It kinda depends on the galaxy size and planet distribution. It also depends on your start.
One thing is for sure, never build (or even bother to design) any offensive ships until someone either declares war on you, or you run out of reasons to build colonies (should happen pretty early) and constructors. The AI is still terrible at 'sneak' attacks, so if you focus instead on planetary development you can usually easilly and quickly pump out a fleet of warships to counter their aggression should it come. Alternatively, just keep an eye on who has Planetary Invasion, and until someone gets it continue to ignore warships *even* if they do declare war on you.
Personally I don't even bother with adding range to my colonizers (unless starting position absolutly mandates it), it gets your economy running much faster if you don't send all your colonies out as far as you can to back colonize later. As soon as you find high PQs you should colonize them, doing this will expan your range as well, letting you get away without having to add the extra range components. Though they arn't that expensive so it doesn't matter that much, but if you're rushbuying your ships every little bit of BC saved helps.
1) New Propulsion (If needed)
2) Ion Drive (If Needed)
3) Xeno Research (If Needed)
4) Impulse Drive
5) Impulse Drive 2
6) Advanced Computing
7) Basic Miniaturization
8) Basic Logistics
9) General Life Support
10) Impulse Drive 3 |
Wow, if you've researched all that and there are still planets left to be colonized you must be playing large maps with abundant all and few other empires. Of course I tend to turn off my research after getting ID2 to pump out colonies/constructors without as much rush buying, kinda depends on how lucky one is with anomolies too.
