So, the beta's got maybe a week left before we get the release, I don't know what will happen to the Spore rush, but it sure was fun while it lasted. If you've got a few hours to play beta before it's gone, you may want to try it, cause it's fun. My last game I played small galaxy, 4 aliens, 2 minors on Suicidal, and basically I was at war with the whole galaxy the whole game. I started it.

The basic rundown of my strategy:

1) Choose Korath, and +50% military.
2) Do your normal starting strategy, buying factories, colony rushing, etc.. But don't sweat it. You only need enough planets to get some reasonable research capacity, and you have access to the Toxic planets. Other races don't.
3) Now for your REAL "colony rush": research Spore. Muahahahahahhahaa. When you do that depends on what size galaxy you're playing. On a small galaxy, do it when the colony rush is pretty much over. On larger galaxies, you'll have to do it earlier or the other races will start orbiting ships. Spore Rush means sporing their planets before they orbit anything.
4) Build spore ships, but also be sure and have some extra colony ships lying around. You'll need them to seed your new Toxic planets with population. Have them tag-team your spore ships.
5) Take out any nearby minors. But first, trade all your tech for all their techs and money. Then, that same turn, take them out before they have the chance to trade. Congratulations--you just "colonized" your first class-15, well developed planet.
6) Go and "colonize" your neighbors' home worlds. Once they lose that, you have effectively neutralized the race. If you time it right, you can get their manufacturing capital in addition to your own.
7) Continue with your "colony rush". Take whatever worlds you wish; you just may want to be careful & choose you enemies wisely on larger galaxies. You should be able to use the weapons techs you traded from the minors to build some fighters. They'll help take out orbiters and those starbases you decided you want for yourself.
8) By this time you should have a pretty decent number of planets. Use them to reseach your way to Interstellar Republic, Economics, Xeno Entertainment, etc.. Turn your economy around as you normally would.
9) Research Xeno Ethics, but don't choose Evil. Why? You've already got +75% military, and you don't need free invasion tactics. It's between Good and Neutral. (In my book, it depends on what alien races are left and how many yellow starbase resources you've got--if you have 2 of them, choose Good. If not, choose Neutral). Yeah yeah yeah, you just poisoned billions of people, you're not Good. Who cares, good is a relative term. Those aliens didn't need to breathe anyway. Pay your 10bc/turn in indulgences and redeem yourself.
10) Go to war some more. It's not like you have to burn billions of population invading planets, you know? The entire line of Planetary Invasion is optional (although you can still invade stragglers to steal some techs).


Any others have their Spore rush strats?