Neither one of the minor powers were more than a roadbump, which we could expect. Of the two, I found the Lothari reasoning more 'logical' (in the sense of 'the crazy dictator's secret police will torture and kill my family, their family, their extended family, everyone who knew anyone on those lists, and anyone who sees them while they're busy with the above if I surrender or retreat') than the Aurarii. Was it just a case that in both cases the minor empire didn't really believe they were next to a big multi-species empire that couldn't just bury them in hulls if needed?

Each hex can have up to 5 outposts and so for a extremely large asteroid belt (72 hex's) you can have: 16 PU/outpost*5 outposts/hex*72 hexs = 5760 PU and that can have 2880 IU as well.  Admittedly 72 hexs is huge but even a system with 18 hexs (rather typical) is 1440 PU and 720 IU which is a nice chunk of change.  Also they are automatically rich so that is 125%.  It beats easily anything but a benign world.  And after a certain point the growth from the asteroid colonies themselves are non-trivial in terms of in system colonization.

What you say about in system colonization is true.  The Shanirians and the other races I run I do that extensively and it takes an eternity to go through each system shovel the 2 PU to moon x and so on.  But the Shanirian's especially I need to do this as they are "green" so they limit their investment in IU on benign worlds to 100 IU.

As for as colonization goes, I force grow to medium on any world either benign or else that is normal or better wealth.  Unlike the bugs I can't do it in one go but it doesn't take that long when you are shipping a 100 PU per turn or more to the planet.  The RM have the capability to do it fast when they so choose.  Also breaking down a few PU on a Large pop planet is usually worth it.  It is important to be clear that in starfire there are no bad investments.  The only question is if you have a better alternative, but when the answer is "nope" then shipping PU 20 jumps to a normal ice ball moon will still give you a net income increase when the colonists arrive.  There is no way an investment can lose money...the only question is the number of turns it will take to pay for itself.  There is no break to the rich get richer faster and faster that usually kills the game.  The only way I can see to do it is to make a lot of the stuff that in the game has no maintenance (as basically no one likes the bookkeeping) have maintenance...then there is a cost as your empire gets larger.  And make the cost scale somewhat with size...or do something that makes adding a system cost more than the system can make so that people think about if they want to expand.  Stellaris does this but even so in that game there is relatively little dis-incentive to expanding.  It is this cost of empire that has gotten virtually every real world empire I know of...eventually the empire expands to the point it is no longer economically viable to maintain it.  Then an internal or external event triggers it to break down.

If I did this again, I'd probably remove the asteroid colonization as well.  It is very time consuming for me, and like you said, an economy bloat.  Still, with the changes I did make the Cold War campaign has lasted quite a few more turns than the Phoenix Campaign did, so I count that as a success.

I wonder if maybe instead of removing them entirely it would make some sense to simplify them mechanically. I'm thinking of the population limits in Aurora which are usually quite small for asteroids, to the point where one might say that a single colonization mission to create 150 PUs on an asteroid, or whatever the limit is, is the extent of the matter, there is no natural growth beyond that. I'm not at all familiar with Starfire mechanics, but I think that ought to reduce the bookkeeping to multiplying the total number of asteroid colonies by whatever multiplier gives the income per asteroid.

Of course since I know nothing of the Starfire mechanics aside from what I glean from this thread and other AARs, I could be way off base here?

Month 215, Day 9, Disputed Liawak System
Late in day nine, the Lothari force closed on the warp point.  Their three escort carriers were running four light seconds ahead of the other nine Lothari ships when they suddenly came to a halt when they reached just fifteen light seconds from the warp point and their sensors detected the Alliance Fleet.  Swordsman of Stars Hartmann, who was sitting in his chair on the bridge of his battlecruiser, staring at the plot tank, wondering where the Alliance fleet was, suddenly leaned forward as the plot updated to show his escort carrier screen coming to a halt, followed closely by the appearance of drive fields belonging to eighteen battlecruisers or carriers, fifteen heavy cruisers or light carriers, seven light cruisers or strike carriers, and twenty-two destroyers or escort carriers.  Given the fact that his fleet was out-numbered five to one, it probably didn’t matter what the actual composition of the Alliance fleet was.  The ironic thought flitted through his head as the Swordsman tried to find a way out of the trap he had led his force into at the warp point. 

