Can I inject an off the wall left field thought?
In a purely single user game, there would really be no value in having a 400 billion star system universe - even playing continuously 24x7, never visiting any system twice, you'd need multiple lifetimes to visit every system in the galaxy, never mind actually taking the time to get any enjoyable gameplay in while doing it. FD have also talked about giving away the secrets of the galaxy & gameplay not matching the richness of the online experience etc, and the effort required to develop an offline universe that would match expectations...
So... how about harnessing a digital asset they already have in the bank? What about using the FE2 galaxy, procedurally converted like for like, for the offline game? Re-use the FE2 mission generation & NPC seeding code for the bulletin board missions etc & convert the galaxy layout, & use the ED client code, digital assets &c to provide the UI & combat etc... this would provide a coherent offline experience at a comparatively low effort, without spoiling the online multiplayer game in any way. It would kind of be FE2+++. Which would, I suspect, be perfectly fine - look at all the love OOlite gets, and that's basically a slightly jazzed up clone of the original elite!
If even that is too much effort, how about documenting & publishing the solo-online subset of the client-server API and incorporating an option that permits alternative connection to a 'localhost' server for solo play into the client? That server API will probably be documented at some point by a geek with a network sniffer & the patience to reverse engineer it, so get your retaliation in first... how would this help? Well, if the community can learn what the client sends to and expects from the server in solo online play, the community can develop its own local VM based server... can you imagine what the OOlite modding community might build given the opportunity to build an ED client compatible local VM based server for ED?
Pluses for Frontier; demonstrates support for the modding community, ensures that there almost certainly will be an evolving playable completely offline game using the ED client, absolves them of any responsibility for developing & maintaining such a thing if it is launched, or supporting it in any way, defuses a lot of the bitterness & distrust that has emerged recently, puts to bed the idea that this change is a DRM rights grab, and if the seperate offline gameplay that evolves is really rubbish compared with the online solo gameplay, proves ED's point about not being able to develop something good themselves.
Can anybody think of any downsides for Frontier about taking either of these options?