How does the AI research compared to us?

[Sardia]

I've been playing a game in the balance mod 1.12 for 40 turns now. On a whim, I decided to save the game, and check out how the AI's were doing. To my shock, they haven't put a single point into applied research. Does the AI ever get applied research?

[Captain Kwok]

Yes, they do. When they do depends on a number of circumstances, but generally in the early game they are concentrated on the main theoretical tech areas like physics and things of that sort.

[Randallw]

I have a game where I have maybe 50 levels of research. A Nuetral empire I am about to invade has over 100. and it is lower ranked than me. Maybe it focuses on low cost levels.

[Sardia]

What do you concentrate on for the early game?
I always leave half my research points into applied research and set the rest to race up the ship construction tree. When a problem arises, I switch to a tech that counters it in the least time, and then resume ship construction tech tree. Not the most efficient, but I do enjoy having large ships.

[Randallw]

If I have enough tech points before start I go for construction and mines because it is a good defence that will take awhile to counter since you can produce plenty more mines than the few ships at the beginning can handle with mine sweepers. I tend to go for a slight edge in shipyards and research. If I have plenty of tech points I start with both the other colony types. Usually though I like to play with racial techs so I make sure to have them from the beginning rather than spend a year researching them. Drones are good to go for as you can send out probes to rush down warp chains and explore. At the beginning missiles are better, at least for awhile, to direct energy weapons so I research PD to combat them. The enemy will probably do so as well, but if they include lots of PD to stop missiles then they are wasting space if you stick to direct energy. It's sort of a trick to make them devote to a model while you are going in the opposite direction.