Tip 17 - First Turn & Shipbuilding

If you start your game like myself, you've set your research and social to 50%, and your military to 0% At this rate you'll never build that snazzy new scout ship, or expand with a new colony ship. 

So early on (first turn) I set my ship-builder to a "colony ship", and then just buy it outright.

It will still say "Build Time: Never", but don't worry.  You'll get your ship next turn.  When this ship is done I'll send it out to explore for new planets to colonize.  At this point you have 2 colony ships.  One can colonize the second planet in your star system (if you want), and then the next can be on the lookout for a juicy new place to call home.

Yikes it's expensive! But usually it's worth it.

The next turn I usually buy a Scout if I'm playing in a Galaxy map that's Medium or bigger.

Note:  You can also choose what ships to build from the primary map screen.  Select your planet by clicking it once.  Then you can click BUILD SHIP to choose the ship, and you can click that little icon (supposed to be a stack of coins) to purchase it outright.  See below:

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