Hmmm, another question on this in 10 mins. Anyway Im guessing but I think because Minor races only have 1 planet and they are usually full of there own ships, the AI has knowhere to put them. They also might not have the range to get the ships to them. (Im guessing it is the first one though)

The minor races won't try to attack another colony, they will send out a few ships to attack shipping though.

I think the problem might be range -- I noticed something similar, then plopped a starbase down to give increased range, and the ships took off like a rocket after I gave that starbase off.

(reposted from my response in another thread on races not making use of ships given to them)

I too have had ships in and out of range of the receiving civilization not utilize ships I gave them. I've given to major, and minor civs, and play with the AI on normal, and the ships just sit there half the time.


I don't know if it's a bug in the AI, but I had a minor race, that wasn't even under attack from a major power, (but might have been at war.. I destroyed the attacking fleet since the minor race was right next to one of my planets), About every 10 or so turns, the damn squirrel would come back begging for more tech and ships, claiming they were on the verge of elimination, with nary an enemy ship in sight. I got annoyed, and took them down myself. Hey, a class 15 planet is a class 15 planet. (Besides, I didn't want the attacking civ to capture any of the techs I gave to the squirrels when they finally went under.)

*note* it's single planet stardock was indeed full. It was using *some* of the ships I gave them, but not all.. only about half.