To buy, or not to buy...

from GalCiv2 Forums
I've noticed that during the first turns of any new game on Suicidal, the AI empires spend their treasury as quickly as possible. I've generally tried a "slow-burn" strategy, where I go with a factories-only build using initially 0%/100%/0% production until factories are online, and 1%/99%/0% once I want to start cranking out colony ships. This has generally allowed me to steadily develop a handful of worlds, but of course I end up well behind the AI in number of colonies and especially technology.

My thinking is that long-term, cash is king. Since people = cash (to a point), my idea is to win the population race, and thus hopefully win both the economic and influence race.

Is this slow-burn strategy really viable? Should I be buying like crazy like the AI? Something in the middle?

Note: I've recently been playing on Abundant everything except for Anomolies (Rare), and Very Slow Research; victory is by military only. Finally, I'm using DA v1.6.
strategies
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Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I look at it from the standpoint that any cash you spend in the first few turns needs to be worth the cost. Depending on anomolies, I will sometimes rush buy 3 colony ships on the first 3 turns, because the faster you can colonize the more quickly those planets will produce for you. And I hate being beat to a planet by 1 or 2 moves, that really burns me. I usually wont rush buy a social improvement, unless its a research lab on a 300% icon tile or something like that. If theres a well placed resource that coincides with your plan of victory I might rush buy a constructor, especially if a minor civ is near it, those bast-holes love to build constructors.