Gameplay Idea

Good question. But I think your "friend" would turn on you long before the issue became relevant. Perhaps you could do it by sponsoring 2 or more minors and manipulating them against each other as well as the majors. Could be an interesting game. Let us know how it works out.

Minor races have no effect on victory conditions, I believe. They also have much worse AI than the major races, since they usually don't have to do much, so I think it would be pretty hard to use them indirectly effectively.

I've never had an ally break an alliance with me before but then again I've rarely been allied with someone massively more powerful than me.

I could also manipulate the major races into allying with me after the minor race has declared war with them, that way I won't get dragged into the conflict. If I get those alliances and build the temple of empathy too I should get a lot of planets through surrenders. This game is likely to take a while to finish so I don't want to start it until I get an answer to the original question.

Minor races use no Troop Transports or Colony Ships. They just appear. So no, you won't be doing a scheme-conquest any time soon.

That's a shame. It would be great if minor races couldn't build colony ships and troop transports but could use them.

I'm pretty sure that I've seen minor races use troop transports.

maybe I'll test it out on an old save game first. I'll let you know how it turns out

Minor races use no Troop Transports or Colony Ships. They just appear. So no, you won't be doing a scheme-conquest any time soon.

actualy i have seen them take over a planet
ONCE

but i saw it.

You can give a minor race any number of your colony ships and troops ships. I'm going by rumor here, but rumor says that the minor races will get around to using them. I don't think a minor race will be all that effective unless it feels that it has a real chance of defeating some of its weaker foes. It's not going to throw its military might against the Drengin if the Drengin already own most of the galaxy.

I do recall a post long ago by another user who claimed to be the kingmaker behind a Snathi rise to power, and managed to get those little squirrels enough guns so that they actually initiated an interplanetary pogrom. At that point, the Snathi more or less just went berzerk and annihilated much of civilization. It's just a story, perhaps a myth, but still, it does fire up the imigination about our true role in the Universe...

The minor races have normal ai but cant use colony ships.
This basically makes them unable to fight competitively in a normal game but to compensate they have a 100% economy bonus.

This means that if you give them an extra planet early on they will not only be able to keep up but their extra economy bonus should give them an advantage.

Id be interested in how you could manipulate them effectively in game though. You'd have to ally early on whilst your still stronger but by the time their strong enough to fight they would have such a stong economy they wouldn't be interested in trading money for an attack.You could just give them all but one of your planets and allow other people to declare war knowing they wont get past your minor race but this is risky and boring.

The best way would be to act like your going for an influence victory ,whilst building that improvement that makes you look stronger than you are,(so your not attacked, and then trading your fully developed cultrually stolen worlds to the minor race for "attack race x" until they get going and start taking on the universe when you can just keep supplying them.

If you give a minor race an extra planet and some troops, they do wonders.

In one game of mine, the Drenjin allied with a minor race. The minor race somehow got an extra planet, and it unlocked thier conquest AI. Suddenly, I had minor race transports and ships every where, and the took over more of my empire then what the Drenj did. It was emabaressing, but really neat to see.

So if you want the minors to do that, ally first, then give them several planets plus tech and money, and they will conquer just as well or better then anyone else.