Unlike my 2 "old" AARs from DA I think I will write this more in a "technical and strategical"-way, not so much supported by a story or going too much into detail.

Mainly because I think there's some lack of current Thalan AARs for ToA ...and as the game is developping quite interestingly and somehow Thalan@ToA@Maso feels about as or maybe even tougher as Thalans@DA@Suicidal

settings:

medium map
very slow Tech
victory: Conquest, Alliance, Influence (I clearly aim for the first one, but I want to have a "way out" in case things run not so optimal...)
7 AI-opponents
8 Minors
Star/Planet-settings at "common"
Tech trading and stealing: on (stealing sucks though ...I hate it )
AIs: Drengin, Korx, Arcean, Iconian, Terran, Altarian, Torians
difficulty: Maso

"cheat" applied: I reloaded map til I got a 300% production tile on my homeworld

plan/strategy: my usual way from DA: strike first and hard, abuse the others as much as possible. My motto: "conquer first - talk later" or "a planet now is better than a planet later"

I won another game at an easier level with Thalans@ToA already, but already realized then that my "old ways" don't work completly anymore. I used to start with a crazy production and get my income from having tons of planets. In ToA due to the lack of factories that's next to impossible and Thalan economy seems to go bust much quicker and heavier and at a much lower production-output. That's also the main reason for getting that +300% tile on my homeworld, so I have at least 1 good production planet at start.

Also I had picked "creativity" - which served me well in my first ToA game - but to say it in advance - was (at least so far) an utter waste in this game. I'm at end of year 3 and it maybe triggered 3 times so far and also at completly useless times (only few turns left til research-end). Whereas I really hoped to gain a technological-edge when it counts the most I would have been much better off by putting that point into basically anything else.  

Year 1

At start I started building a swarm of cheap Colony ships as I expected planets being highly contested in such a crammed medium galaxy. My Hyperion Matrix at the 300% tile worked well for that.

Research-wise I aimed (with some deteriorations) for Invasion tech - which is usually my aim with Thalans to have that first. (I got an economy building early too, as this is highly needed)

I got a handful of normal planets and one "pearl": a class 20.

I was sitting at a "border" of the map, not very comfortable as I had neighbours right away in both corners + the middle of the map.

My direct neighbours were: Torians, sitting in a corner who expanded like crazy. drengin - sitting in the middle of the map and also expanding like crazy. Arceans, sitting in the other corner beside me - who were soon in a clearly loosing position as they got trapped between me and the Iconians which resided beside them.

The Terran lived near the Iconians. Korx lived directly opposite me and Atlantians in a corner between Torians - Drengin - Korx. (look at later posted maps for galaxy-setup)

All the time I tried to trade tech whenever it was somewhat comfortable, which despite me having an very low reaearch output at least until year 3 (when I wote this part) had me very well in the tech-rating, maybe I was even "technology leader" - a bit hard to say.

Due to the very slow research (and my bad luck with "creativity") not much happened "action wise". 2 "super races" formed shape: Torians and Drengin.

Drengins had the most planets of all. Torians also had quite a lot and due to their incredibly pop-growth they soon had a rocketing population (and economy) which dwarved all others.

One noticeable event I still can't really understand. My scouts found a cluster of planets directly at the far end of Torian territory, there were 7 "standard" planets not colonized yet.

I didnt have any hope to get any return from this as travel time was very long and the production lost for other things was punishing, but still I sent 3 "expensive" colony ships to that cluster, both equipped with an Impulse drive in a cargo hull, which made them quite expensive (compared to my usual cheap ones...)

Well, right when they arrived there a good 10-15 weeks later the Torians also started to swarm that cluster with colony ships. I managed to grab 3 planets and due to a rush-bought colony ship there another one. Most Torian colony ships had to fly home unused Anyway...as I said, I have no clue how the Torians could have failed to colonize that. First it took quite long for my scouts to find that. Then when I found it I first had to actually build the more expensive ships (took me 2 turns each IIRC) and finally they had to fly there. And according to the econ charts the Torians economy didnt crash or something but instead was the strongest of all races. well...it's going to stay a mystery what kept the Torians from colonizing those planets before me.

(It may well be, that if I win that game - it was due to this decision as this turned out to be the perfect outpost.)

