Would be cool to learn the stories behind Captains / Crew via some sort of storymode. Small missions where you start out with a Captain (or maybe even a Crew) en discover / encounter/ rescue them from those mission by interacting with the environment (like, cargo boxes, but then like: tiny jails, or bushes or something tied to that story).
Each little mission could be a bit different, like: destroy x-amount of units to “rescue” a certain crew, or reach point x whiting x-number of turns with you Captain. Such thingies :D
Give AI-players another good run as well <3