Hi!

Reading your post I can not point at anything specific, but the general impression you develop too slow. I can suggest you to search the forums for early game strategy tips, like Ok, Let's Help the nub....

BR, Iztok

What general difficulty do you have set? Set it at Normal or below until you can beat the AIs, then tweak it up a level at a time. If you DON'T get the hang of it at Normal, back it down the scale. Once you get the hang of dominating the galaxy, you'll probably be able to go up a level per game for a number of levels. Oh, and put your galaxy settings somewhere in the middle ranges, so there is enough stuff to work with, without giving the already competent AIs too many resources

Focus on building up your economy first. Build little in the way of initial ships except colonizers, and a few constructors on demand, to grab any resources you encounter.
Put about 4-5 factories on the home, a couple of labs, and money bldgs. No morale bldg unless you have a bonus site. No influence even if you have a bonus site, until later, but don't put a non-removable bldg on it. Put money makers everywhere else until you balance the economy, then slowly convert some mid-sized planets with good bonuses to ship builders. Big planets as money farms, except one as the core research base, a home for the tech capital, and eventually the Omega center. Smaller planets as labs.

You can add a farm to bring colonies up to 13B, but don't experiment with pushing them higher than that for now, except you can push a planet with a morale bonus tile to 20B. NEVER take a planet pop above 20, until you feel you're ready to experiment with more extreme strategies.

After you begin to encounter "Them", keep a small, cheap ship with a basic weapon in orbit at every colony. Small and cheap can include armed cargo hulls. This raises your military profile in the eyes of other civs and helps keep them off your back for awhile.

Trade (i.e. freighters) to enhance your income. It probably won't be much of your economy in the late game, but at the end of the opening phase, Trade can be the income stream that finally stabilizes your economy. Plus, your trade partners are more reluctant to eat you.

I emphasize again: learn to do all this stuff (and more - troll the forums for ideas) at LOW difficulty levels. This is a complicated game with a huge amount going on and "SMART" AI. Don't be embarassed to stack the dec initially: think of it as having a simulator available during the long passage to begin life in this corner of the galaxy.

drrider

PS - the above is not my own preferred strategy; I'm an all labs guy; but the more extreme strategies discussed in these forums are just that - extreme. They are suitable topics for experimentation after you have whacked some dumbed alien a** a few times.

Great suggestions so far.

Your economy is the key to everything. Those BC's not only represent money, but resources for your production and research facilities. Your population will typically provide most of your BC's through taxation. Trade (diplomatic and freighters) and tourism provide most of the rest.

The higher your tax rate, the more BC's you bring in per person, but your population growth will slow. Early on, try to adjust your tax rate so that you maintain 100% approval on all planets with lots of room for population growth.

Like drrider suggests, make most of your big juicy planets money farms. On these planets, I start off with two factories (one if I get a bonus tile,) predominantly economic facilities, a farm or two, a moral building, and eventually a fertility clinic.

I also like to put a farm on all PQ13+ planets, but not until I need it.

Good luck.

I noticed you said you turn up military spending at the start and then buy a colony ship when it is almost complete. That might be too slow as someone mentioned earlier. You most likely will need to rush buy a few colonizers, and would be better off with that slider being higher on the research than the military. After the first 2 or 3 colony ships, you can leave the slider higher on research and just have your capital thats making your ships focus on military.

I am always behind on those "top XX" list, yet most of the time I win ( maso and suicidal diff) - Do not pay too much attention to them they do not reflect real situation most of the time

In my latest game, I was the second to weakest military force in the game. I just trounced the top military power. I went from last place to first place over the course of a few months.

How? First of all, I'd spent time building up my alliances: I cozied up to a couple of the mid-level powers by giving them free stuff. and generally kissing buttock. I developed my planets. I built up a good infrastructure and fortified my constructors. I flipped one of my smaller factory planets to a research planet and started researching soil enhancement so I could turn my crappy planets into decent ones. Then I took on a minor race and stole their PQ 15 planet. Lo and behold, the frogs had researched Plasma II: that's at least two ranks higher than any other weapon system in the game. I used my new plasma weapons to build some fighters and conquer the second-suckiest race in the galaxy.

