Yea DW is a great game. I have all its expansions.

Having one empire 'way ahead' on the tech curve could make it really hard to get ahead. However if mechanics were put in place to allow you to catch up (espionage to steal tech, getting tech upon conquering a planet), then it might be a neat game. Having the Drengin start out in the Age of War seems like a quick path to defeat.....unless multiple Civs were allied against them. 

I like the idea, and it would make a lot of sense if someone wants to play a realistic/more plausible game.

Just think about it: when humanity achieve interstellar travel, there will already be much older, larger and more advanced empires out there, and we will be just newcomers, with less advanced tech and no colonies. Civilizations don't simply spawn magically at the same time... Just think of Mass Effect, where the Alliance is the youngest of the races and therefore the weakest one, but still one of the majors.

Please, make this an option in the future.

You could mod this just give some more starting techs than others. You could maje some tech trees more advanced than others. This would make a great 130 player mod you could give it a fixed map where some own more territory than others. You can make the less advancef races into teamd. In this mod can ee have non humanoid races, cyborgs,  and cyborg aliens.

I'll be the first one in line to purchase that DLC if it has the options that leiavoia mention.

Great idea, you could also put modifiers on old races that have empires in a "state of decay" so that they are crumbling while new pioneering civs are rising up and starting their expansion.