8 AI colonies by turn 30!?

Well you can buy colony ships until you run out of money. And not everyones starting location is equal. What I do to prevent wasting lots of time is when I start a map, I save it first, then with cheats enabled I use the fow cheat to reveal the whole map. Then I look around to make sure that I have a good starting location and as do the AIs (sometimes they have a terrible start resulting in a very one sided game where youre god like and thus no challenge).

I also dont recommend researching universal tech first. Go for production or engine tech.

I'd say I'm surprised the AI did so well on Normal (without bonuses), but I've noticed a clear improvement in AI at 1.3. Also, it's totally doable. You start with 2 colonies (home + colony ship), you have enough money to rush buy 3-4 colony ships and some improvements on your homeworld, and there's plenty of time in the next 20 turns to build a couple more. With a decent starting position and a bit of luck... Also don't forget some anomalies give "frozen friends" (extra colony ship), though I find the AI skips graveyards due to pirates. Krynn specifically have three planets in their starting system, so in number of planets owned they would get a little boost to start (easy to colonize in your backyard).

I agree with Annekynn, though I go speed boost first every time. Right at the start the difference between 3 moves per turn and 5-7 moves per turn is huge.

I just deal with the hand the Universe (Random map generator) has dealt me and move on.  I kinda like that not everyone has a good starting position. Randomness is fun.

I do the same, but I typically start a new galaxy if I haven't found a second planet by turn 50ish

Ouch! I've never had that happen to me. I would probably do the same in that situation.   Also, to the original thread creator, if you go through the pragmatic tree first, you can choose the 3 free constructors and upgrade them quite early for like 64bc each to colony ships while building your first (I never buy any colony ships but use my money to buy techs and buildings instead) one and can have 4 colony ships scouting for new worlds relatively quickly. I wouldn't be surprised if Brad or Paul programmed the AI to do the same thing. I remember watching Brad play once and he also used this trick/exploit/cheat/tactic (choose your own adjective here based on how you feel about it) so it wouldn't surprise me to have him let the AI do the same things we can. I've already been impressed with the AI improvements as I see them building ships with my designs, some races actually build out their planets exactly the way I would have. I haven't seen that often but every game at least two races I've captured planets from I have not had to redo most of their worlds because they weren't so bad compared to others that we've seen. After reading Brad's post about 1.4 I'm already salivating at the thought of playing against the new AI...

Thank you all for your comments!

Just to clarify, I also open with speed boosting technologies. I know the Krynn have a 3 planet home system, so maybe the AI recognizes this and build two more cheap colony ships? I didn't know the trick with the constructors, but the Krynn went Malevolent Ideology, so that wouldn't work. Maybe they got lucky in scouting and focused on rapid early expansion. But what strikes me as odd is that they also seem to have more techs than me, and were able to build a few starbases. While I was barely able to squeeze out a constructor (I don't use the default constructor design) and two colony ships. I don't see where they cut corners. If the AI manages that with out bonuses (as it should on Normal), then kudos to the AI and the guys who programmed it

As the Yor, I spent my starting credits on Assembly projects to get my population up, which hardly leaves room for buying ships.

It's possible to get 8 colonies by turn 10.

Without upgrade exploits? 

marigoldran

I agree with you. And i did it with custom races. I read your "colonization" guide. But i must ask, is it possible with vanilla races?!?

Yes, if you redesign the colony ships, rush-buy them, and obsessively restart the game until you're in the middle of a really densely-packed part of the map. 

Still do able.  Key is rush buy with the constructor to colony ship trick.