[Atraikius]

I happened to notice a noticable weekness in the Rage this weekend, (to some extend it seems to effect most of the races though) In one game, the Rage were destroyed by an AI player in the first 15 turns or so, but I'm not sure who did it.

Then in a game yesterday, I started in the system next to them. After a hostile message from them refusing a Non-Aggression treaty on turn 4, I immediately began attacking them without declaring war, and ended up wiping them out by turn 9. From what I could tell, the problem lay in the fact that since I did not declare war, they never shifted to the attack or defend construction que. This resulted in them not building any noticable defenses on either of the two planets they had, and the continuation of construction of thier colony ships (Which were promptly destroyed).

I have two possible suggestions for you in this case:

1 As a majority of the combats resulted in a stalemate, each time I attacked, thier current anger settings resulted in them getting a little happier with me. This prevented them from reaching an anger level in which they would declare war on me, thus preventing them from switching production to warships and defenses which would have stopped me. (I believe this is what had happened to them by an AI player earlier, with the AI player attacking but not becoming angry enough to declare war, while the Rage did not become angry enough to declare war either).

2 Once again, as a warship or more sufficient planet defenses would have prevented me from eliminating them, either of them earlier in thier exploration que would have given them the protection they needed to hold on long enough to build more warships.