Empires can form colonies on many planets throughout the galaxy. Once started a colony is quite independent from your overall empire. It has its own population , specialists and buildings, as well and its own food and production output.

In order to start a new colony, you will first need a Colonization Ship. Once you have this, you must send it to colonize a planet. This can be done in several ways, but will take time, depending on the speed of the ship, and how far the colonization ship is from the target planet.

To colonize a planet from the Galaxy Map, first select the star system that contains a free planet you wish to colonize. Next, left click your chosen planet, and you will be asked to confirm colonization. Click 'confirm', and if the command was successful, the nearest idle colonization ship will be sent to colonize the planet.

You can also use the Path Manager on the Fleets Management Screen to colonize a planet. First select the destination star system (see Controlling Fleets for further help on this). Next, select 'Colonize' from the action dropdown list in the center, and then select a planet by clicking Select target planet on the right.

When you are ready, click and the entire fleet will be sent to the target star system, and upon arrival will attempt to colonise the planet.

If you have access to the Explored Planets Database, you can colonize a free planet by clicking . If the command is successful, the nearest idle colonization ship will be sent to colonize the planet.

Note: If a planet is already taken when a colonization ship arrives, then the mission will fail, and the colonisation ship will remain idle in the star system of the target planet.

You can access the Colonies Screen from the menu at the top of the page. On this page you can view a rundown of the status of each colony in your possession.

On the left is an image of the planet, holding the mouse over this will result in the details of this planet being displayed at the top of the page. Here you can view important information about the planet and colony. To the right are three columns showing the current specialist assignments for each planet. You can click and drag these specialists from one assignment to another.

Finally, clicking the planet image on the left will open the Colony Information Screen, with the full information about that colony, its star system, and gives you options for building and setting assignments.

The Colony Information Screen can be accessed from the Colonies Page, as described above, or by clicking a planet on the galaxy map.

Once open, this page gives you a full run down of that colony, as well as a view of its star system. You can hold the mouse over other planets to view information about them, and if you have another colony in this system, you may click it to view its Colony Information Screen.

At the bottom of the page is the colony build menu. Here you have several options for customising your colony:

The Construction Yard allows you to place orders for new buildings into the colony build queue. When you click the Construction Yard icon, a list of available buildings will display, categorized by building type. Click to expand the list, and click to add a building to the queue.

Note: Each building can only be built once per colony, and will be removed from the Construction Yard list once ordered or built.

The Ship Yard allows you to place orders for new ships into the colony build queue. When you click the Ship Yard icon, a list of your ship designs will display, categorised by ship class. Click to expand the list, and click to add a ship to the queue.

Note: You can add multiple ships of the same type to queue at the same time, just keep clicking .

The Manage Colony Buildings menu allows you to view and sell (demolish) any buildings that are already constructed at a colony. When you click the Manage Colony Buildings icon, a list of existing buildings will display, categorized by building type. Click to expand the list, and click to sell a building for a small amount of money .

Note: Selling a building is an immediate action, and will remove the building from your colony. You will loose any benefits, as well as maintenance costs you had from that building. You can rebuild the building again from the Construction Yard.

The colony notebook is a place for you to write notes related to your colony (or anything else you wish). It can be useful for recording plans and strategies related to individual colonies. The colony notebook is private to your empire, and will not normally be seen by other players. However, if your planet is captured by another player, they will capture your notes for that colony as well.

To edit or view your colony notes, click the Colony Notebook icon, and type your notes into the space provided. When you are done, click to save your changes. Click to exit the notebook.

The colony queue shows items you have ordered at a colony, but have not yet completed.

All items that have been ordered, require a set number of production points before they can be completed. Until this time, these items sit in the colony queue, and will be completed from the top, downwards.

The item at the top of the queue is the item next to complete. The time until completion is shown, and is calculated according to colonies current production output. Changes to colony output will cause this time to change.

The current number of production points is also shown, and the number required for completion.

You can move items in the colony queue, up and down. This will change the order in which they are built.

You can also delete an item from queue by clicking , this will stop it building.

If you move or delete the item currently at the top of the queue, or if excess points remain after its completion, then the unused production points will be given to the item that then moves to the top of the queue, if one exists. Else they will be kept and used the next time an item is added to the queue.

It is possible to hurry the construction of an item at the top of the queue, by using money from your empire's treasury.

In order to hurry production, click next to the item at the top of the queue, and confirm. When accelerating production in this way, the selected item will be built in a single turn, but each unit of production you buy costs 3 money .

Note: You can not hurry production on a planet that is being blockaded by an enemy fleet.