Early in the beta there was alot of talk by Stardock about having the ability to park your ships (I assume with a special module) on a trade route to pillage them. Then the owner of the trade route would be warned that it was being pillaged, this would then start a counter of about ten turns (depending on some factor, route length and techs perhaps?) in which you had to destroy the ships or move them off the route otherwise the route would be lost.

While this was happening the owner would stop getting credits while the pillager would gain credits, followed by a large sum of credits depending on the trade route at the end of the turn limit. I believe this also was an ability all pirate ships were supposed to have until they were watered down as well.

Im not sure of the reasons for this being removed but has there been any news about if this is coming back in some form?

I tend to play evil races and as such I rarely use trade ships, more for flavor then inability to do so. Which means Early game and the beginnings of mid game I can really be struggling for credits that the trade routes would otherwise support. Would be really nice to give players more options. Not to mention giving the pirates more of a threatening and flavorful aspect.

Random question:

Does anyone know if the GalCiv3 dev streams are still happening? I assume since the forums have been relatively quiet of developer posts recently that Stardock is on holidays or busy doing something at the moment? I have probably just missed a post somewhere.