*sorry was supposed to be a quick question, it got long, ignore the second part if you like*

Newbo question, but one that bugs the hell out of me every game.

Sometimes on a planet screen I can merrily repeatedly click 'build' and the same building will be laid down. The game will helpfully select the next tile and keep the same building selected so I can lay down about 10 of the same building in about a 2 seconds.

Sometimes it decides to de-select the building after every time I hit build. Which annoyingly means I have to keep selecting the building again and hit build then reselect the building.

I can't figure out why it works quite randomly one way or another. Whats worse is I'm fairly sure its an amazingly simple answer, which is why I've never asked until now.


P.S

The reason I like it is because of my planet setup. Which while I'm on this maybe I should quickly set out encase I'm doing something wrong here.

I usually play Crippling and win most of the time so will be looking to go to Macho soon.
I normally play Neutral/Good, Huge map with uncommon stars, abundant everything else. Although I do mix that up now and again.

I have 6 types of planet.
My HW is a bit of everything, as thats all I have to begin with.
The core worlds, normally right by my HW are full of trade goods and wonders.
I have maybe 2/3 builders, because of nice bonus tiles which are all manufacturing.
The occasional planet is pure research if it has nice bonus tiles.
All the rest are 1 factory, 1 moral, 1 farm, 2/3 Research, the entire rest is Income, these make up about 90% of planets.

I set my sliders to 20%,20%,60% and every planet gets focus, depending on type. All, planets stay social focused until built. In the early mid game I'll pile into researching up income, factories and research (in that order) then put every planet on social focus until all are fully developed.

What I do is colonize as much as possible from the start. Normally building one 1 trade center on each to avoid bankruptcy until population is enough to break even. So I end up with a good number of colonise. Pay the other races to go to war alot so that anyone who is hostile towards me is too busy to fight me.

I avoid building any fleet until I have at least harpoons, and then I focus on getting total majesty. The reason being I can have a spin control center and avoid having much of a fleet at all. This saving allows me to develop my planets better.

The problem is all my games are looking the same, I either get attacked early in the game and loose crushingly. Or I survive the first two years and then the rest is a forgone conclusion. I'm getting much better at managing the other races to avoid them attacking me early so win almost all games now.

So now that most games result in a win after I have finished turtling, and finally attack with a fullish tech tree. Normally by the time I am on my last 2/3 races the tech tree is actually finished and I turn all my research buildings into income buildings and I can just buy my friends through influence starbases.

Im thinking maybe games should not have to last until techs are complete, and second if these tactics will fly on the next level up?