Most IMPORTANT early game tech.

The way I play I do the applied research like you said and after like level 5 or so I get another colony type and build more

as for weapons capital ship missiles and everyone likes drones, so get at least level one and level one warheads and for a while that will be good, unless your playing with a person and not the AI =p

with BM
I go sensors lvl3 and ion engines et least lvl3 (opens CT engines) asap, becose this way i can survey and colonize faster, and i think this gives bigger research boost than applied research. Then i go for ground canon, so my troops have upper hand and conquer enemy colonies. This way i does not have to research other colony types and i can get some colonies of other types. And more important, i gain more type of breathers. And THIS boosts everything skyhigh.

In short, expansion >> applied research.

Being able to colonize all planet types right away works well for me as I can expand very quickly, which means more room for more research facilities. Also good sensors early on makes colonizing even faster. Weapons never really help me much early on as weapon platforms easily defend the planets against early low tech ships, meaning you don't have to worry too much about overextending yourself.

Against AI almost anything works...
Weapon Platforms + Colony Ships is pretty solid vs AI... I've researched to dreadnought before needing to build attack ships in single player.

But I agree, sensors are uber-valuable early on... and if you care colonizing every system you can, then resupply can wait, but engines and missiles (for WP) are gold. Colony types and research are great but don't spend too much research time on them... unless you have a few large research colonies.

In BM I'd say that there is no most important techs. You'd better get intel ASAP, but it's a cheap tech. Engines and sensors are really useful in the early game, but you can also skip them...

Otherwise Mines, Ship Capture, Emissive Armor, Racial Techs, Extraction Techs lvl2, Light Cruiser lvl 1-2 all can change the game significantly.
Every level of fighters also gives a nice boost, and an extra 10 range in any seeker tech can grant you victory.

I would have to lean towards sensors, engines, ship hulls, shields and torpedoes.

Sensors so you can explore systems faster and easier, and because of combat sensors which improve accuracy. As someone mentioned on the boards, at times when accuracy is low (say, due to long range), that little accuracy bonuse could actually be increasing chance to hit by several times.

Engines, because even basic ion engines 'get better', because each level increases the amount of supply each engine carries, so its like getting extra supply storage for (almost) free.

Ship hulls because just one or two extra levels means you can fit more per ship, and need less ships for some tasks, and also means colony ships could be fit with extra supply storage or cargo pods, meaning more range and more colonists. Also, have extra space for...

Shields, because they delay the damage of the ship, meaning less damage to be repaired later on, or even not damage to be repaired. That and you don't need a repair bay or space yard to recharge shields after a battle, making it like 'self fixing' armor. Just have to keep an eye out for those who love using phased polaron beams, although that problem is later fixed with phased shields.

Torpedoes.
Smaller, cheaper, and faster firing than CSMs. Anti-Matter Torpedoes make a good 'poor man's missile', range and hitting power aren't that great, but it's a cheap seeker.
Gamma Pulse has less range than CSMs, is a little lighter, and iirc, is able to do more damage.
Quantum is my fav, at some point, they can do about as much damage as CSMs and have equal range, but are better in that they are 10kt smaller and fire a little faster, which means more damage in the long run at cheaper cost on top of being able to fit more Quantum Torpedoes than CSMs on a big ship.
Also means Small Anti-Matter Torpedoes. The only thing worse than a fighter is a fighter with seekers. Those poor PDs are going to go nuts with all the fighters and seekers to shoot at. Only down side is the little things are heavy as heck.
It does make fighters deadly later on in a storm with combat sensor penalties while the enemy has high level ECM and other defense bonuses, since the small anti-matter torpedoes can still hit easily.

Playing Captain Kwoks Balance Mod, sensors lvl3 definitely, then ion engines 2, missile & cannon lvl 3, small weapons 2 then armor 5 (small emissive armor) and ship size.

Another key tech I found due to ruins special last game is ship capture, because by capturing enemy colony ships you not only get a new race type which allows you to exploit existing colonies with a little freighter work, but you can reverse engineer other colonizer types which are very expensive techs in BM.

