Actually there are only two empires with relgious in this game, and I havn't encountered the Norak yet. The toltayan are a thorn in my side but I'm catching up. At this point I'd say the praetorian are a bigger threat even without racial tech - they seem to be able to produce BBs much faster.
Yeah, Devnull has lots of cool toys
I only took 1 racial tech, but there are cross-over components for each (example: chant crystal which needs religious and crystal). They have a cool space monsters AI as well, although I'm not using it in this game.
The devnull AI probably isn't much better than any other mod where people have actually updated the files and test them (tdm, etc.) Thats why I've purposefully limited myself (no diplomacy, not researching combat as much, etc.). I suspect AIC/proportions would be the best AI, although I havn't played it myself.