I have a suggestion for a change to the game. I haven't tried any betas so this is based on the original patch.
Every game for me starts out with the AI grabbing planets so fast that I have no choice but to buy a colony ship every turn until I run out of money. I have to rush these ships to star systems as fast as I can and hope I'm fast enough to get some decent planets. The initial ship range is so large that my opponents and I can colonize many, many star systems from the start. This doesn't seem very realistic to me and I end up placing very little importance on engine and life support techs for much of the early game. Also I have very little interest in low numbered planets as I'm rushing to find the 8+ ones.
I have ended up making most of my games with only 2 opponents and making them below average intelligence just so I can get what I feel is my fair share of the planets. This tends to lead to games that I am too dominate in by mid-game. Just about every game where I try to use more opponents I end up getting totally shut out of good planets early and get crushed early on.
My suggestion is that you change how starship engines/life support extend range. At turn 1 you can reach only the nearest star systems and exploration would be very limited. Assuming civs don't start right next to each other this would give each civ a chance to colonize their part of the galaxy in the very beginning and a civ would spread out more uniformly from its start. After researching engines and life support a civ can then begin to move a little farther out. Make the range increase a small fixed value so each early engine tech increase, you can reach only a few more star systems. Perhaps later at warp drive or higher you get the range that you start with right now.
Interaction with other civs would come a bit later which would be good as I seem to meet them before I can even get a translator researched. This change would also prevent the AI from getting a survey ship out first and then grabbing every anomoly on the map. Similarly you would have a chance to get constructors out to resources in your area before the AI can.