I start with level 3 ion engines, because of the decreased shipcost and increased shiprange; I also apply level 3 sensors.

After that, when playing versus players, 1x intel and then MINES!
Gotta lock the other party out asap, and secure your space. If the other guy runs into mines he'll have to send minesweepers; it'll give you a couple of months to prepare whereever they are.

After that... Well.. whatevery is suitable.

~Myrath

hunh... No one's said spaceyards yet? weird. but yeah, being able to build your uber-dreadnaught(or scout with a few popguns attached) in 2 turns instead of 4 is nice.

But thats not early game. I once had AI in my home system, THEN it was early game action (First AI doomed in first year and gone in begining of second (and i was United Earth Empire and they were Terrans, lol))

With Balance Mod I focus on unit techs early:

1. Sensors to Level 3
2. Stellar Harnessing to Level 3 (to get solar sail and that empire-expanding 1 extra movement point)

Then I set research spending on Applied Research permanently to 50% and then I continue with a mix depending on situational needs:

3. Warhead to level 1
4. Mines to level 1
5. Drones to level 1
6. Fighters level 7

Then I branch out based on my style of play. I use drones for cheap scouting since they are the only unit that can both use capital grade weapons and also warp to other systems, and can be constructed on any colony. Combined with solar panels, they can scout out a very large galaxy without slowing down. Drones are the least used unit in the game (and least explored unit since players don't know what to do with them!), but in early through mid games they can be the biggest advantage in scouting out the best places quickly, and in early harassment and defense. In groups of 24 launched together (1 sensor drone, 23 CSM drones), they make killer mobile missile fleets that can saturate most early Point Defenses. The advantage is that they can be constructed and launched (and re-launched) on any planet, and if you have 24 colonies sitting and doing nothing, it's nice to know you can assemble a fleet of Sensor/CSM/PD/DUC drones in a single turn to meet any threat.

I simply rush my empire to 7-10 systems depending on the map and competition, and use mines for early colony defense. I can chuck out enough mines to stop most early invasions in a matter of a turn or two and so then let the colony work on building more permanent defenses and structures. If enemies are nearby, I use fighters to secure the system, and then once the system is secure, I build drones to harass nearby systems. If I can't secure a system with just fighters, and if my fleets are too far away or too weak, I build drones in other nearby friendly systems and mass them up at the warp point and send them to the front to help out the fighters in their mop-op operations while keeping enemy capital ships at bay. This strategy usually buys me enough time to mass a capital fleet and move it in for system domination. I rinse and repeat the process in the next neighboring systems. This keeps my fleets back at home massing and defending where they belong until needed for some big battle, while providing space for the enemy to battle out my front line system units and expending their resources doing so.

There has been many a time when a player I face finally takes one of my systems with a lot of effort against my unit defenses, only to find out that in the next couple of turns that my capital fleets warp in and wipe out their remaining invasion force, and take back the very system they took AND wind up being in serious danger of losing the system they launched from. They usually follow suit with unit defenses in response, but by then I've got a few cloaked drones inside their territory scouting out systems and bombing planets.

Space Empires Wiki

Yes, but drones and fighters lvl7 are NOT early game in BM...

True. I would call drones early-mid tech, and fighters level 7 as a mid game tech. But if you can buy them early before the game starts, drones are totally well worth it.

Space Empires Wiki

Am I missing something? I don't see how you could do something like what Inigma mentioned without researching better spaceyards somewhere....

Missing a big something, yes - drones and fighters do not require spaceyards to be constructed. In a 10 system empire, I usually have 3-5 planetary spaceyards during peacetime, and 5 station spaceyards (two over home planet, three at defensive points). The number almost doubles during wartime, but my production needs favor numbers over big capital ships. I can defeat most fleets with smart numbers of frigates and light cruisers - death by a thousand stings. I only need the occasional big ship to go head to head if I'm only suffering by technology. But with my strat, I'm usually the one that's ahead in tech.

