Anyone able to give me advice on how to run stable and experimental side by side on my single computer...?
Copy your entire game folder ( I suggest the "stable" version) somewhere else on your hard drive, and run the game by double-clicking on the EmpyrionLauncher.exe (can even drop a shortcut on your desktop). Just make sure that Steam is running (minimize it to the taskbar) in the background before you start Empyrion. The "isolated" version will not get updated, so it's perfect to work on lengthy modding/ scenario building.