Nothing to do with Minor Civilizations!!

[MGGebriel]

So I started a game with the newly patched version of the game and ran into a couple of Minor civilizations early on.

There is absolutely nothing to do with them!!

Invest button grayed out.
Only statement is that they would provide food to whoever protects them.
Diplomacy screen provides no clue on what I should do.

Assuming I should address this as their request, I've tried to protect them but nothing happens when I take a ship to their planet!

A little help here would be appreciated!

[frdnwsm]

Have you colonized a planet in their system? You can't do anything with them until you do so.

[MGGebriel]

Thanks a million! I tried searching for days on anything that would point out what was missing without any success, so thanks a lot!

[Exarch_Alpha]

Besides the bonus, they also give votes for the council. Rush to colonize their system - else the AI WILL grab it. It´s top priority for them too.

[frdnwsm]

Their actual contributions are pretty dinky, although ones that contribute research are worth pummping up a bit. But as mentioned, they do give you more votes in the Council.

[Captain Keen]

You're looking at it entirely wrong.

Imagine a system with three ♥♥♥♥♥♥ little planets in it. Like, utter junk. Small, toxic, irradiated, poor planets. The type of planet you'd only ever allow into your empire if you conquered it from some other empire.

Now, instead imagine that same system with a fourth planet in it that gives a max of +9 research to all those planets.

Small planets terraform in, like, 6-12 rounds. They get to have 12 pop. They can eventually feed themselves with one guy on food duty, putting 11 on research, giving each planet an absolute minimum of 20 research.

More like 30.

Sure, it takes a bit of effort to make the most of the indep races. But they are absolutely, definitely, worth it.