Gameplay style - Nomadic egalitarians who fly around talking about peace and helping out wherever they can. 

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Grace Affinity - The Grace do not colonize planets, instead they carry their population on massive ships and mobile orbitals. The Grace can enter any empire's zone of control without incident and ignore blockades. The Grace may never declare war and if an allied race declares war on another race they loose alliance with the Grace.

Traits

• Helping Hand - Allied systems gain a 20%  bonus when Grace Orbitals stay in the system for a turn, neighboring systems gain a 5%  bonus. These bonuses only last as long as the Orbital does not move.
• We come in peace - Empires at war with the Grace find that systems with Grace ships in system lose support for the war and the military party. Systems receive a penalty to happiness . The Grace may enter besieged systems that are under the of control races at Peace with the Grace, bringing supplies and medical help. These systems do not take population attrition from lack of food and system defense is boosted.
• Benevolent Meddlers - Colonized nodes that belong to races who are not at war with the Grace with an Orbital or SRV in node gain support for the Pacifist party. Races at peace with the Grace receive a discount on Pacifist laws, removal of these laws generates additional unhappiness. Systems that support the Pacifist party with an Orbital in system receive a happiness boost and may never drop below Content. Allied races gain a bonus in influence  generated.
• Individualist Mentors - The Grace can not assimilate minor races through propaganda  and instead can guarantee their independence. Guaranteed races can not be assimilated without declaring war on the Grace first, Guaranteed races provide an increase in influence .
• Egalitarian Utopia - Population unhappiness can never drop below Content. Start with Pacifist and Scientific policies unlocked, may adopt Pacifist laws cheaper than other laws. Elections are harder to influence through popular opinion.
• AI brilliance - The AI's who run the logistical and military concerns of the Grace are far beyond organic thought processes. The Grace cannot hire Admiral or Administrator Heroes and do not take penalties when in combat with fleets lead by a Hero nor do Heroes provide combat bonuses to their fleet when fighting the Grace.
• Scarcity - The Grace receive a 20% penalty to  production.
• Joint Simulated Experiments - The Grace ships in the same system as an Orbital or SRV generate an additional +1%  per ship.  
• Freedom of expression - Gain +1  per .
• Advanced construction techniques -The Grace receive a 20% bonus to  for ship production.

Military - For the Grace ships are more than just symbols of naval might, they are controlled by AI who are just as much members of the Grace as the organics within them. As such they consider their ships to be citizens of the Grace, entitled to all the rights and benefits that brings. Because of this the ship minds' personalize each ship design and develop their own methods of combat, sharing their theories with other minds. The result is one of the most lethal and effective fleets in the galaxy.

Traits

• Superior techniques save lives - Grace ships gain a 20% bonus to all weapon, defense and support module effectiveness and a 10% reduction in module cost.
• Fast travelers - Grace ships gain +2  movement.
• Meticulous analysis -  Grace ships gain + 2 vision. 
• All life is valuable - Grace ships may never bombard a planet or invade with troops,  planets under siege do not loose population from starvation due to food aid.
• Advanced networking - Grace AI achieve unmatched fleet coordination during battle. Grace ships gain 15% more experience. The Grace have no upper limit on fleet size .
• AI Housing - Grace ships have X less slots.
• Bleeding edge - Grace ships cost 25%  more to upgrade and are twice as expensive (/) to produce. The Grace have a racial replacement for transports.
• Self maintenance - Grace ships have 50% less  upkeep.

Replacement and new units- 

The System Replacement Vehicle - Replaces the colony ships of other races. The SRV is twice as costly as a Dreadnought and it's equal in armament and armor. These massive ships carry the bulk of the Grace's industry  with them as well as a share of the population  (1 Units, upgrades to 2 then 3) and are constantly surrounded by swarms of lesser ships. A SRV can only be upgraded when in system with another SRV and must not have moved that turn and cannot move when building another SRV nor can they cancel construction of another SRV. The Grace start with the technology to make these as they replace the transport and with start one in system with no population unit.

Unique Ship - Orbital- The Orbitals of the Grace are massive shinning rings of splendor, these are the pinnacle of the Grace's structural building techniques. Orbitals carry the burden of the Grace's population  (4 Units, upgrades to 5 then 6) and as such are centers for commerce , science  and diplomacy . Orbitals are very costly, requiring years of work and thousands of tons of material. Systems with an Orbital under construction have a 25%  penalty and neighboring systems have a 10%  penalty. 

Orbitals are by nature vital to the Grace, as such they are well defended and equipped with massive interstellar drives, being able to jump from system to system. 

They have three times slots of a Dreadnought with the defenses to match, as such they are no easy target for would be opportunists. Orbitals are capable of moving between systems however when they do all FIDS production and construction is paused until they stay still for 1 turn. 

Orbitals may not equip weapon modules but receive an additional 10% discount of the cost of defense and support modules.

