If you consider what amounts to an area of hundreds of tiles to be a choke point then I guess so.   By that definition, the entire continent of Europe was a choke point for allied invasion.

One concern I have, and maybe it's unfounded, is that the galaxy will lose some character/interest. In GCIII, I enjoy managing colonies, and each colony or system takes on a certain... personality. I often use this "personality" to name hypergates, and it helps me keep my bearings in the galactic map.

The way the map and colony management sounds now, I wonder what the focus will be on--fleet management and multi-turn space battles? Politics and intrigue?

I'm not saying this in a derogatory way--just pondering the ideas from Frogboy out loud. I'm trying to get a flavor for what kind of game GCIV might be with less colony management...

well I'm always a fan of more planets. there is always a rare setting for those who like less planets. 

Thanks Frogboy, that's exactly what I pictured.  A layout similar to Sins of a Solar Empire, except with multiple star systems instead of just one system.  This could be okay, however, I don't want to loose the feel of the game so as long as the individual smaller maps are large enough to keep that feel than maybe it will be okay.  (Large enough that multiple factions/races could occupy the same small map.) That way one could have a small game as part of the larger game.  If it's one faction/race per cluster then I agree with everyone on the choke point theory.  There may be ways around this with the temp hypergates, but that would just allow for a brief surprise where then one can defend quickly.

As far as colony management, as long as it's possible at some point of the game then I'm good.  The Frog stated that with higher technology one may be able to customize a planet similar to what they do now.  Before that assign/train govenors.  I just don't want to loose that micromanagement as an option as I love working your planet to a class 30 or higher.  Either way it's going to drastically change the feel of colony management from Galciv II or III.

Each hypergate is hundreds of tiles wide? You should have started with that tbh.

Quoting Moser_Alchemist,

reply 80

Quoting Horemvore,

reply 71

Quoting ForesterSOF,

reply 70

Like B5 small ships would need them but big ships make their own so in late game an invasion could bypass CPs.

Code breaking is not my forte, so in laymans terms plz?

B5=Babylon 5 tv show.  In the show small ships couldn't enter hyperspace on their own,  so they had to travel using gates.

The large ships could enter hyperspace and exit hyperspace on their own.

AH now I get it

Yea, the Hypergates couldn't be blockaded.  You can't prevent someone from getting into a new area (they'd simply appear on the first empty tile near the hypergate).

You could, of course, build up a huge fleet to cover the area but that's no different than in GalCiv III where i build a bunch of military starbases around key worlds and even then, it doesn't stop a ship with a jump drive from simply arriving anywhere they want on the edge of the cluster which is took big to effectively defend.

Exactly, I just play with stars scattered all over...

One of the things to remember is when galactic civilization 3 came out. It worked in beta, but when the game came out the user interface sucked. We got a planet list on the main screen, but that was it. They were missing several, like most screens. This time around hopefully the game gets a pass to make sure the game has as much functionality as this game.

Hypergates are choke points, but apparently Jump drives bypass them, at the cost of slower hyperspace movement.  So at higher techs there are no choke points. 

At least, that's how I'm reading Frogboy.

I wonder how that affects Trading ?

I like the idea of this map layout. However few more ideas:

