I'm surprised that no one responded to this yet...
1) I don't remember exactly which changes were made since TA 101 but in any case the strengths and weaknesses of the races remain the same.
2) Weapons:
- Lasers: smallest but most expensive
- Missiles: largest but most cost-effective (i.e. most damage per cost)
- Mass drivers: in between both
3) Terran early game & Terran advantage:
You should play this a bit slower than the Yor (where you need to attack soon and make use of early soldiering bonuses) or the Torians (where you can colony rush thanks to their super breeder ability). A major difference is also that the Terrans have much better diplomatic skills, so use/abuse those to acquire useful technologies from other races. It can also come in handy if you sell basic techs for cash to other races, especially minors. Worth noticing is that the Terran tech tree is pretty much the "standard" one, so preferably try to acquire unique technologies from the other races rather than techs that you will be able to research yourself.
Economy-wise the Terrans are much easier to play than the Yor.
4) General early game colonization:
This depends strongly on the galaxy size that you choose (+ whether you choose abundant habitable planets & other options that influence the number of planets in the galaxy)
Can you let me know what kind of galaxy you typically use so I can tailor my advice?
5) Building strategy for Terrans:
Generally speaking the strategy will be pretty similar to what you did with the Torians:
- Use your capital for early production (colony ships & constructors), then economy (economic capital as soon as possible) because of the large population. Add a political capital to keep your approval up.
- Use your second planet (of decent quality, in the beginning don't bother colonizing low quality planets except maybe in a tiny galaxy) for production, again focusing on colony ships & constructors early on. I suggest building your manufacturing capital here and later on use this planet to build military ships. Thanks to the high production, it usually makes sense to build some galactic achievements here as well, since those typically take a long time to build.
- Use your third planet for research, later on add the technology capital.
- Depending on the galaxy size, you might want to develop 1 or 2 more planets to build colony ships. Beyond those, don't develop any planets in the early game. Wait until they have at least an income of 12-15 bc, then fill a couple of these planets with economic buildings. The only exception would be if you have bonus tiles for production or research; in that case you can either fully dedicate the planet to production/research, or balance between that and economy.
Your diplomatic skills will help to keep up with the other races (through tech trading) but be careful not to fall behind by too much, especially when it comes to military - diplomatic skills will only go so far in avoiding a war, especially if there are evil races in the galaxy. So just having small planets dedicated to research may not be enough; in addition you should use a decent planet (or one with good research bonus tiles) to build your technology capital: that 100% bonus should apply to as many labs as possible...
Hoping this helps as a starting point - don't hesitate to post back for more specific advice. It's not always easy to describe what to do with the Terrans since they have the "basic" tech tree; typically people who are used to the older expansions will recognize the Terran tech tree and apply their usual strategies. Instead they will ask for advice on the other races.