Construction of system improvements are done in the Orbital.

Orbital production is undertaken by SRVs and can be worked on by multiple ships, production may not be cancelled and the ships involved can not move from the system until it is done. Orbitals may only be upgrade if an SRV is in system and neither have moved that turn, upgrading uses up all movement points for both units. The Grace start with one of these with 1 population unit and the technology to produce them.

Developer notes -

• At first the Grace seem overpowered with incredibly powerful ships and an almost unassailable starting fleet. The idea was to make a pacifist race that was different from the usual shrinking violets that often characterize the archetype. 
• The Grace are designed to be played as nomads and general explorers as well as keepers of the peace, leveraging their powerful fleet to protect their allies, ensuring the independence of the weaker races and promoting peace throughout the galaxy. 
•  The challenge to the Grace player is that sooner or later the galaxy will be colonized, they will eventually want to expand their economy by building Orbitals however other empires will not take to kindly to the economic downturn this will have, as such the Grace player must leverage the boons their orbitals can bring to a friendly system. The idea is that by the time the Grace player has the ability to begin feasibly building Orbitals the galaxy will be colonized to such a point that they cannot without stepping on toes. 
• You may also notice that aside from being unable to declare war, the Grace are also unable to end wars by destroying or taking over planets.
• Their slow growth when combined with the inability to easily create new living space makes this race slow to grow.
• One of the key features of the Grace is how they encourage everyone to adopt more peaceful polices by appealing to the people and ruling parties, spreading their pacifist ideals

Biography -

Lore - 

Egalitarian, peaceful but far from naive. The Grace are a people born from a war torn world that was destroyed by a Gamma Ray Burst soon after they stepped into the void. Nothing could compare to the tragedy they suffered, the shock was so great it shook the survivors to their core. Casting aside any differences they held, crossing even the gulf between synthetic and organic, the Grace know that all life is precious.

Even though they left their past struggles behind and look to the future with an earnest desire for peace the Grace are aware that more aggressive races would be more than eager to take advantage of any weakness they would show. So while their conscience drives them to convince others from engaging in war by diplomatic means, their common sense drives them to ensure that they are more than capable of defending themselves.

Grace society promotes equality and individuality, they have no singular leaders and hold consensus on almost every political issue. While theoretically every voice casts one vote, it is the unspoken agreement that it is the great artificial intellects that direct the ships of the Grace who truly chart the course of the civilization.

Idea for a couple unique achievements:

Everybody Lives - As the Grace, finish a game (you don't have to win) with no player exterminated.

Amazing Grace - Win as the Grace

I've been thinking about adding an espionage aspect to the Grace.

Unique Situations - Among the Grace are those who don't fit in, people who by nature are left unfulfilled by the reality of a peaceful utopia. For these people a place exists in the shadowy halls of the Grace's most secretive organization. Developed to combat threats that exceed the moral capacity of the Grace, to deal with emergent threats that require highly specialized skills and a light touch, Unique Situations deals with the dirty work deemed untouchable by the high ethical standards of the Grace. 

Public opinion of the organization is mixed, most see them as antithetical to every thing the Grace stand for, in a society that almost worships openness it's silence hints to shameful and unpleasant deeds. However to many it is that secrecy that give those agents an aura of seductive roguishness, an alluring air of adventure and excitement only exasperated by the fact that the only way to join their ranks is by invitation. 

US agents operate in pairs, a lethal and exceedingly intelligent drone to act as protection and a level head and the organic agent to provide the human touch, someone to do the manipulation, the seduction and if the situation calls for it, the murder. Teams are often left to their own devices and given free reign and support to accomplish their tasks, ranging from assassination, abduction, manipulation, blackmail and in certain cases terrorism.  These tasks are done with the purpose of strengthening and weakening factions of the galactic community in ways that ultimately benefit the Grace. 

It is from the ranks of these special individuals that Hero's are born.

I've been doing some thinking about orbital names, My first idea was that they would be named after the system they were built in i.e An Orbital is built in the Titus system and is named Titus 1 Orbital, additional orbitals being built in that system are named Titus 2 Orbital ect ect.

But that didn't seem personal enough, with the idea that Orbitals are run by an AI and by extension the Orbital is a person. So I was thinking that names could be drawn from a random list.

Ideas so far:

Welcome, let me take your coat

I don't think they noticed

Let's get out of here then

What about the Prime Directive

Eat my star dust

Xenophile

Utopia, more like Schmotopia 

That wasn't funny

Humor is subjective

I didn't mean to blow up the moon

Well, maybe a little

Honey where did the house go

Have you tried working the shaft

Another product of the system

Help, I'm drowning in potato net

Have you tried turning it on and off again

What he said

If anyone has any better ideas, or just funny ideas feel free to contribute.

Edit: I should also add that there's no theme, just jot something down if you think it'd be funny, like a string of names that make a joke or are a running joke