So far I've been steadily building up my economy. I'm doing a mine --> automine conversion, attempting to get past a horrific corundium crash that has all but stalled my economy. I'm 30 years in and teching up with 36 research labs (corundium crash means no new ones probably until next decade).
Mars is fully terraformed, but no industrial base (no minerals).
Alpha centauri is connected to sol, and is a jump dead end, which I think is great. Terraformed one habitable planet there. It is quite mineral rich, but still light on the corundium, so I havn't been able to turn that into anything big yet. My geology team is leveled up to about 350, so I'm trying to really use them before they start dying off.
My jumpgate constructors are beginning to roll off the assembly line, so i should have nice trade between two very safe systems within the next couple years.
My starfleet is pretty weak. A few patrol ships which likely won't stand up in a fight, but my technology is starting to come together so more may come online soon.
So I am in an early game industrial expansion phase, weak militarily. I've ordered a few new shipyards and are expanding the existing facilities.
Is my early buildup phase lasting too long? Three decades is a lot of 30 day cycles. When do people typically start aggressive exploration and military investment? I had a lot of room for safe expansion, so I didn't want to poke any hornet nests.
