[Foiden]

Good point. I noticed this also with ship engines. For instance, once your engines went up a tech level, the cost for them went down. So in a way, they think smarter and found a way to give you the same performance using a smaller amount of resources. Thus ships that are cheaper to produce. Of course, one issue is that the hull size pretty much puts a standard maintenance cost on you. (If I'm wrong about this correct me). In the early game I practically cringe each time I think about making another ship with a 300kt hull. Those things eat materials like mad, to keep in space. I guess that's a part of upkeep that is important. It certainly makes sure you colonize as fast as possible with each new colony ship you produce so that you can get that mineral sucker out of the air. My first game caught me off guard because one moment I had 70,000 in minerals, the next moment it was all gone in a flash. I was like (what happened?) then I looked at my colony ships sitting there and imagined the captains of them saying, "hehe. Sorry about that."