“The enemy force is launching fighters.”

As he expected.  He drew in a deep breath.  “Very well.  The enemy has finally given me a chance to come to grips with them.  They will regret it.  All ships launch carried craft and prepare for battle.”

It was a good thing that the Swordsman of Stars had called the fleet to alert status as they closed on the warp point, as a standard precaution, because the Lothari fleet was ready for battle and its fighters and gunboats were armed and ready.  Even as the fleet’s small craft launched, a message was received from the Alliance fleet.  Hartmann had it transferred to his console, and played it in privacy mode.  It was short and to the point.  The Alliance commander demanded the surrender of his force.  Hartmann was tempted.  They were heavily outnumbered, both in terms of ships and small craft.  Realistically, they had no chance of winning the battle, or even pushing through to the warp point.  Neither could they escape, with the enemy’s fighters pursuing them.  After considering the enemy offer for a brief moment, Hartmann came to a decision.  Surrendering without first damaging the enemy fleet was unthinkable, as the enemy’s next step would be to advance on the home system.  Worse, if word of their surrender got back to the home system, InSec would likely arrest everyone who had ever known anyone in the crew for being associates of defeatists.  Better to go down fighting. 

“We will advance on the warp point and jump back to the Kalizwali system to report the enemy’s advance.  All ships advance at maximum power!”

The Lothari fleet began advancing towards the warp point and the Alliance fleet.  The Lothari escort carriers waited for the main fleet to arrive, then joined with their advance.  The fleet’s fighters and gunboats remained in close formation with the bigger ships. 

The Alliance fighters advanced towards the oncoming Lothari fleet, leaving their fleet behind at the warp point.  The two groups advanced towards each other for several minutes, then the Lothari fighters and gunboats moved out ahead of their fleet, interposing themselves between the oncoming Alliance fighters and the Lothari fleet.  They were grievously outnumbered.  Lothari sensors were now able to determine that the Alliance fighter force was composed of just over five hundred fighters, compared to the Lothari force of seventy-two fighters and sixty gunboats.

When the Alliance fighters reached five light seconds range from the Lothari fleet, Swordsman of Stars Hartmann ordered his fleet to come to a halt, to allow their fighters and gunboats room to maneuver and engage the enemy fighters.  One minute later the two groups of small craft came together in a furball in front of the fleet.  At the last second over half of the Alliance fighter group turned aside, avoiding the battle, leaving the one hundred and thirty-two Lothari fighters and gunboats facing two hundred and thirty-seven Alliance fighters.  There could be only one conclusion to such a mismatch.  The Lothari small craft managed to take out sixty-six Alliance fighters, but were completely wiped from space in less than thirty seconds. 

The Alliance fighters that survived the battle turned back to their carriers, while the second group, which had avoided the battle with the Lothari small craft, raced in towards the Lothari fleet at maximum speed. The second Alliance fighter group launched fighter missiles at the Lothari fleet at one point two five light second’s range.  Swordsman of Stars Hartmann, knowing it was coming, ordered his fleet to divert engine power to engine modulations and to retain point defense for anti-missile defense, and leaving the oncoming fighters to the fleet’s heavy lasers.  The Lothari battlecruisers hit two Alliance fighters with their lasers, destroying them utterly, and while the targeted battlecruiser group’s advanced capital point defenses swept most of the incoming missiles from space, fourteen leaked through the defenses and were absorbed by one of the battlecruiser’s shields.   

