Massive early expansion seems to be a must?

If you want to be a builder concentrate on your duplomacy and trade routes. A trade route to each civ will normally stop them from declaring war upon you. If you have a radically different alignment however you may need to give some of them gifts every now and then.

An advantage in no.s of planets is only really necessary on maso unless you have AP in which case you don't need one early on you can acquire them later from the weaker AI's through a bit of conquest here and there to put you on an even footing.

A class 26 planet is really a great bonus to start a game.

I also dislike conquest, my miltary is always weak and I concentrate on trading.

Start the game 60% Taxes, 100% Spending.

Miltary 100% build colony ships take all the class 15 and higher planets I could get.

Research 100% build Comunication theory, Unversal Translators, Diplomatic Translators.

Social Spending to 100% and go all guns for diplomatic translators.

Set Miltary to 12% Social to 28% research to 60%
Taxes 40 % Spending to give positive cash flow.

Research least time consuming techs.
Build Freights as soon as you get trade, build constructors to increase your range.

Watch relations with major races,
If relations slip bellow nuetral send them a freighter,
offer a cash bribe when you a afford it.
They will come to your way of thinking and when they are friends you still have to monitor relations but you may not have to bribe.

When you expanded as far as you can and can create no more trade routes.

Add modules to starbases you created and build defenses on your systems.


Trade technology with minor races as soon as you meet them.
Do not give anybody diploymatic translators.
Avoid trading tech to major races they do well enough by themselves.

They may come to you and offer something like dreadnaughts for some minor tech, go for it.

But it a major race has dreadnuaghts and you went to them and asked for it. It wost cost too much.



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Thanks a lot for the info! I'll restart that game and try it that way tonight

You are right - the diplomatic translators are a great asset - +20 to diplomacy can do the trick if you want to keep the other races on your side.

I play nearly all my games with no more than 4 planets throughout, and never build any military. As mentioned, trading and diplomacy are the key. +60% diplomacy starting pick makes games a lot easier.

Use freighters a lot - they make slow scouts, but have the best range in the game and you need that if you're stuck in a corner.

Corner starts are the hardest for a builder strategy, as you rely heavily on early contacts for trading, but it is not unwinnable. Good luck.

I don't build any military either (except excaliburs late in the game), but so far I relied on total supremacy to keep the other races at bay... I'll try the diplomacy/trade/bribes trio

Yeah, the populist (i think its them, the +20 morale/diplomacy) party is definately the best for going no military. Also take +60 diplomacy, that way you can talk your way out of any war. And colonize any planet above 14 PQ, maybe even 13, for these planets can still be very productive, and once you get terraforming, there around PQ 18/19 anyways.

edit: also, might want to try the rare setting for stars. Just save game, enable cheats, use the reveal map (Ctrl+U) and see if there are 3-4 yellow stars you can grab. If there is, reload game and play it. If not, Ctrl+N again. With the galaxy on "rare" settings, most AIs will only have 2-3 worlds on huge maps, or 4-5 on gigantic. One AI will inevitably get about 7-8 and try to bully everyone else around, but a few trade routes should help keep him your friend.
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You could have built a starbase to extend your range. Then you would be able to reach more planets.

Or, you could have colonized a lousy planet to extend your range. Abandon the planet when you've colonized a good planet and improved your range.

I rarely take more than 2-3 sectors. I like to build up slowly and expand slowly. Sometimes if my starting sector has 5 planets, I am content with 2 starting sectors. Ideally i like to have 7 planets going at the start.

I then add new planets from minors or any AI that declares war on me. Eventually, when my influence builds up, they all topple like dominoes.

But I tend to start slow and avoid the rush at the start. Let the AI spend its money developing the planets.

I'm a builder. I like the fact that building is a decent option in GalCiv.

Do you have to "land" grab? Yes. You need to come out near or better off then the AI on planets. Otherwise, you'll fall behind on tech. And that can be bad.

How to mitigate "bad"... make sure that your Military Rating is always #1 or *near* the #1. If your military is much stronger then the computer, it will leave you the heck alone.

How do you get a high military rating? Anti-Matter Missiles are the best way. Corvettes will do early on. You can also buy ships from the majors, if you are making enough money.

There's no point in dealing with evil races as they exist only to be destroyed by a good goody coalition.
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Are you kidding Goblin?

The Drengin tend to be my best buddies in MOST games... even though I run a 100 morality! They respect my economic and military power a lot more then those snooty Torians. Those guys just see those lovely worlds my people spent so long making an Eden from Hades, and say "Hand it over. We've overpopulated and need places to keep our harems."

Of course, after I've crushed them mercilessly, they make a good trade good for our merchants to sell to our Drengin friends and trading partners.

(I really do get a kick out of seeing things like "They can relate to our lifestyle" on the Drengin info screen when I've got a 98+ Morality. Or "They respect our way of life." I guess it's all those AMM and Drednaughts looking for those GROSS rejects and drop outs trying to capture my trade ships. Grrrr! Leave my money alone! :))

That may be right, but I never build any military at all in my games except in the late game when the excalibur becomes available - and everybody leaves me alone. On the condition that I'm leading in tech and population (those seem to be the major components)...



I noticed that too - they even give me presents and tell me they could just hug me LOL Even in my last game where they had conquered half of the galaxy and I had the second half, they kept giving me presents like 50BC for 12 turns! And my only ship at that time was my Survey ship

The big advantage of the no-military is that you can invest all the resources you would normally spend on building ships in creating huge starbases by cranking out masses of constructors - while the AI players keep warring and spending half of their resources in their war efforts.

I also think that good races tend to like you even more if you don't have a big/no military, as they often come to me saying they like my peaceful nature and would like to support that by giving me more credits

I haven't seen that in a long, long time. That's cause the Yor decided right afterward that my worlds were just the right kind of places for their people.

Do you gift/bribe the AI? I can play a no-military game, if I keep grovelling the way the AI expect you (and each other) to. But there will come a time when they decide its time to grow bigger by absording you, and no amount of bribing will stop that.

But you said you run the largest pop. That means you have the most worlds. Which means you aren't on the the next target to absord list... the AI likes to start with the smallest (and therefore, the weakest overall) and work its way up.

Indeed - a good starting position and very aggressive expansion are the key, as well as the first few techs that give you a pop growth bonus. Add the pop growth trade goods and you're about set.

As you said, if you're one of the smaller races, you don't stand a chance.



No, I don't give them any gifts, except when a race is in bad shape and asks for help. And I don't bribe them either - I make trade routes with those that are the most likely to be hostile, then I can go about my own business and grow while they tear each other apart

Note: I am mostly playing on normal, so I guess this way of playing would be much harder on the higher difficulty levels, as it is not so easy there to get an advantage in the early game...

The principe you have described are good for higher levels. The important thing to remember is that AI are more likely trying to bully you before trade routes have any effects on relations. So you need to bribe AI that are below neutral relation to avoid them coming to you to "help" their civilization if you don't want a war. You may also need to bribe AI to declare wars between them in order to be their unique trading partner

As for population growth, the following thread as some pointers about when 100% morale isn't longer needed to have the maximum growth on a planet, depending on your empire growth bonus.
http://www.galciv.com/forum.asp?BID=GS&id=153400
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That's good - I'll try it when I'm more experienced with the game mechanics. That's also one of the reasons I like GalCiv not being multiplayer: you would get crushed in every game without any military



This actually also works on lower difficulty levels LOL

And thanks for the link, that was useful!