Vespae VI - New Turn-Based 8 Player Game - Tick 0 Cycle 0

Vespae VI looks like an interesting turn-based game that will be a challenge. This will be my first Solaris turn-based multiplayer game, though I've been preparing for it with some turn-based 1v1s.

With it being turn-based I'll ensure to do a comprehensive end-of-cycle update every time but will likely do briefer mid-cycle updates when interesting things are happening.

Rules

The ruleset is fairly standard with 6-tick jumps, 5 starting tokens, all tech at level 1.

The Galaxy

Wow, my start has a lot to digest. A binary star, an Asteroid Field, and 2 wormholes one of which goes right into an opponent's starting stars. Good quality starting stars and high-quality stars nearby, however horrendous jump distances between expansion stars. All things considered, this is probably a good starting position but it has the potential to be a bad one. In particular the long jump distances between stars and travel time present logistical problems and I'll need to get to HS2 earlier than I usually would

Objective

The aim here is the same as always. My priorities in order are:

1) Win, if winning is possible.
2) Finish as high in the leaderboard as possible if winning is not possible.
3) Survive, if a high place in the leaderboard is not possible.

Other players

This is a pretty experienced lobby. The other players here have won 63 games between them at the time of writing versus just 16 from the 7 in Trani. 

Innoble (29 win, 231 rank points) I've seen this guy racking up the 8p turn based wins so I'm considering him the favourite for the game and most likely to win/biggest threat.
LimitingFactor (24 win, 130 rank points) Only played with him once before in Mintai where we never shared a border. His start makes him most likely a key strategic enemy vying for the alliance with Inerz. 
Necria (13 win, 54 rank points)
CRISPR (6 win, 192 rank points) I've never played him before, to my knowledge.
Bubblegum war lord (2 win, 19 rank points) An unknown player.
Vik Ia (1 win, 33 rank points) I'm allied with him in Abyss I, but he doesn't know it and I don't intend to tell him. I wonder if he'll notice from style of writing though? 
Ktoc (1 win, 16 rank points) Played in my last game. We were at war all game but I think it was good spirited. I don't think we'll be allies here based on geography but I'd be willing to be.
Inerz (0 win, 3 rank points) Played with them in Trani, they probably didn't do enough diplomatically there but we had reasonably good neutral relations

Early Strategy 

• Covered in the screenshot of my galaxy, but in short - be nice to everyone, expand east. Watch, listen and assess what is going on. Try to avoid conflict over either wormhole.

Diplomacy

• Reached out to the priority 3, Inerz, CRISPR, Bubblegum to get a feel for where there head is at.
• CRISPR says they want an alliance which works for me, they're in a good spot geographically to be an ally so I'd be happy with this.
• Inerz wants to work together more this game because they worked too much in isolation last time. I'm happy with that and trying to negotiate a fair border with them and tech trade.
• No word from Bubblegum yet. 

Tactics

• I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried about Bubblegum buying a General and punting it through the wormhole on Tick 1. This would be devestating and as I need to use tokens to expand I won't have a good defence against it. This sort of kamikaze tactic would lead to a difficult war for us both and is not rational so I'm really hoping they don't do it, but I need to use my tokens elsewhere for expansion so I'm not wasting them on a Colonel yet.
• Current plan is to stick 29 ships on the wormhole that connects to Bubblegum ASAP and just a scout through the other wormhole.