[geoschmo]

More conflict. Yes, I did not think about that, but I believe you are right.

As far as placement of ships, the AI will direct ships to defend claimed systems based on the level of enemy presence there. This actually should aid them in that as it will allow there forces a more direct route to defend those systems, and thus should be able to bring a defensive force to bear more rapidly and in greater concentration. Or at least it would work that way on paper. Haven't tested it yet.

I started long ago removing or reducing the number of black hole systems from my maps when I play the AI, so for me that wasn't much of a factor. I know that if no alternate route exsists, the AI will send an endless stream of colony ships into a damaging warp point. But does the AI always chose the most direct route even if a damaging warp point is on that route and a slightly longer route exsists with no damaging warp point? I don't know.

This may tell us though. If nothing else, with more routes, chances are better of finding one that is shorter and has no damaging warp point, so it should help the AI some, even if it doesn't help as much as it helps the human players.

Geoschmo