Please bear with the complex title of my post, hopefully I can tie it all together.  Not wanting to go into the long history of Borders and Zone(s) of Control (ZoC) in strategy games I wanted to present some ideas here and see what everyone thought.  Generally speaking, Borders and ZoC pretty much come from the established urban centers that we create.  In the Civ games the Borders grow larger, due to the strength of generated by Culture but basically without Cities there is no formula for extending a ZoC let alone a Border outward and forward.

Seeing though how this game can be played from the map perspective if needed/wanted, then one could hope that the features on that map (which are representative of the world at large and can have proper names for them) could play a factor in perhaps setting up Borders and the like. 

There are a myriad examples of this in books, movies and even real life.  Geographical features (rivers, mountains, deserts, forests etc.) are often used as places where Borders are decided upon.  I wonder if this is something that could be implemented in Elemental.  A couple examples of this could be:

1.  You are getting your little Empire established and you have 3 cities within close proximity of each other but there is a large mass of land ahead of you that you would love to just have all for yourself.  Now instead of trying to rush the average settler units out to lay claim to them directly, perhaps an option could exist to "plant a flag" as it were and lay claim to a piece of territory.  Perhaps using the map itself to draw a line of demarcation and lay claim to that territory.  One could even use Geographical features to act as markers.  So you lay claim to all of the land between here and the Sea of 'Y'or the Great Forest of 'X' or the Mountains of 'Z' and then your Borders change to accommodate that but your ZoC still stays within those cities you have (maybe stretched out a little further because of your claim) and it gives you time to catch up to your new borders.  Granted this sounds like it could be abused and over exaggerated (what with people laying claim to the whole world and whatnot) but laying claim to a piece of land is one thing but actually having control over it is another.  So you could lay claim to all the land in the world but unless there is something physically of yours on it, chances are it's just a waste of hot air.  That leads into my second example.

2.  Now you encounter forces of another empire and you each exchange pleasantries with one another.  Perhaps during a dialogue script or maybe as a diplomatic option, you can set formal boundaries between your two empires.  It could be something as simple as the ruler of the other empire recognizes the scope of the lands you claim and you two formally set borders as such.  Playing off on that, if the two of you met through simple exploration of one another it would be a solid way to claim land without having a city or other physical structure present, for the both of you.  He could then claim all of the land up to your border as a diplomatic tit for tat, becoming mutually beneficial for the both of you.  This is seen as mostly happening when you are both physically quite distant from the main cities of your empire and having a large plot of empty space between your areas. 

3.  An extension of this would be if empires are right on top of each other and a more formal border is suggested.  This feeds into the geography aspect as a set of formal boundaries between your two empires becomes established based on a mountain range, or a river or a great forest and the map is redrawn with the borders established to reflect that along the geographical lines. 

4.  Not to mention that these ideas can lend themselves into a more robust diplomacy system.  Say you are the winning party of a war and you accept a peace offering.  Perhaps as part of the treaty of peace you could demand land all the way up to the River 'X', or we want the Mountains of 'Y' (and whatever precious minerals they have) or you could just draw a line as to what land(s) you do want for peace.  Conversely, perhaps you wish to gift land(s) to a faction for whatever reason.  Perhaps wandering mercenaries help you out in a war and you reward them with a gift of land for them to set up their own kingdom that would be allied with yours (Rohan being a good example of this).

Since the interface uses a map, I wonder how difficult it would be to put actual map coordinates onto the map itself.  That way you could specify in treaty negotiations or border negotiations where exactly the border would be or what land you are seeking to acquire?

Outposts, are another interesting idea and they could be incorporated into this easily.  I loved the idea in MOO 2 the idea of building outpost ships as a way to lay claim to a planet without building a full colony ship and establishing a formal colony on a planet.  Outposts were useful in claiming systems that were predominately gas giants and asteriods but they were also a good way to lay claim to a planet you wanted but couldn't quite get to.  I would love to see Outposts like that in Elemental and they can further lend to the idea of having Borders without necessarily having cities right on top of one another. 

Say you Scout ahead and find a nice geographical choke point or a good place to set your borders while you build your empire.  Perhaps you can create an Outpost unit(s) and send them to those points and 'Plant your flag' as it were.  It would be a formal military presence and would generate its own ZoC and color scheme of your own borders.  As part of the laying claim to land idea, you could draw your borders from where your cities are now and have them end at the outposts you set up.  Any Empire coming up to those Outposts would see a formal presence of your Empire and could ignore them and proceed onward or leave them be and recognizing the claim to your lands up to those Outposts. 

Eventually those Outposts could be upgraded to Cities or Fortresses of their own if chosen. 

How does this all fits into Minor Tech?  I love the idea of random tech but also a need for formal research as well.  However, Outposts could exist outside the norm and be truly on the frontier.  As such the need to adapt on the frontier is great.  Perhaps an Outpost could generate a chance to produce one random minor tech just from having to rely on necessity and being out in the field.  Some examples could be they learn to adapt bows or crossbow range based on their tinkerings or maybe they they learn to extend their food supplies or maybe they improve the quality of shoeing horses giving them a speed or movement advantage, or maybe they come to a better understanding of tactics based on their actions in the field.  These are minor Eureka moments and little things like that give a boost to those who want some randomness to their techs (making the world believable) and the need to have a formal tech tree to proceed with the game.

Hopefully this post manages to make sense.  Sorry for the length but as this idea was forming it kept leading to more and more things which, I hope, are interrelated.  Thoughts?