This is just a short post to see if anyone else has noticed this -
The AI in all my games seems to be greatly favoring missile weapons. In the past three games, each with nine civilizations, I've only seen the use of non-missile weapons three times. Twice the Drengin use beams, and once the Altarians used mass drivers.
In addition, I've been forced into using beams or missiles myself. The AI seems to research only armors in the early game. This happens every time. Later, apparently to counter the massive use of missiles, they begin researching missile defenses. I haven't seen a beam defense rating of over 1 in five games. As you might suspect, this means I end up using beams in most games. That's okay. Beams are pretty. But it makes my game easier because I don't have to worry about what defense an enemy might be using, or what attack. I already have a pretty good idea.
Why? Am I alone in this? I suspect it may be that missile weapons look somehow more attractive than other types of weapons to the AI. At least intially I think I can agree. Missiles start off cheap to research go up quickly in firepower. Only problem is their space, of course.