@Romeo ammonia based life form <.< enjoy your toxic hyperpresurised planets 

i was thinking of a few factions that would be non playable to add as crisis (end game event like invaders from another galaxy or stuff)

had a "replicator" (stargate) based faction that doesn't use any food but uses industry to build more pop and get bonus industry to it's system for each ship it destroys which allow them to progress very fast (the more ship they destroy the more ship they can build and they can spawn pop real fast thanks to this). That's the self replicating nano/micro robot nightmare (and they would probably ruin and deplete planets at a much faster rate than carvers <.<)

also thought about a species that is based on copying others (all their yields and base political affinities are based on the ones from the other pops in their systems (was trying to balance though by limiting the number of other species one individual can copy at a time). They would also have a bonus to science that is the complete opposite of the sophons (meaning if they learn from others they excell at researching stuff that has already been researched).

from a background point of view it would be something like they were just above inteligent animals that use camouflage and pheromones to mimic and thus avoid potential predators or get closer to preys but one day an endless ship arrived to survey the planets and they were being that this specie couldn't even come close to copy, but they still were able to boost their evolution by much (interference from the endless is not excluded). Once they were able to become a space faring race they decided to start to travel to learn more about other races, to find stronger species , copy them and one day supplant them.

must have a few others lying around tho

That's actually a pretty neat idea. By any chance, have you once submitted this idea to the Major Faction Contest? 

vahouth wrote:

A "one system" tall empire like the Cultists from EL.

The Vodyani do somewhat offer that already (Not quite as severe, but somewhat). I would like to see a Terraforming race that can terraform a planet to something only they like. If we want to use the Sowers as an example, rather than terraforming planets in to nice, beautiful Tier 1 planets, they could be a corrupt version who terraforms things to a custom Tier 6 planet that every other race dispises except them (Such as a Grey Goo planet, or Nuclear Planet, or Digital Planet) as well as being uncaring to all kinds of planet (IE, no -15 Happiness for Barren, or -25 for a Gas Giant).

A "one system" tall empire like the Cultists from EL.