[rdouglass]

Boarding is not the only way to get a ship. I use Crew Insurrection (intel II) and many others use the Psychic tech weapon Allegience Subverter or something like that. Then the only trick is to get it to a Space Yard. I keep a DN with a SY close by any empire I'm attacking just for that reason. I rarely ever research Beam Weapons, Armor, or Torpedo Weapons. The AI does the research for me and I just grab the ships and analyze them.