• Star systems or very small clusters outside of main ones, those would not have any "natural" wormhole and would work only with hyperjump technology (so there might be something for later game exploration and also to not make it just big chunks.
• Upon entering hyperspace I choose tile from different or same cluster to go, but only those that are in "line of sight". Aka if there is system in between, I need to emerge from hyperspace there first. If I want to fly around and do surprise attack from behind, this should be possible, let's say utilize few midpoints where fleet will turn around. If this will be limited to like 1 or 2 mid points, it will not eliminate all the sneakiness but will keep stuff on good level of resource need. But longer path = more travel time.
• Natural hyperlanes should be the only ones to be used for diplomacy and trading ships -> thus those ships won't need big pathfinding. AI though should actively utilize jump tech for surprise attacks
• If you control the cluster, all ships entering it from hyperjump should get actively spotted by sensors. This should be big energetic operation visible across the whole cluster even if you don't have direct line of sight. No need for details, just "energy signature of ship entering from hyperspace detected" and where it happened. Just that one-time flash. This is always thrilling moment before you send scout there to detect if it is friends or foes. 
• Natural wormholes being soft chokepoints is okay, but they need to be part of diplomacy. See Mantichore empire in Honor Harrington books. They profited heavily by letting other empires to use the wormholes they had around their system for big cash. Or how Bospor works in real life. Later on it will lose the attractivity as ships will be able to tunnel through hypergate anywhere.
• Fortifying should be a thing, and starbases need to have big firepower but unmovable or slowly movable. Imagine making long range rocket ships with all the shields and no engines. Or just starbases (but please let them move as shipyards do). Starbases should be the first ones to shoot and shoot all through the fights, not like nowadays when they start shooting when defender fleet is dead. Starbases should be big calibre that is death trap, but also if it is taked out, big lose.
• Hyperjump should allow us to "bundle" few fleets or ships, so they arrive all together even if they had different speeds (aka mark them to one big fleet just for the hyper travel and use the speed of slowest ship)
• Tiny and small ships should not be able to do any hyperjumps, natural nor with technology. They are just too small to have the power for it. Make them just local ships, aimed for defending and good firepower. Large ships should be able to do jumps, thus all sizes will have very good value to go for. Carriers being able to load up tiny ships and carry them through wormholes. You lose carrier, tiny shipy have to stay in the cluster.
• Life support has to change to be resource for fleets. Fleets should have unlimited range, but rather amount of turns they can stay away from range of your resupply bases. Once the ship is away for more turns, it starts taking damage. Can be mitigated by having support ships dedicated for carrying more supplies. If you don't bring more supplies, you can just lose ships over time in enemy area. Bringing ships back to resupply and repair (and apply upgrades based on new techs) should be okay to do. Breaking supply chains should be valid strategy as well. Repair each turn as we know it now should drain those supplies as well, on higher rate. (so one can roam for months; or have few fights and have to resupply after a week)
  
  EDIT:
  ship maintenance completely reworked in a sence that you "buy" restocking of supplies, aka you have to use credits when loading ships up, and they don't drain elsewhen. Also buying of supplies as a part of open borders treaty from other players when ship enters range of their planets and stations - for your travelling ships.
• Not being able to intercept/detect ships in hyperspace is okay.

Actually the impassable objects do create bigger problem for pathfinding than amount of tiles. 

For citizens, I would love to see actually two types of them.

First, citizens as we know now, that you can either send on certain planet or keep in cabinet. No need to change this, except making it easier to make them travel way easier.

Second, give "small" citizens based on planet's population, those will be always tied to that planet and you will be able to tie them to some building = they give bonuses based on that. For every 5 small citizens, you get one big as a bonus(for cabinet or otherwise).

I like the idea of smaller ships being unable to have jump drives or move through the hyper lanes this makes larger ships necessary where now they just aren’t I never build anything beyond medium. I also like the idea of needing to supply ships.

Also can we please look at changing the ways carriers work. Needing to stock them with fighters is the only fix they need. I don’t use them any more after using one carrier to win the entire game.

I am on board with the way more planets/clusters idea.   I would just call them galaxies.   That is not to say that "smaller is better" is wrong, though.   It's just the artistic direction this is taking.   This sets up D-Day style invasions and would probably feel similar to Continents style maps in Civ.   But this could take on a whole new Star Trek feel, where play styles in different galaxies are very different.  One galaxy is tight-cluster, ample resources.  Another is spread out, lots of life support, lots of precursor planets.  Anomalies which simply don't exist in other galaxies.  Technologies which just don't unlock unless you meet this minor race.

You'd have missions, just like Treasure Hunters and Salvage missions.  But they're "Explore Andromeda" and "Explore Milky Way" missions.  After some time, you get a weak survey ship in the other galaxy, on a semi-random tile.  You explore around a little bit and set up a hyperlane.  You can set up multiple hyperlanes.  Then you set up starbases to defend/augment them.  But the xenophobic Iconians don't like it and will blow you up ASAP if they catch you doing it.

The architect on Freeorion decided to go all hyperlanes because it made the AI easier.  Everything becomes a directed acyclic graph.  But they did not have the advantage of already having AI source code sitting around from previous projects, and they weren't mixing tiles with hyperlanes, like this is.  DAG software libraries are really easy to find.

I'm not really on board with no campaign, unless resources simply don't permit.  This cluster idea just screams CAMPAIGN.   First scenario is one-cluster.  Second scenario is two-cluster, with you starting in one and having to take care of the other.  Third is multi-cluster, with several neutral parties standing between you and the evil dragon lords on the other side of the universe.  You have to use diplomacy in order to travel across the universe on time before your ships all go out-of-date just getting there.

I was happy with Galciv3's campaign, and was even happier with the campaign's mod than Crusade's sandbox one.  It was just short-lived.