I don't think NT can get into Engineering as that is already in 3 departments (service, med and sci), and with the ruling that a corp can only be in 3 departments, that would not be too possible...
Orion express, however?
One idea came up on the discord of allowing officers to pick their sidearm in some way. Making it similar to the token miners get could be interesting, they insert a token into a vending machine and can pick which sidearm they receive between a pistol and a revolver. The option of a taser as a third selection could also be interesting.
In regards to the payment system changes, info on the programs that an order was paid for by department account rather then the person's own account would be useful. It currently still says it is paid for by X person even if the departmental payment is used.
The latter question is interesting. If a character was arrested for something, 20 years passing could well mean their sentence has passed. That or they escaped from prison in the fall of Biesel etc.
I imagine rich/posh characters would be harder since we're on some random ship that isn't as fancy as the Horizon, the flagship of the SCC is?
What kinda avenues might there be?
In regards to the money section, I'm wondering what you mean by it affecting the starting situations of the characters. Other stuff like the cleanliness of the ship, supplies and food make sense, but I'm wondering about that one.
While the ship flying system and stuff in SS14 is cool, SS14 in general isn't really suitable for HRP. In addition to coders here likely not knowing about how SS14 coding works.