[Q]

ZzZ your choice to research fighters seeems very reasonable to me. Especially if you have Version 1.35 of SE IV, where there seems to be a bug that makes fighters extremly hard to hit with conventional weapons!
My next choice would be small mines in the orbit of your colonies, if the rage have not too advanced minesweeping components in their ships.
If you have any attack ships left, try to make a counter attack on their colonies. Even if you loose your ships it will weak them quite a bit, if you are able to destroy some of their planets.
Besides that try to colonize systems away from the Rage. You might even find new allies (I am an optimist: of course you could also find new enemies!)
Good luck!

[This message has been edited by Q (edited 09 May 2001).]