[Growltigga]

Andy, the cargo button is very useful indeed!

As all the AI have declared war on you, it sounds like you have gained 'Mega Evil Empire' status. This is a default option which makes every AI irrevocably declare war on you at the same time. It is triggered IIRC when your points get a certain percentage above the points score of the 2nd placed player.

IIRC, you can turn it off by going into the settings.txt file and where it says Mega Evil Empire typing False instead of True - I may be wrong so dont try this uunless one of the modder gurus have confirmed this

Heavy research IMO is a human thing and as to what to research, that is the fun of trial and error

Retrofitting is CRUCIAL - try it out and get the hang of it - you will get whomped without it

Re spaceyards, any units built by a spaceyard will be AUTOMATICALLY stored on the planet, no shuttle transport is needed - a spaceyard built say at a warp point will need internal cargo bays to hold the stuff unless it is launched

Re components on a spaceyard, I just do bridge, life support and crews quarters and 1 spaceyard module, if I am under attack or at war, I may upgrade them to include 1 missile or a couple of point defence cannon - depends what is going on and how I feel - to quote the TV show, the choice is up to you