I don't think so, even in the demo you can't colonize class 0 planets which are uninhabitable. it makes sense because some of those class 0 planets are gas giants.

although, I wish I could have some kind of mining station to use to put on those class 0 planets, even if they are uninhabitable, they could still have useable resources. but right now, you just can't and the closest thing would be if a space resource happens to be in or pretty close to a star system with no habitable planets, or a nearby star with habitable planets.

This brings to mind the whole issue of how you can bend the very fabric of time/space to your will, but you can't repair the damage done to a planet by mass drivers.

If warping reality as a method of propulsion is possible, how about terraforming? And I don't mean being able to use the red squares .

Warping time and space is possible, and many methods have been used to create FTL travel, or just travelling at C itself. Since the universe is curved, things like creating a bubble wormhole surrounding the ship would make it travel at C. The only problems there are a) dragging a black and a white hole next to each other, moving the localised wormhole they make around, and c) getting out of the bloody thing afterwards.

I'm assuming since in galciv2 they have cold fusion=infinite energy then severely buggering up the fabric of space-time is easy.

And the reason we don't have terraforming is because a) we have space travel, w00t! Bit busy dealing with a massive invasion "I'm not dead yet!" and c) It's a bit like glorified gardening. Ford Prefect, galactic gardener does have a funky ring to it though.

Marcathonas:
cold fusion != infinite energy. infinite energy would violate the second law of thermodynamics. cold fusion (if possible, and that's a VERY big IF) would only supply CHEAP energy, but not infinite.

ALSO, you confuse Schwarzschild wormholes with lorentzian wormholes and both with the functionality of a Alcubierre drive.

Scenery.

there hsould be research into terreaforming..
and fifrent types of terrea forms as of now in real life if any one keeps up with anything they are saying its more then possiable for us to terra form mars.

in game there should be research to terraform certain types of planets and gase giants would require certain technology reg rock planets be basic form of research, water planets ice planets so forth. some planets you should just be able to build habbit tates on.

I thought Mars was a pq4 so you could inhabit it. There are a couple problems with terraforming planets.

First, you have to create an atmosphere that supports life, which on a barren rock would most likely require to BYOA (bring your own atmosphere). On larger worlds this would most likely require tons of material. The average human breaths about 11000 liters, 388 cubic feet, of air in a day. This includes the other gases as well, i.e. nitrogen. If you have 5 billion people on earth that is roughly 2 trillion cubic feet of air used in a single day. This is just atmospheric needs as you would need fertile ground for the planet which would be 148 million square km for a planet the size of earth. I am not sure how much dirt that would require to support life but I am betting it is a lot. So would you rather spend trillions of creds on terraforming a planet or travel a few weeks away and colonize a pq10+.

Second, so you can get cheap air, maybe from sucking from a enemy race's planet, there becomes the problem of balance. Mother earth has spent the last 4 billion years balancing this planet. It isn't as easy as everyone makes it out to balance the ecosystem of a 5.972e24 kg ball of rock. Everything has to be balanced, and when you throw in a few billion colonists that have to be balanced.

Third, so you stole some poor planets atmosphere and you have cleaned out the equipment because it accidentally sucked up some hapless sky divers. What’s next? Maintenance. Some of these planets are lifeless balls of rock for a reason. If they are to far away from the sun you have no heat, or so little that it doesn't matter. This means that once you have colonized a planet there would be a race of how they would die from either freezing to death or starving to death as the local ecosystem died from a ice age everyone should have seen coming. In this day and age i guess you could create a machine to heat the planet, and provide enough light for you plants to survive, but i think heating an entire planet would probably not be cost effective.

Fourth, Lets say you have done all the above in a cost effective way, i.e. got a research victory ascended and used you vast knowledge of the universe, you still have to get the material from somewhere. I am thinking that removing that much mass from any planet may throw the gravity for that particular solar system off. So what happens with the planet you sucked all that mass from and the solar system it is in? I don't think it would be a good thing. Things in this universe tend to be connected, and i am sure it would come back and bite you on the behind.

In the end it is much easier to conquer your enemy’s planets, or find better ones, then to terraform. When it comes to just building habitats, that might be more cost effective, but nothing is better then free, i.e. already has a good atmosphere.

There is a percursor device that will turn a PQ 0 into a PQ13, had it happen in one game where the Torians found this device which turned all PQ0 in I forgot how many Parsec into a PQ13.

It was halarious to see a colony rush in late mid game.

I say after researching a certain technology, all the civs should be able to build one, and just one, Genesis Torpedo (a working one, none of that 'protomatter' garbage ). They can then use it to change whatever planet that choose and it has a random value to how much usable land it will have (but 5+ to make it worth the trouble). This could also be a Galactic Achievement of some kind or something, and you wouldn't want too many. But being able to make 1 planet that wasn't habitable, habitable in that key spot...I think that'd be cool and add to the game a lot

Peter