Colonization Recommendations?

I usually save the 14 and under sectors for later, after I've colonized the 15 and above ones. Even in late game, the AI doesn't seem interested in sectors less than 15. (This is normal AI BTW)

Makes sense. And I'm only playing on Normal now. Anything more and my game doesn't last very long...yet!!!!

Nothing is more important than the inital rush. So grabbing all the yellows you can is the top priority. My method calls for saving the PQ 14 and even PQ 13 planets for the second wave that comes later by basically picking one planet to be your colony ship builder. Keep autolaunch off for that planet. When the ship is ready, pick your target, plop down 100-200 million folks (depending on your morale bonus and whether it is a PQ 14 or PQ 13), and send them on their way. A few turns later, when the next ship is ready, repeat. This way you slowly add to your empire.

To keep costs down, build nothing that costs more money than it is worth on the low quality recruits early on. In the early game, this basically means buiding soil enrichment, habitats and a bank. A little later in the game, when the economy is better, I add entertainment centers, research labs, and manufacturing centers. The next stage after that slowly adds anti-matter power plants, stock exchanges, teleporters, stadiums, economic exchanges, and terraforming.

That is a bare bones model. Of course, if a system has specialized needs, add that to the list as well. It is quite common for me to add a news network to prevent a culture bomb if it is a colony on the border of another empire (or, better yet, inside another empire). If I get lucky and one of these lower quality systems has a high influence, then I might add an embassy to help start a culture bomb of my own. And a system that looks like it might be the frontline of the next human-alien war might get defenses, for example.

In the end, these planets turn into PQ 15 or better. They usually don't end up being star players, but they do their part helping my economy and giving me influence.

I do pretty much everything above, but if I'm playing on a map with rare planets, I usually grab up class 13 and 14 planets right away and terraform them up to class 15.

Has anybody actually ever seen the AI grabbing <15 PQ planets on higher diff levels ? Is this kind of a bug or do such colonies not really pay off in the long term ?

I may be wrong on this, but I could swear I've seen minor races appear on those!

Do you mean minor race homeworlds or those minor races that pop up once in a while ? btw, has anybody ever been able to keep pace with the AI´s speed concerning colonization ? Feeling sooo bad

A lot of the initial rush depends on luck. Assuming you are running flat out at 100% spending and between 75 to 100% military, you should be able to gain the edge in the early rush if you and the alien have a similar position. But, if one of you starts in a bad place, then that player is going to be stunted at first and might have to fight or culture flip a way out of it or else might never recover at all. Some people trying to gain an edge on the higher difficulty levels swear by the +speed advantage as well. That extra speed costs a lot of points, but it is worth it if your game strategy relies on speed.

Hm... speed advantage. Completely forgot about that one . Should give it a try next time !

If your evil, I think that you can sometimes turn a 10-14 quality planet into a 15+ planet if a quality "special" shows up when you colonize it. Mid game it might be worth trying it.. let the failed ones revolt or die off.

Rob

True, you can hope for colonization events on bad planets by colonizing them over and over again, but I think that it is real cheesy to try and exploit colonization events. I only abandoned one colony ever, and that was because I had colonized a PQ 3 by mistake instead of the PQ 13 in the same system. If I land on a planet, I intend to stay there.

I do see a case where colonizing a real substandard planet near an enemy to get in range for an attack is a viable strategy (basically, a sacrifice colony), or using the same technique as a stepping stone to a yellow star, but I never had to do that myself. I could live with that if my situation came down to it, but intentionally recolonizing the same planet for events is total cheese.

To answer Khan ThoR, yes I've seen the AI colonise PQ 14 worlds at Crippling in 1.05. Did it twice in my last game.

Ah, that´s fine !That irritated me somehow - felt like exploting to me if only I did it.

I too have seen AI colonize worlds under PQ 15. Everytime I have seen it happen though, it is in response to some new colony rush...usually initiated through the every sector in 2 directions from planet X had its PQ boosted by Y% event. Once those planets are taken, the AI has a bunch of colony ships floating around in space, and they seem to want to use them to form new colonies, even if they aren't good ones.

I have never seen the AI claim less than PQ15 worlds in the beginning colony rush.

Sometimes too a good AI will choose a PQ lowering moral choice when colonizing, and will end up lowering a planet's PQ under the PQ15 threshold, leaving it with a planet lower than PQ15. But that's a rarity.

Minor civs will colonize any world they want, but they always get their planet upgraded to at least a PQ16, even before any social improvements.

All this, BTW, has been observed on my Difficult or Painful games, on v1.04 or higher.
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I sometimes colonize worlds with PQ12.
If one's in the same sector as another, better planet that I've already got, and I want to boost the star system's maximum population (to make it easier to load up transports, or increase trade income), then I think it's worthwhile.
Also, if there are no decent worlds left, then I sometimes colonize low PQ worlds purely to create "special" events, so that I can improve my alignment in the direction of good. (It seems pretty difficult to reach good otherwise, even if you always pick the "good" choices.)


~SDC~