I expected to find myself in war with the Torians very fast - as i was evil and they are "good"...so I hoped to be able to use that outpost in order to fight the Torians from 2 sides effectively. But soemwhat later I found an even better use for that...and I'm still not at war with the Torians nearing end of year 3 despite them hating me all the time

Here's a map of the situation at the end of year 1, which incidently was pretty much the end of the "colonization" phase:

Nobody had any warships yet and I just started to work on "Planetary Invasion"

I just noticed the population chart shown on this SS and I have no clue whatsoever what's up with it. almost seems as if the chart is still from my current status in the game and wasn't updated when I loaded an old savegame for taking the SS...

Year 2

Year 2 was rather boring and most races started to prepare for the inevitable conflicts

As soon as the Drengin and Torians started building warships they soon began to dwarve all other races in the military rating.

All other races developed about the same - only Arceans clearly had lucked out and lost ground massively with their 3 planets.

The Drengin and the Thalans tried to bully me a bit ... but I never ever, under no circumstances say "yes" to any of such "offers to protect me". point.

Sometime during the year I managed to reach my aim: to have Planatery invasion before all others.

Soon Thala began to pump out 1 Troop-ships (tiny hull+troop-module) every turn+ plus some on my "Outpost" as there was also a planet of a minor race.

I strategically wanted to make friends with Drengin and Korx as they are evil themselves and were most likely to forgive me my intended "conquering of everything I can conquer", so they both got 2 Trade ships (bought "Trade" from the Korx and afterwards sold it to all other races, netting me a nice profit...)

I think end of Year 2 or early Year 3 I also managed to get econ + research Treaty from/to the drengin as I definitely wanted to keep 'em for "last"

Sometime at the end of the year I invaded 2 Minor races - both had kindly started building econ capital - gratefully noticed and taken into posession. (1 was near my homeplanet, the other one at that "outpost")

I bought some strategic techs, mainly "Xeno Factories" after which I switched to a factory-only build-up of my planets (whereas I earlier only had Xeno Labs which I focused to production whereever absolutely necessary)

Then I started to prepare for my first "real" war - and there was only 1 logical choice for that...

Year 3

The first few months were used to send my troops towards the Arceans and gathered my forces outside their planets - yet they didnt want to declare war on me ...so I had to in the end.

At about halfway through year 3 things became interesting for real.

The Drengin declared war on the Iconians (which was a bit unfortunate (Or so I thought) as I wanted them to be my next target.

I had built Eyes of Universe meanwhile which gave me a great view on the action and the action was: The Drengin wiped out all Inconian ships it could find - but had very few Troop ships.

so a quick decision was made: I sent whatever I could muster towards Iconian territory and intended to bribe the Drengins to declare war on the Torians (as they already hated me - and I would probably be their "natural prey")

One turn before I was ready for this the Drengin went nuts. They at once declared war on most minor races AND the Terran AND the Altarians. But not on the Torians. damn cowards those Drengin! I had no idea wether I could still pay them for declaring war on the Torians and wether they could/would deal enough damage to them to keep em busy even if I could

But again 1 turn later the Torians declared war on the drengin for them declaring war on the Terrans.

So all was fine. I invaded 3 Inconian planets the Drengin had thankfully wiped off any defenses. The Iconians core-planets were untouched by the Drengin so far, so I had to do this myself and while the Iconians were no pushovers, it was also no major problem. Their just-finished Micro repair bots on New Iconia were a bonus.

Summary so far (as of end Year 3): I took about 7 Iconian planets, 3 of which I cleared myself, the rest were made defenseless by the Drengin. Unfortunately (for me) the drengin beat me by 1 week for the Iconian Econ Capital. Therefor I took "Snathi" after it was ripped of any defenses by the Drengin 1 week before their Troopships would have been there.

I thing went "badly" wrong: After I got to medium spy-level on the Iconians I wanted to do the same with the Torians...They let me get to "low", but then they neutralized all my 6 spies at once. That hurt - and still does as I never really recovered from that.

during that crazy expansion my economy went bust as I mostly had to use "Information Warfare" to get the Planets..as I just couldn't afford to simply throw masses of Thalans on the planets. for 2 turns I even had to set all production to zero in order to be able to afford some more invasions and to beat the drengin there.

Speaking of the Drengin - while we aren't friends yet, I'm happy that they consider me "neutral". What they are doing to the other races is crazy. They wipe out starbases, fleets, planet-defenses, trade ships ...yikes.

If my economy were just somewhat better I could invade planet after planet after planet ... the drengin do have the warships but they still have the same weakness from DA: they barely have any trooptransporters. The Torians are keeping up somewhat well, being able to destroy at least some Drengin ships, but from being ahead of the drengin military-wise they took quite a dip on the graph.