The Alliance fighters turned to run back to their carriers.  Swordsman of Stars Hartmann did not intend to allow the Alliance enough time to rearm its fighters, so his fleet followed the fighters as closely as they could.  One minute later the Lothari fleet was ten light seconds from the Alliance fleet on the warp point, and both sides began launching SBM’s at each other.  Two Alliance battlecruiser groups engaged the Lothari battlecruiser targeted by the fighters, but only managed to punch one anti-matter tipped SBM through the Lothari group’s very effective point defense and engine modulations.  In return, a Lothari battlecruiser group launched twelve anti-matter SBM’s at a Rehorish heavy cruiser, but the range was long, and the cruiser group’s point defense swatted the few missiles that achieved lock-on before they could close on the ship. 

The next salvo of missiles was launched at 8.5 light seconds range, and the Lothari BC group equipped with long-range missile launchers was still having a problem penetrating their target’s engine modulations and point defense network.  The Alliance was having the same problem, and its two long-range missile BC groups failed to land any hits on the approaching Lothari ships. 

The lead group of Alliance fighters finally managed to reach the Alliance fleet, but still had a way to go to reach their carriers, which were retreating to remain outside Lothari weapon’s range.  As the Alliance fighters continued their run towards their carriers, the two side’s warships were now within capital missile range, and the Lothari battlecruisers switched to the more capable missiles immediately.  Once again, the Lothari twelve-missile salvoes failed to penetrate the targeted heavy cruiser’s active defenses.  The Alliance ships switched as well, and managed to get one capital missile through the defender’s fire, further reducing the targeted BC’s shields. 

The Lothari ships continued to charge towards the warp point and the waiting defenders.  The range was now 5.5 light seconds, and missile accuracy was improving.  The Lothari battlecruisers managed to punch a single capital missile through the Alliance heavy cruiser’s defenses, reducing her shields to less than half strength, but in return the six Alliance ships equipped with spinal force beams opened fire, scoring four hits on the Lothari battlecruiser that had been hit by the fighter missiles, further reducing its shields.  The spinal force beams were at long range, but as the range dropped their strength would increase proportionately.  In fact, as was common for most Alliance fleets, most of the 4th Fleet’s combat units were optimized for close range combat.  As the Lothari were about to discover. 

With the two fleets now four light seconds apart, more of the ships were able to get into action against their opponents.  The first to fire were the trio of Alliance heavy cruisers that had been targeted for Lothari long range missile fire.  The three heavy cruisers were of the latest Alliance design, and each mounted two capital force beam emplacements and a single spinal force beam mount that ran the length of the ship.  Now, all of their weapons were able to fire, and the elite crews of the three cruisers scored five hits with their six capital force beams, and two hits with their spinal force beams, knocking out a Lothari battlecruiser’s shields and damaging its armor.  The Lothari battlecruiser group that had been silent so far responded with six HET lasers and three spinal force beams of their own, getting five hits with their lasers and one with their spinal mounts, chewing through the heavy cruiser’s passive defenses.  Many of the Alliance beam ships were older, with older beam weapons, and thus not in range yet, but the more advanced ships battered down one of the Lothari BC’s armor and damaged several engine rooms.  In exchange, one Alliance heavy cruiser suffered serious shield and armor damage. 

The Lothari battlecruisers suddenly accelerated as they activated their engine tuners and continued charging forward at full speed, with the one damaged BC and their carriers failing behind.  The sudden acceleration caught the Alliance force by surprise, but at this point the entire Alliance force was within range of their weapons, and all of the Alliance ships opened up on the five intact Lothari BC’s.  Three of the Lothari BC’s suffered serious internal damage, and two of the remaining three BC’s lost most of their shields and armor.  By some strange fate, Hartmann’s flagship was the only Lothari BC that remained undamaged, although two others had no internal damage, yet. 

The Lothari ships continued their charge, with the three Lothari BC’s with no internal damage reaching a half of a light second from the warp point, with the remaining three BC’s strung out behind them, straggling from engine damage.  The six Lothari carriers, which had so far been ignored, were a light second from the warp point.  One Alliance heavy cruiser had suffered internal damage.  At such a close range, the exchange of fire was brutal.  The Lothari, who only had three ships in their fleet optimized for close range combat, came out much the worse in the exchange.  Making matters even worse for the Lothari, some of the Alliance ships had datalink jamming systems on board, and the Lothari were now close enough for those systems to become effective.  And, as a final decisive blow, many of the Alliance beam ships were armed with plasma guns, which they were now close enough to employ.  In the end, when the firing died down, six Lothari ships were left limping towards the warp point, all crippled and slowed so much that they would never make it before the Alliance ship’s weapons recharged.  In return, an Alliance battlecruiser suffered minor internal damage.

