Are you looking to avoid any imperial entanglements? I only ask because there is this chap who claims he could make the Kessel run in under 12 parsecs. Now I realise that a parsec is a measure of distance and not time so he's probably just talking shap but I should still have his number here somewhere if you want it. And I think he played "indie" once.
Indeed - I'd love to be as close as neutral to those slave-dealing scums of the ea... ahem, gentlemen with different views on personal freedoms - but just neutral enough to be able to obtain that beautiful ship.
As someone who had played "Freelancer" to death and back, I loved the option of fluctuating reputations in that game - you do some jobs for one faction, get good with them, buy their equipment/ships, then BAM! you do 180 and smack them in the face. It felt nice to do that, especially with pirate groups, but I suppose ED will be more rigid regarding player reputations with certain groups.