I played as United Earth on the Star-Trek map 0.2

Soon after starting I met the Vulcans, Andorians, Tellarites, and the Bolians. We formed an alliance after first signing non-aggression pacts. When we formed a Federation I renamed it to: 'United Federation of Planets' instead of its Stellaris made-up name.

My starting strategy was to focus on colonization. I quickly grabbed all the planets between the Tellarties and Vulcans. So I was able to grab the area around Risa, above the Benzanites, and below the Vulcans. At this point the Federation was formed.

After colonizing the area around Risa I was able to have the Benzanites enter the federation. At that point the colonization drive went north-east, running into the Ferengi and the Breen. I went West past the Breen, then North East again - rounding them. Following that I went North and West, covering the approach to the Dominion, and to the Voth Theocracy and Devore Solidarity (with their Brunali overlord behind them).

During the colonization drive my fleet expanded and upgraded when I felt it necessary. I never went to war. Nor did the Federation as a whole. The greatest difficulty was about generating enough influence points to keep colonizing while also being able to hire science officers, sector governors, and the occasional admirals. Systems with hostiles were usually bypassed until my Starfleet was sent out to clean a bunch of them at once, every so many years.

The first thirty years after the formation of the Federation I made research treaties with my Federation companions. After those thirty years I renewed them, and I had fallen behind in tech due to my many colonies. After 90 years I was well ahead in technology, and I made a habit of subsizing my federal companions with minerals and with energy (and research treaties).

Afer 200 years United Earth encompassed around half the galaxy (more than 150 planets, divided in 11 sectors. The other federated states possessed 5 planets each, on average. In the last 10 year stretch I started giving my federal companions newly colonized planets in the eastern arm of the galaxy. And then moving on while keeping the planet farthest in so I could colonize new ones, and then repeat the proces. This way my federal companions each doubled their planet count: to 10 on average.

I stopped playing when it became (crystal) clear that there was no one in the galaxy who could stop United Earth. At 200 years the Borg were ganged up on, and destroyed, by Delta Quadrant empires.



Ideas,

- Forming the federation should not use the stock Stellaris federation feature. It makes more sense to have the player transform into the Federation, absorbing all members. That may be possible through event scripting, as it is in Europa Universalis IV.

- Ideally there will be event chains surrounding the formation of the federation. So that we can experience the early Star Trek era with separate allies before they become the UFP.

- Solar-Panels on Space Stations played a crucial role in maintaining my energy income. I had a Space Station at every colony, with solar panels. Ideally this is changed into Dilithium and Solar Panels are removed. I would remove the power cost from most buildings, but add it for Starbases and for Starships.

- Techonological progression is too rapid. In less than 120 years I went from the 1st power-source tech to the last one (zero point energy). Ideally there should be a line of tech to increase the effects of an existing power-source tech that you have. So that I can make Fusion more efficient, for example. With assorted ship component and building effect(s). When I research a new power-source it should be revolutionary. This applies to most technologies.

- The map is too small, it needs to become larger. The Klingons don't have enough space to grow. Neither do the Romulans. Nor do the Borg. It would probably be better to have the map limited to the Alpha Quadrant if its to stay this big. Then you could throw the other races in via events, such as Borg incursions, Vaudwaur tunnel raids, and the Dominion War.

- Colonization is too easy and cheap. Its easy to focus on colonization tech as the player and exploit that. The AI will usually fall behind. Either because they get the colonization techs late, or because they don't want to focus on it, or both.



Other experiences from my play-through in no particular order,

- My ships changed from Early Star-trek to TOS versions during my play through. That was cool.

- I had a number of Star-Trek events fire. That was nice. The events seemed well written.

- There are a lot are a lot Romulan races in the galaxy. I counted at least 5 empires with the race 'Romulan'. That seems like work in progress, inaccurate depiction of certain races with romulan as a placeholder(?).

- Whenever I became Federation president I made a whole lot of ships which would pass to the Andorians, who would assign an admiral to that fleet. And then apparantly it stays in their command. The Stellaris Federation features make no sense.

- Upon becoming Federation President new auto-generated ships were added to my ship-design list. Despite having that feature off. A Stellaris bug.

- My federation companions were passive the enitre game. They were a handy source of migrant pops for all my new planets. And their fleets deterred the Cardassians in the early game, and the Romulans later on.

- My Starbased went from 1K firepower to around 600 firepower when I researched a default Stellaris weapon tech, which Starbases use. I believe this is a bug. I researched practically everything.




About other AI Empires,

- The Borg appeared threatening for a while. But after 150 years they were smashed to bits by a coalition of the Brunali, Krenim, Devore (Brunali vassal), and the Voth Theocracy (largest empire in that quadrant). The Kazon also piled on, seperately. In the end the Borg lost almost all their territory. And there was a new race of liberated Borg(!?) with who'm you could conduct diplomacy.

- The Cardassians did quite well. They conquered the Bajorans, and threatened the Ferengi as well as myself in the first 60 year period. At their height they possessed 11 planets. But they got hedged in and the Ferengi grew more powerful due to conquering large parts of the Breen while the Cardassians were busy being rivals with the Vulcans and the Andorians.

- The Ferengi are very warlike. They lost Ferenginar to the Cardassians after 60 years. But instead of collapsing they went after the Breen and rebuilt their fleets. They conquered around 10 Breen planets in two seperate wars. Including Breen itself. I shielded the five remaining Breen colonies in a northern pocket by closing borders with the Ferengi. So the Breen survived. The Ferengi were never angry with me. The Breen were always hostile.

- The Klingons got stomped by the Nausicaans, the Orions, and finally by the Romulans. They ended up as a Romulan vassal. In total they had around 6 planets. I periodically gave them a research treaty, energy, and minerals. I was positioning to support their indepdence in case the Romulans became an acuate threat.

- The Romulan Empire did quite well. They had around 21 planets. They covered the entrance to the two south-eastern spirals of the galaxy with their colonies (as seen from the Alpha Quadrant). But they didn't focus on expanding into those galactic arms. They were apparantly content with having cut-off the Orions. The Romulans once asked me not to colonize a planet on their border. I refrained from colonizing it (destroyed the colony). We had a Neutral Zone that way.

- The Voth Theocracy grew to be the biggest empire in the Delta Quadrant. After 120 years they were close to reaching the (outer) Galactic Core. But I got there first and colonized it all. They had two wars with the Borg in total. The Voth won both.

- The Dominion was the largest AI empire around. They had more than 30 planets. I was never afraid of them, they weren't very warlike (4 wars the entire game). They co-existed with an empire that called itself a Remnant (of something) which was colonizing down one of the spiral arms (towards Tholia). Several minor empires also existed at its border the entire game. I made two of them into protectorates. Those then promptly declared war on the Dominion, and were occupied, but no peace was ever made (more than 60 years).

- The Brunali Empire vassalized the Devore Solidarity and conquered the Vaudwaur. Not much to say about them, other than they finally piled on the Borg with the Voth Theocracy and with the Krenim. I never shared a border with them, but I did with their Devore vassal.