This got the attention of the Tech Cheese (the big dogs, custom race with mondo research bonuses) and they immediately attacked me. My allies jumped in, and TC wound up on a four-front war with me and my allies. Right away, I found out that my Medium-class frigates were no match for Tech Cheese Battleships, so I sold my plasma technology to the Arceans in exchange for Superior Hulls (I think that's the one, the one between Medium and Large Building).

Still, it looked like I was about to be pwned, especially when two of my allies signed peace treaties with the Cheese. I was able to bribe one into resuming hostilities, the other wanted nothing more to do with it. However, I was able to bribe the Drath into attacking the Cheese by exchanging my now obsolete Laser technology, and some cash too. I got a lucky break when a major event popped up that increased my tax revenue something sick. I got a second lucky break when a galactic event increased reproduction rates: my planets were some of the few that had room to grow, and grow they did. I got a third when the Tech Cheese, sick of fighting a four-front war, sued for peace. I took it right away.

Instead of resting on my laurels, I prepared to go back to war. I ordered my tax rate lowered so I had 100% approval, maxxed out production, and switched to 100% research to grab Large Hulls right away: it took me 9 weeks. I then started provoking the enemy into declaring war again by massing my fleets on his border: the Cheese declared war again, and my allies jumped back into the fight.

My first generation battleships turned out to be swiss cheese against the Tech Cheese Battleships: the enemy had a three-to-one kil ratio, and even their Medium frigates could kill my Large Battleships in a one on one fight. I then redirected research to advanced Plasma weapons and abandoned Point Defense on my Larges, focusing on putting as many guns as possible. In the meantime, the Arceans attacked an outlying Tech Cheese world: they died, but they killed the Battleships and my fleet of Mediums was in place to mop up the survivors and invade, capturing the Tech Cheese Research, Industrial, and Manufacturing Capitals (I kid you not, they built all three on the same planet )

My upgraded "World Slayer 2" was nowhere near as strong as the TC's battleships, but I had two advantages: first, the enemy battleships were all using Point Defense, which was useless against my Plasmas. Secondly, with my six factory worlds working at focused military production, I could churn out a World Slayer about every turn. It turned into a battle of attrition: the enemy battleships still had a 1.5 to 1 kill ratio, but they were up against multiple pairs of World Slayers each battle. They would kill one fleet and immediately get attacked by a second, then a third. Meanwhile, my few surviving Mediums and Smalls were running around behind enemy lines wreaking havoc, destroying mining bases, shooting down freighters, running away when the enemy Battleships drew near. My spies were dispatched to the TC homeworld to take out their factories and prevent them from building new ships. When the Tech Cheese and the Torians signed a peace treaty, I bribed the Torians into resuming hostilities.

I then took over their homeworld and used the starport to build more World Slayers. The remaining assault shuttles swept through the rest of the TC worlds and soon eliminated all resistance. In the end, the TC dispatched a fleet into my territory to attack my resource bases. Those resource basees were in the middle of my industrial worlds. It was the matter of a couple mouse clicks to fast-buy a couple World Slayers and send them in: they died, but they reduced the fleet to a single wounded battleship, and the next two ships off the line finished the job one week after the last TC world fell and the Battleship became a pirate vessel.

In the end, the Tech Cheese's graph went from a mountain peak to a valley faster than you could say "PWNED." Three factors helped me win:

1. I had strong allies who could help me shoulder some of the burden.

2. I had a much higher production base and could field more ships.

3. I was lucky. More than that, I took full advantage of the luck I was given.

So if your numbers are low compared to the AI at the beginning, don't think of it as an indication that you necessarily suck. Imagine, instead, how much more awesome it will be when you take them out. The game is pretty good about lucky breaks, bad or good, changing the scope of the game, which pisses some players off pretty badly