I have found spaceyards as a peacetime mid-game tech, or wartime late game tech, and not early game.

Space Empires Wiki

AAAGH! the goal posts have moved, cant repair tech you dont have any more and you cant reverse engineer a 100% broken component. How capture meson gun without getting blown up ? tricky!

And yeah, I often wonder why people want massive ships, when 20 smaller ones will do a far better job (in custom tight formations). In BM, Stock, etc... pretty much any mod which doesn't deviate from the SE V formula... there's no BIG SHIP to make a difference. I'm talking something that costs 1 million resources and has 20,000 kT space with 600,000 Shields/Armour.

I haven't had any active PvP combat experience, but what I usually go for is a fleet of specialist Frigates (later, Light Cruisers). Though yes, even though I don't like using them much, I do agree that units are monstrously good in the earlygame (and in general throughout really). Their extreme specialism, not requiring space yards and immunity to regular ship weapons makes them difficult to deal with in early game.

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go to this Wiki if interested. No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE

Ernm... if you have good enough Combat sensors you can hit them reliably early-mid game.

Imo bigest advantage of big ships is that if they win battle where they had upper hand, they will have small or no losese, where equaly strong small ship fleet would lose few ships (damaged and sent to repair or destroyed).

Another noticable advantage are mounts (+10 range, double damage, +30% accuracy IS noticable bonus, even if it takes 1.5 times more tonage).

Only seaking weapons on frigate are equal to seaking weapons on baseship.

Maybe it's just me with obsolete experience against AI, but I never took losses with large fleets of small ships. Because all the damage was soaked up by my 'tanks' right at the front who usually had organic, emissive or crystalline armour. That was their entire purpose - have 1 PD and 1 direct fire weapon so the AI considers them a threat, then the entirety of any remaining space was spent on toughness. Repair ships would always be present in my fleets so there never was a need to send anything back for repair.

Now if I ever was to go against a FLEET of big ships, then I'd be worried. But a lone ship with some good mounts etc? It doesn't stand much of a chance against Zerg fleets.

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go to this Wiki if interested. No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE

In one game, AI massed HUGE fleet on warp point. I went around it with fleet of 10 dreadnoughts and wiped whole system (AI still siting on WP), so i attacked that big fleet. And even those dreadnaughts too some loseses. But during fight, a lot of them lost shields and some armor (but shield regen & organics) regenerated them. If they were smaller, they would be dead (and i would win anyway).

When comparing, you must compare resource to resource (small ship fleet is much easier massed, so it can cost much more than one baseship, then of course baseship cannot beat it).

Of course, the above has inherently assumed both races are getting equal research points. We know that's never really the case.

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go to this Wiki if interested. No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE

I'd consider force density. If you can have a max of 200 ships, for example, you start to see why larger ships are of greater value. Your 200 CL vs my 200 DN.

Assuming equal tech, and equal design skill, I think we can guess who would win. That is the true power of large ships.

As long as you don't run into that max ship wall, we can debate what is best. But if that max ship wall is there I think that the debate ends when you take advantage of it.

So, what large ships do is allow you to build greater force density into your fleet.

Oh aye, if you have a low ship limit then of course big ships become important. Also assuming it's endgame and you've had plenty of time to research & build the big guns/components alongside big ships. GETTING to that level of endgame however, isn't always achieved. Hence we come to the age-old topic of RTS games: Tech-rush vs Earlygame Rush (and usually it's somewhere inbetween you want).

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go to this Wiki if interested. No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE

I agree that with same (and relatively low, no same = everything researched} amount of research points, having good weapon tech is better than having big hull with bad weapon.
And thats not rush vs tech, its hull tech vs weapon tech.

But if both theoretical players want to use eg. large freighters, they both have acces to hullsize from frigates to battleship (IIRC). And then batleship user has equal position research wise.

And btw. i don't like ship limit. Maintance should be ship limiter. Artifical ship limit is becose of turn times. But if its there, its there to exploit.

Larger ships also allow you to use more enhancements. for example, the entire complement of religious techs. and their normal counterparts.