The Arceans play the same stunt game-after-game with me as well... My other major repeat-annoyance are those damn twitchy Iconians... Everything's fine for a while, then BOOM, they hate me. We trade blows, they get stomped, then they try to kiss and make up... Everything's back to normal then BOOM... Idiots didn't learn their lesson. My current record is seven seperate wars with the Iconians before I got so pissed off at them I annihilated their whole race...

The top races are quite varied in the games I've played on a range of maps and from normal to crippling. With the higher economic bonuses I'd say the Drengin have gotten much better, though I can't reliably make that assumption on ~8 or so full games. I've seen the Altarians, Torians, Krox, Iconians, Yor, Arceans and finally the Drengin pull ahead to be the biggest threats. Last game was the first time for me the Drengin wasn't the whelp of the galaxy and the first eliminated. Of course last game was on gigantic and the Drengin had about 1/3 of the galaxy to themselves at the start. The Terrans have always gotten a bum rap in my games so far, but I do often play with tech trading off, or play as Terrans myself. I would say the Yor and the Altarians have been my most consistently strong enemies, though given the right opportunity / placement on the map every race has pulled ahead mid-late game. That's when I attack them, even if they are my allies because I don't like being shown up like that.

I either severly underestimate the Drengin, or I don't. I was across a huge galaxy from them and they appeared stuck in a tiny corner and ready to be obliderated. They declared war on four different nations within thirty turns and were winning against them all while gaining territory.

I sat on the opposite end of the map doing my own little thing while I incredulously watched the mini map turn red and read reports about tribute sent to the Drengin to prevent war, and the outright conquest of the Thalan. How they were able to take down multiple races at the same time amazed me. My Technology, Economy, and Industry outpaced theirs, so they left me alone when their ship's range extended into my territory. Other times, the Drengin don't do quite so hot. Other times they just plain stink. When I finally declared war and took down the Drengin with my Dreadnoughts (they'd just gotten battleships), I found two military resources next to their homeworld. And their three dinky home systems.... Were almost solid inhabitables of decent quality on a solid "uncommon" map.

I find the Drath and Altarians the worse. I have people attacking me for no reason, using with "Drath Fighter mk3-1"

And the Altarians tried to kill me in the campaign mode. The ships I had to make to beat them would have taken a DL battleship one on one

I was about to post that the Dregin typically are battle-fodder- Trade is the basis of the economy, econ is essential for buying things+research and since no one trades with the Dregin-----Dregin are an easy target, particularly mid to late game if the rest of the universe is trading. The Arcean need knocked down in a patch-I purposely excluded them from my last game as I am tired of a yellow map. And its nice to see the Iconians (and the Yor, who also always fall)are a pain to other people as well.

A more general problem is that it seems the good races are overpowered and the evil too weak. If and when the good/neutral gang up, the evil races are isolated and vulnerable.