Whenever i encounter other races there is always the problem of strategic nudity. Every one encountered has no strategic depth because you basically stumble into their defenseless home system a problem even the almighty spacemaster takes time to fix. The way i play it is we are allied before we begin as vicious and pitiless resource war which at least give time for the race to organically grow some strategic depth i.e fleet bases, strategic systems and well trained forces. I bring this up because the more races appear on the scene the more difficult building a coherent story becomes i.e trying to grow several empires fast enough without overusing spacemaster, has anyone a better method. P.S Hopeful the new version will ease this