So I have set out some posts about how to play, but here is the most important part of any game: the start.

I personally don't know what race I like the most, but I played Vasari quite a bit.

So when i start, what should I do?  Imagine this is a 2v2 where there really are no roles of feeder and attacker.

Personally (with quick start), i get an egg, scuttle cap ship factory, get maybe 4 more scouts to do what they do best, get maybe one or two skirmishers, build a civilian research thang and max out for the terran population, build a warfare research thang and research the assailants, and research fully the first phase missile tile (by now, i sent out my egg to a nearby asteroid to take it).  Then i try to get as many assailants as possible, I get maybe 5, and then i get rushed, or something, or i feel like i need a bigger fleet to take on the enemies.  I get into a pickle.  I build more fleets to take over planets, but the planets are already in the enemies hands.

Frankly, after this point i dont know what to do.  I dont have a sense for when to research what. 

In the begining i tend to ignore planets with many pirates, and usually end up getting asteroids.  A problem is that when i get the asteroids, the enemy attacks, and my fleet is busy repelling their fleet (which is quite often huge compared to mine), so i cant get the planets with many pirates, but the enemy can.  So annoying, lol.

I want to be self sufficient, without asking for feed to repell people.  For example, in the beginging of a game, yellow tec came to attack.  I got feed to repell him, and then to build defences.  I got many assailants and destroyed his capitol.  Then his existence was in my hands.  He came wave after wave, and i destroyed him wave after wave.  I didnt bother to attack, as i went to get blue tec on my other side.  All his fleets were elsewhere, and he didnt really mind me taking his asteroids.  I won by only surviving, and mostly with enemy feed (for about half of the game i had my home planet and an asteroid).  Also, this was a 5v5.

Now,  Tactics.

I suppose this is after i start, but my last game that i played, i was tec attacking advent, er they were attacking me.  I had a better start in this game, a 2v2, as it was less crowded.  He had scouts, illums, and diciples, and a Mothership.  I had scouts, lf's, lrm's, a few hoshikos, maybe 1 or 2 carriers, and a colonizer cap.  I made my scouts attack his illums, lf's attack his scouts, and lrm's attack his diciples.  I do focus fire kind of thing, where i select all (fore example) scouts and shift click on all the illums in the collapsible tree, so they all attack one at a time.

My teammate told me to focus fire on his cap, but i decided not to, was it the right choice?  I started to evenly take out his ships, but we were still on the same ground with amount of fleets (he started with more, and ended with more before i retreated).  In the end i continued with this tactic and got reinforcements.  He went to my home planet, which was defended by a lava planet with pirates, and when he got to my home planet (which i defended with a buttload of mines around my repair bays and pretty much all my buildings, he decided he didnt want to deal with that, so he started to leave.  At that point i focus fired all on his cap and got it down to about 1400 health and no shields. 

Then he went back to the border between our stalemate base planets, which both had repair bays 1 sb and factories.  (i defended my sb with mines).

Then he quit and his partner quit and we won.

ALSO!  on a funny note.

I was attacking a stray enemy's asteroid, when his teammate came to defend it.  Prior to that i (as vasari) had a mine laying ship and put them near the asteroid for kicks.  I focus fire with my assailants and lvl 8-ish cap on his lvl 1 kol battleship.  I almost killed it when he started to retreat.  He hit everymine except for two, which did the finishing blow.  It was great.

Thanks,

Zlotbot