Im doing from the ground up and I just realized that all the independent faction planets are grayed out as empire, but when i load it up again as rebels or black sun then i can see the independent factions control along with the space station level or ground level. (cant even see this if i move a stealth unit over the planet as empire so sending out stealth scouts is still only useful for seeing space force) I can see the main factions planets, and any that the main factions take. But the non playable factions while i can see their home planets, the planets they capture are grayed out still even after capture. I loaded up a couple different from the ground up modes and what makes me think this is a bug is that on several of them I can see the orange and white independent faction planets but only SOME like 1 white and 2 orange on northern worlds as empire. Again when i load it up as rebels and black sun everything is available to me except for the planets with the hidden base feature. I dont remember the empire being handicapped like this in the past?