Update - played to turn 134, and I had a peek into some AI turns to look for troubles with ship designs, diplo etc. :
Minelayer didn't work correctly, either, yet gave a hint at what might be wrong!
- minelayer FF gathered mines up to ~67%
- switched to "move to *yard planet*", and sat there
- I deleted that order, gave it remote load order for more mines
- issued a remote minelaying order
Ship did that, and tried to return to the yard, again, as the minister was still enabled, but then I got an declaration of war
- and suddenly the minelayer set out to mine some border warp point, all on his own !
=> might be that getting a "target hex" for satellite/mine-layers does not work for the player at least in peacetime!
Carrier on ministers worked -almost- as expected, switching to "Join Fleet" at 644/750kt cargo. Could have loaded some more fighters, even on the way to the fleet, but at least that one was chosen sensibly: nearest/biggest fleet without carrier
Plagues seem to kill "mechanoid" pop on the very first turn, when they appear. There's a plague message, but no "colonists died" message (if there's ever one?). Mood dropped from "jubilant" to "indifferent", though. And I'm pretty sure I had more than 98k pop on that planet, as the neighbouring colonies are of the same age and ~750k pop.
No visible effects in the next turns, though the planet condition still reads "Plague Level 3".
AI diplomacy is completely borked:
First offer is "Give us 5% tariff, and we both agree we won't shoot". Second, within 10 turns or so, is "Intersettle with us, .. (plus some goodies, or badies). Third is "intersettle, and exchange tech", or "Be brothers with us" straight away.
Sometimes in between, there seem to be random declarations of war, albeit very seldomly - with relations "amiable", both for player vs AI, and AI vs AI.
In general, relations ramp up to the best possible within short time, in 13 of 14 cases - only 1 AI somehow insisted on being pissed off, but it was never the one that declared war?!
Worst thing is, the AI players seem to agree to those treaty suggestion more often than not, resulting in redicolous research for the AI, and colonies scattered all over the map, which couldn't be defended if there was any war between the AI, what most times isn't the case.
Sorry to have so much to bicker about, but .. hey .. things can always get better