the community, vastly extending the game life, and sales - I have a friend who recently bought SEIV just to play Atrocities Star Trek mod.