Well, it looks like Newbie II might be wrapping up soon. It turned violent after all, and my poor Irha-Nrr have been caught unprepared to deal with war on such an enormous scale. Too many resources devoted to preparations for constructing ringworlds for my pacified species, not enough to building up those 30-ship fleets necessary to go head-to-head with a big human player. I am now attempting to negotiate terms with Dragonlord to preserve the lives of as many of my pacified species as possible.
I finally _did_ learn something new about playing against human players by playing Newbie II; they are much better at betrayal than the AIs. An excellent lesson for PBW players, I recommend it highly. I knew it intellectually beforehand, but until you actually _see_ the empire you've spent two weeks (realtime) building in the spirit of goodwill and peace for all races suddenly confronted by military forces you haven't prepared in the slightest for it's hard to keep it close enough to heart.