The Alliance commander issued another call for the Lothari ships to surrender, but again that message was ignored.  In the absence of a response, a single Alliance battlecruiser group swept the remaining Lothari ships from space as they limped towards the warp point.  The battle was over. 

Cho-sho Watanabe detached his empty carriers to return to Alliance yards for replacement fighters, and the six ships that suffered damage either in the battle or during the race to the warp point.  As those ships set out for home, the Cho-sho set his destroyers to picking up Lothari survivors in life pods.  A fair number of Lothari had managed to reach their pods, but strangely, very few officers had survived.  One pod was found empty, containing only an Alliance datapad, with a note addressed to Cho-sho Watanabe.  After being examined for traps, Watanabe retreated to the privacy of his office and activated the pad.  A video started playing immediately after the pad booted up.  The video showed Swordsman Hartmann standing alone in what appeared to be an office much like Watanabe’s.  Watanabe activated the video and Hartmann cleared his throat.  “If you are seeing this, then I and most of my men are dead.  Know this, we died doing our duty, but I regret that we died facing an honorable enemy such as the Alliance.  This was not my choice, but we, as soldiers, are not always given the choice of the enemies we fight.”

Thinking of the D’Bringi who had so recently been fighting each other, Watanabe could only nod.  “Still, if I do not regret dying in service of the state, there are things that I do regret.  Things that, looking backward, I would change if I could.”  It was difficult to tell, masked as the Lothari was, but Watanabe could hear the emotion in the other officer’s voice.  After hesitating for a few seconds, the Lothari continued.  “You will find things on your colony that will enrage you.  That must enrage you.  Your people will want revenge against mine, that is natural.  But know this, there are many within my people who oppose what has happened.  It will be my eternal shame that I did not act when I could have, to stop the barbarities that you will find.  But I did not, because I feared for my family and relations back home, who would certainly have suffered for my actions.  And so, I was a coward.  Blame me.  Blame those who acted on your colonies in this system.  But don’t blame my entire people!  Most have no blame in this, and would oppose it if they could.  I beg this of you.”  The video flickered out. 

Cho-sho Watanabe sat in shock for maybe five seconds, and then he activated the comm system in his desk. 

“Yes, sir?”  The ship’s CO appeared slightly harried as she was handling all things that needed to be accomplished after a battle. 

“Immediate message to the picket at the warp point back to the Telmasa system!  All troop transports are to enter and proceed to the inner system.  As soon as we are finished here, we will head in-system to provide protection to the transports.  The scout force is to split, with half of the scouts coming here, and the other half going to picket the inner system and the colonies.  Understood?”

Catching his tone of urgency, the ship’s CO saluted and turned to begin issuing orders.  Watanabe’s eyes turned towards the system display on the monitor on the wall of his office.  What was happening on the colonies in the inner system?

For those who aren't familiar with Starfire, or who haven't played in a while, I thought I would post a little refresher on how Starfire colonization works. 

