The more i play this game the more i realise that there is a massive disparity between families every round. This always seems to go down due to activity but i do not believe it purely activity.. There are massively limiting factors between a family with many members vs a family with few members.

The problems have always been here but its only now, when families are NOT filling up, that we are really noticing these problems. We need to fix the limitations to small member fams, so that even families with less members can actively compete with the top few...

This fixes many of the games current problems such as:
Inactivity - by making small families fun to play
Game appeal - New players can now compete with the bigger fams, less farming, more active players..
Farming - Fams are now more even so less farming.
Fun - Now everyone can have fun - not just the pwning few...

The following is a collective of ideas that i believe are needed.

1.) The explo limit.

Background:
The limit is currently 8 per player...

Change:
Change the limit to incorporate family size. So a 10 man fam in a 10 man max gal would get 8 per day each. And a 5 man fam in a 10 man max gal would be allowed 16 each. Both families get 80 expos per day. So planet growth would now be even. The obvious problem is when a guy joins your fam he takes up 8 expos/day slot, and it takes time to kill inactives. Even so this would not be too often a problem and the advantage of it is still worth it.

2.) Entry To Galaxy

Background:
At start of the round players random and then delete/re-random to get in the big families. This creates a pretty big difference between how many active and good players each fam gets..

Change:
Change the way we start each round. Each round has three start stages. First the round will open for entry and players sign up to  play that gal in the same way they do now. However, rather than land a fam, they get entered onto a list. Once the entry time is up, the list will randomly allocate players into families. This means that family size will be determined purely on how many players sign up, rather than a set variable which we have to hope we reach.
Example:
Round announced as open on 'Announcements' thread. It will have round details and also a date that signups end, with the round start coming two days after that. You go to sign up in the same way you would now. Once the entry time finishes, players will be allocated their fam and be able to go to that account and play. All fams would have even numbers of members, sometimes with one or more families having at most 1 more player than others.

Max fam size for entries after the round has begun will be set by the formula:
Highest number of members in fam at time of allocation * Number of families.

2.b) Disable delete at bor.

As an addition to the above, your delete should be disabled until 48 hours into the round. This means fams are set at bor, no players trying to land with better players. Its all evens.

3.a) Empire large size costs

Change:
This should be family large size costs. Your large size costs should be calculated by family size not player size. Otherwise a fam with 5 players trying to compete vs 10 will have much larger costs with the same number of planets.

3.b) Exploration costs

Change:
This should be calculated by number of planets in family, not by number of planets you own. This punishes families with less players.

4.) Morale

Background: Morale loss counted per player

Another major loss for smaller member families vs bigger member families is the morale loss. Generally speaking, morale loss will be higher as you have a higher planets to player ratio - that shouldnt matter enough for us to need to fix though as most attackers will have small planet count.
The main problem is that the smaller member fam will have less active attackers. 2attackers vs 4attackers = 220 morale vs 440... The bigger fam can do double the amount of attacks as the small fam. This is a major loss!
Albeit, less attackers means bigger fleets on those attackers, generally speaking most fams only have one main attacker to break people and other smaller guys to use thier morale to take planets.. Therefore the benefit of bigger fleet is short lived as you have so little morale in comparison.
I believe the fix for this is to change the way morale max is calculated to incorporate number of family members, so that 6 attackers in 10 man fam have 660. Where as 3 attackers in 5 man fam would have 495(currently 330). Thats 50% more morale for the less attackers.

The overall reason there is such disparity between families is because there were rules brought in to punish big players to try and make fams more even and all its done is punish smaller member fams, not big players.

These changes dont overhaul the game so much as to put everyone on a level playing field, it in no way disadvantages the top fams, it just no longer disadvantages the smaller ones..

Hope a developer or two has the time to take a look at this and maybe take some ideas on board.

Edit: 1 TAG POINT, good thread