Meanwhile I collect quite a few Troopships on the Torian borders so I'm ready if ever there is a great opportunity to take 'em over.

But when Drengin went nuts I quickly built some constructors and positioned them "strategically" nearby foreign mining-starbases. And the drengin did the the favour of destroying a moral starbase, an econ starbase and an Influence starbase. Adding to that the military ressource I had from the star + the Influence ressource I got from the Iconians - I feel quite comfortable there. esp. Morale and Econ helps a TON.

I'm slightly troubled by the bug in the Thalan tech tree which means that all those starbases are undefended (and which in turn makes one advantage of evil nil: that you dont have to pay for upgrades of starbases...). So if ever war breaks out with the other races and they still got a Navy worth speaking about I can be sure that I'm gonna lose some as they are naturally massively spread out and impossible to defend unless I'm much higher in tech rating by the time trouble arises (unlikely).

situation at the end of year 3:

The Iconians have 2 extremly far off planets left which they somehow colonized. They are going "soon" (soon is relative with ships mostly moving at 3pc/turn)

I started building some Frigates b then, which at least for a short bit give me the "best" ships in the galaxy as neither of the others have Frigates yet. But I expect the dengin to catch up soon - and from past experiences their first frigates are going to be a shock (as their Small-hullsized ship at least match my frigates in Offense, but at least my Frigates hold some defenses agaianst the Lasers used by Drengin and Torians)

On another topic: I managed to build most Tradegoods and GAs: Eye of the Universe, Galactic Bazaar, Tri Quan, Galactic Guide book, Harmony Crystals, Restaurant of Eternity, Nano recorders + the "captured" Micro repair bots. I'd really like to go for Aphrodisiac, but the research steps needed for that are way too painful. There are so many things to research asap...and with Creativity failing me so badly.../shrug

The question now was....against whom to go next....The Terran would be the "easier" prey as they are heavily haunted by the Drengin - but they have strong ties to the Torians - and if the Torian declaed war on me because I attack the Terran could turn out nasty.

So from that side I should go against the Torians - but they have a navy which still outnumbers mine by far + they have incredibly high-pop worlds which despite the low morale gonna cost me some...

here another stat-page at the end of year ....one thing is for sure, I won't win a popularity contest in that galaxy....but somehow I knew that from the start...

"Year 4"

The answer presented itself on New-Years-Eve.

So...there was the yearly gathering of old "buddies" (ok, 1 didnt take part any more...and for at least one other it's gonna be the last time)...still we met up and discussed something about traderoutes.

Now...seeing as the partiers voted it's of course obvious who had to be conquered next...even though they lost the voting anyway...

It was yet another race against the Drengin whose Troop-transporters arrived first, and yet again I won the race (well, actually I've been there already mostly)

In an heroic move I got 6 Terran planets at once ...but the best part of it was the techs gained from that: Superior Hulls (the one that comes before Large Hulls in case I remember the name wrongly), War Colleges, some invasion tech ....and best of all: Manufacturing Centers....all in all the research of at least half a year saved. That I also got the terran econ capital is just a sidenote there.

Ok..I'm up-to-date with my report now.

I plan upon finishing the Iconian and the Terran, which should not prove to be too difficult...mainly to grab as much planets from them as possible.

As long as the Drengin play the usefull fool for me and kill any resistance I will go on harvesting the planets they offer me.

As I wrote at the start I really want to win by conquest...as I still got to settle something with the Drengin who "forced" me into an Influence win on my Suicidal game (DA).

And unlike the Torian whose military doesn't really scare me (papertiger who mainly keeps it fleet at home) they got the numbers and the quality of ship and are actually USING the ships.

I admit..so far I have no clue how to beat 'em.

My only idea is to have way more planets then them in order to research faster than them sometime (atm I research slower, but gain more techs "otherwise") and to have the economy to support this. The Dengin on the other hand placed some spies on my worlds I just can't remove unless tzhey are on really critical tiles (Manufacturing capital etc). And they stole way more techs from me than I gained by "Creativity".  That's why loosing all my spies earlier really hurts.

One really stupid point is that in theory all races are willing to sell almost everything for the right price. But nobody, not even the messiest minor race is willing to sell that 200-points-research "Space Weapon" to me. Not even if I offer ALL my planets and ALL my Tech for that. Huh?