The basis of production in Imperial Starfire is the Population Unit (PU).  A PU is modified by the mineral wealth or lack thereof of its planet, and the race's tech level, and other modifiers, to find out how much mega-credits it produces a month.  A planet, moon, or asteroid can have varying numbers of PU's, with asteroid having the lowest upper limit of 16, and benign planets having the highest limit of 3,200.  It seems pretty straight forward, and it is.  Except, this is Starfire, so everything has to be complicated.  The complication comes with how many actual people the PU represents.  A PU can represent anywhere from 50,000 to 22,500,000 people.  This varies based on the number of PU's located on a planet/moon/asteroid.  Mostly, you can ignore this, as it has no effect on the game, as PU's are the basis of production, not people.  The only place this becomes important is in terms of colonization.  All costs for colonization are calculated by Population Transport Unit, or PTU.  One PTU equals 50,000 people.  So, for smaller populations, one PTU = one PU.  For a very large population, one PTU equals four hundred and fifty PTU's.  This is how the economics of colonization work in Imperial Starfire.  It doesn't make any sense to draw from a planet with a size of small, settlement, colony, or outpost, because it would deplete that population rapidly.  Generally, planets with populations of the size medium, or 400+ PU's, are considered suitable for supporting colonization, as at that size one PU equals 18 PTU's, so drawing PTU's from a medium population for a full sized 150 PTU colonization mission would only reduce the medium population by just over 8 PU's.  That's a winner for the colonizing race, as it is losing 8 PU's at the source population and gaining 150 PU's at the destination.  You can boost a colony's population over 150 but doing so rapidly becomes very expensive.  To boost a small population of 150 PU's to a medium of 400 PU's would take 650 PTU's to gain 250 PU's, whereas those 650 PTU's could be sent to five different habitable planets to gain 650 PU's of income. 

Because of speed limitations, it is most effective to colonize systems within four jumps of your colonization-source.  Anything farther than that increases the cost of colonization, and the duration that the cargo and quarters capacity is tied up.  Colonizing more than four jumps out can be done, but in my standard Starfire campaigns it was rare. 

That briefly is the economics of colonization in Imperial Starfire.  In the Cold War campaign, I have drastically reduced the population growth rate to 20% of normal, if I remember correctly.  This has affected the economics of colonization a lot, and in ways I didn't expect.  Under the standard rules, generally by the time I had colonized the worlds within four jumps of my main colonization-supporting planets, some of the new colonies had grown to medium size and were thus able to support colonies themselves, extending the range at which colonies would be placed.  This is not true in the Cold War campaign.  Only after about 200 turns have colonies planted in the early days of the game grown enough to support colonization.  This means that all of the major races were discovering planets in the 5-8 jumps area, or even the 9-12 jumps area, that they cannot cheaply colonize, because their only source of colonization remained their home planet.  I soon realized that I was going to have to colonize planets in the 5-8 jump range band, and that I was going to have to force-grow colonies to medium size to support colonization efforts by shipping in PTU's to grow the population, rather than relying on growth.  All of my races have been engaged in this practice, some more effectively than others. 

Generally, there are three kinds of colonization taking place in the Cold War campaign. 

The first is in-system colonization, where a medium size population ships PTU's to the other planets, moons and asteroids in the same system.  This is cheap and effective, because each system will support a limited amount of free in-system colonization based on its productivity, and this can greatly increase the wealth generated by the system.  For example, the Rehorish Home Planet produces 12,357 MCr's per month.  The Rehorish Home System, which is fully colonized, produces 17,872 MCr's.  The real drawback of this form of colonization is the time requirement it forces on the player in real life.  Even with Starfire Assistant to help, it is probably the most time-consuming part of each turn, except for actual battles. 

The second is standard colonization of newly discovered planets with 150 PU/PTU colonies.  Both the Alliance and the Colonial Union have been forced by slow population growth to colonize in the 5-8 jump range-band, and sometimes even farther out than that. 

The third is population-boosting colonization, which the races are using to boost the population of existing colonies to and past the 400 PU level so that it can support both in-system colonization, and the colonization of nearby habitable planets.  This is very expensive and resource intensive, since it ties up large amounts of the race's freighters and colony transports.  Generally, my races have reserved this type of colonization for benign/very-rich planets, or strategically or economically important systems. 

The slow population growth in this campaign has really caused a problem for the humans in the campaign.  Since Earth was largely bombed out early in the campaign, they lost their source of nearly limitless colonization, and this has affected all human successor states.  Because this is the first time I've used the slower growth rates I did not anticipate how it would affect humanity.  The Colonial Union ruthlessly plundered the remaining population on Earth to fund a massive colonization spree in the aftermath of the war, and this was effective, but has depleted Earth's population to the point where it is no longer the largest population in the Colonial Union.