I have some comments about Stellar Manipulation.
First of all, I concede its current state is something of my design and wishes. I complained about two things:
First, old human tech SM gave 3, 4, 6 LY per level for warp openers. I thought it is not long enough, JLS obliged and changed values to 4,6 and 10 LY.
Second, I complained about _VERY_ slow expansion of agressive races in non-warp games. Once again, JLS accomodated my wishes and lowed SM cost by 50%.
AI plays very well now IMHO. But, and I mean BUT, the combination of those two tweaks made human SM very robust. In the game I play with latest settins, it is very easy for humans to get very effective expansion tool.
I suggest to restor the values of human SM warp openers to 3,4 and 6 LY. It should't be a problem given the new cheap research cost !
Just MHO, may be i'm too harsh on feloow humans
