Thanks.  I'll take a look at them.

Technically you had the same size empires you just had more "space". For the influence game your approach was better.  The AI will expand to nearby sectors once the sector is filled up. They will also war with their neighbors.

I wouldn't expec tthe AI to expand into you and then backfill when borders meet. Thats a human strategy. THe AI will be more organic. 

Illauna,

Thank you for taking the time to look at the save file.  The reason I provided it was to let the devs get a look at how a game played-out by a non-dev.  If you are happy with how the AI civ performed that is a good thing for you to know.  If you saw some things that you think could be improved, that is good as well.  Either way, I just wanted to give you some data to work with.

This also comes down to personalities. For instance using soak 200, the tool devs use to test the AI. Around turn 90 Terrans had forward settled on the Arceans. 

I'm not sure what has been proven here.  I can tell that the Arceans did NOT have as many core worlds as the Cuddly Pandas because they occupied a microscopic part of the map and the distribution of good planets doesn't work like that, that I've seen.  And I also guarantee that this game was not close, at all.  The Arceans were stomped.

I wanted to post about the AI strategy of colonizing class 1 planets early in the game but decided to reply here instead of making a new thread.  IMO, it's bananas.  Why are they (AI civs) doing this, even on higher intelligence levels?  There's no reason for it that I can see, and I'd never suggest doing this to another GC4 player.  Early on, two things are true: your colony ships are precious and your range is very limited.  But if you put someone in the minister of exploration position, your range improves just enough, and you can get a resource or two with constructors to extend your reach.  There's just no way anyone should be getting these class 1-3 planets in the first 50 turns, or even in the first 100 probably.

Am I wrong here?  What's the secret wisdom of getting these things?  I know they do give your core planets some small advantages.  Are these supposed to outweigh getting a class 26 planet and putting a governor on there instead?

I think food had a recent change. Now if food goes into the negative, your population growth stops. Simple as that. I remember when it used to only apply a penalty to happiness.

Also, I was pointing out that the AI has personalities. Not all of them are playing to conquer the Galaxy. They have their own flavors. Terrans tend to hyper expand, Mimot are militaristic and build a ton of military ships, etc...

You can use any starting world Shield, Wisp, Hammer…etc. Im just explaining gc4 game mechanics, you can look at the tutorial. Its very different then GC3. 

Cores only provide multipliers they need the flat bonus of the class 1 - 15 worlds

A class 1 world that has 4 minerals feeding a core with 100% manufacturing is 8 manufacturing.

You should prioritize potential core worlds but its false to say class 1 - 2 is worthless unless your thinking in GC3 terms. 

50% of the worlds are class 1 - 2 by design you will need to colonize those

Thank you for finally replying with something, but I feel like you're still not reading my posts.  Please point to where I said class 1-3 planets are worthless?  And shouldn't be colonized?  Or that I'm not colonizing them?  Also, I feel like you are willfully misunderstanding what I am saying and why this thread exists.  For the first, I'm saying that these lower class planets should not be prioritized in the early game, and for the second, that the AI is not playing the game well and the game is not fun because of that.  My supposition, and the reason why I "jumped" on this thread, is that one reason for that might be that they are not getting good planets.  But regardless, the AI is not fun to play against and it's always a walk-over.  A person who doesn't know that core worlds multiply the resources of colonies routinely destroys the AI, although I haven't gone above genius yet.

Here's how this actually plays out in the early game, as far as I can tell.  If you are getting anomalies then you're already finding +1 and +5 manufacturing bonuses for all worlds for many months.  You can do that and use your colony ships to stake out a claim to something larger than your thumbnail in the galaxy.  Your colony ships require 1 pop cap, and most 1-3 planets have little or no farming stat that I could see and so I assume do little to help with pop growth.  Your core worlds make citizens (pop) and your core worlds let you make more colony ships to then get those colonies.

Your position apparently is that this is all WAI and it's just too bad that the game is not fun to play once you get tired of murdering helpless civs.  Maybe the core gc4 mechanic of colonies is supposed to be a bigger deal than it ends up being and the AI didn't get the memo on that.  Maybe the anomaly bonuses are overpowered.  But I'm telling you this is not or should not be considered WAI.

Well if you looked at the save youd see they have almost the same number of worlds and cores colonized. The OP had also snapped the pic after they conquered the AI. 

I see you just now read the first three sentences of my first post here.  Thanks for backfilling after skimming far ahead.  Doesn't look like the sector is bigger than all the rest combined, looking at the stars in particular, but whatever.

Edit: I don't think these things we're talking about are at all clear but I think this conversation has, eventually, been somewhat helpful.  Anyway, I apologize and I should have started a new thread.