Can you give some examples?  I'd be interested to see if there's a way to solve such problems without putting such heavy restrictions on gameplay.

This already can happen if #2 and #3 are allies.  What this would allow though is #2 #3 and #4 to all gang up on #1.  I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing, because if #1 has friends he can also get them to fight back.

This is what I mean, right now the game is essentially a round long chain of fam-vs-fam or ally-vs-ally.  I don't understand why such rigidity is a good thing.  What sounds more fun to me is if it's a free for all and the bottom ranked family can recruit 5 other small families of mostly inactive players to launch a campaign against a larger and more coordinated family or alliance.  If they're too uncoordinated or inactive to do so then they will fail anyway.  If they can actually pull it off then why shouldn't they be rewarded?

Or to put it on the flipside, the top 4 fams could all agree to work together to dominate the round.  They might be pretty successful up front but this would also allow 20+ families to challenge them all at once.

See above.  That sounds like way more fun to me honestly.  I wouldn't consider this "shady" but rather it could make the game more challenging for the top fams and also give more opportunity to the small fams.

So you've been honorable all round, you're going to win the round because you played fairly etc, the rest of the Galaxy doesn't think you deserve to win (percieved farming, dodgy moves, or just don't like Render winning) so they all drop their NAPs and send you to the bottom. You forget the crap that has already gone on before when it is an Illegal Alliance, is it even worth playing with certain people knowing that their head hunted by other players? Why bother playing for a month when you can lose it all in one day?

This is important though.  People at the top being a target for those who aren't is not a new thing, nor is it a bad thing in my opinion.  If that family in your example wants to stay at the top they will have to strategize defensively more than they do now.  And they wouldn't be sent "to the bottom" but rather they would lose their standing.  Why should they be guaranteed a top spot all round just because they were successful in the beginning?

What you point out is reflective of rank churning.  If it's harder for the top to stay at the top, only the very skillful will be able to actually do so.  Right now it requires skill to get to the top, but not the same level of skill to stay there.

I haven't forgotten.  I think these rules were added with good intention but I think they were the wrong changes to be made.  Not only are they restrictive but they also involve human understanding and intervention (the mods).  What I am suggesting is to remove (or at least modify) these rules and address the underlying imbalance more properly from a programmatic perspective.  You can prevent a player or family from losing everything "all in one day" by implementing new game mechanics.  What we have done instead is tried to prevent it with vague rules that require guidelines to be interpreted by a volunteer staff that is already scarce in time and resources.

Restrictions are a touchy thing.  Restrictions that require judgement calls to enforce are even worse.

I just don't believe a fair fight should resort to "asking" for help. Losing planets then sending retakes to planets which are now in the hands of the Fam you beat earlier and are now NAP'd to because that was the only thing the beaten Fam could do to get their round back on track. Next thing you know you're down 100 planets because you got shafted by the Fam your fighting because they handed those planets to another Fam for "safe-keeping".

You a correct in saying the established rules turn away new players, but surely this is at the bottom of the list as to why. I mean, half a day for something to build (provided you're allowed to)? Having to do what you're told "because thats the way to win"?

Halve the build times. People these days just turn the x-box\psp\wii\PS3 on. Has anyone actually thought through the Psychie of the current players? Obsessive compulsive springs to mind....

Well, we can't change galaxy types to that degree yet but it is something we want to do.

Although, I think that is besides the point.  You said it pretty well here:

I think that is very true, but think about what that actually means.  To me, it means the game's design has resulted in that only the obsessive compulsive types do well at this game.  We've filtered out the casual gamer.  I don't think we should tailor to just the obsessive compulsive, I think we should broaden the range of the type of players we are able to keep interested.  This will increase overall activity and make the game more enjoyable for newbies and vets alike.

This goes back to the comment I made about the game being formulaic.  If we disturb the formula that is required to win, then people will no longer do this to new players.  Right now the vets know exactly how to win this game, it's just a matter of who can have the most active family and who can get the most obedient new players.  Removing or changing the IA rules would disrupt this entire system.

I disagree that this is at the bottom of the list of things that deter newer players.  It's not clear perhaps, but it's imo a huge factor in the activity problem we have, which is very high on that same list.  Smaller families have no place in this game as it currently stands.  You either accept that you're going to lose and try to play for fun or you give in to apathy and stop caring entirely.

This attitude isn't good for the game, and directing new players to a special higher-paced galaxy isn't going to fix that.

That's a fair point, but again I think it comes down to defensive planning.  Cancel wars would still happen but if you want to protect your shares then you'd better laser up or have decent op defense.

Cancel wars are great and should be encouraged, but as it is many of the current families will never even get to experience them.  The proposed changes could enable that experience to be had by more players.

If anything is abusable it is rules that require interpretation, such as the current IA rules.  People often complain about the mods not doing anything about blatant IA.  Unfortunately, "blatant" IA is difficult to prove which is why we often can't act.

Removing the IA rules and supplanting the shifted balance with tweaks to the game mechanics would imo solve this abuse, not cause more.

I'm not sure what the specific tweaks would be.  That's part of the challenge: finding out what is needed and figuring out the right way to find a solution.

In essence this would be a "do over".  At some point in this game's history the staff saw a problem and the IA rules were added to fix it.  It's time we recognize these rules as more hurtful than helpful, and re-evaluate our options.  We can't do that until we rid ourselves of these rules to expose the underlying imbalance.

Indeed.  I agree that a change this significant should be handled very carefully.  The good news is, it doesn't require any code changes to try!

Speaking of trying, we could always give it a whirl for one round for one galaxy and see what happens.  Even if it fails, we'd still gain valuable insight into the underlying imbalance.  It's been quite a long time since those rules were enacted.  We need to refresh our collective perspective.