I had a three way alliance going (Myself custom, Humans, and Altarins) vs. the Arceans and Drenjin. We proberbly would have won (I was averaging 11-1 kill rates... not bad if I do say so), but he culture snowball kicked in, and suddenly the Arcean culture was causing rebellions in planets two sectors away from thier nearest base. It was kinda hard to fight that, my empire was smart, but not big (huge gal, tight clus, few stars), and so i couldn't hold anything I took from them (would be in rebelion five turns later or so). Then the Drenjin begain to bet the Altarins like the family mule, so it went down hill quick. Eventually, with only a couple colonies left, I destroyed them myself to prevent them from falling into enemy hands (Masada style).

The Iconians raped my empire with just transports...

Horrible, horrible. They sent one transport at my undefended Research planet (at the time, none of my planets had defense), I rush-built a defender and sent it to my Research planet, but couldn't afford to rush-build any others. I thought my little Defender would protect my research planet from any future transport agression, only to see six Iconian Dropships appear on the edge of my two undefended economic planets... crippled my empire beyond repair...