Does the AI knows what to do with Starbases?

[Foraven]

Aside from sending resupply ships, the civilian AI don't seem to know what to do with starbases. I tried to make them trading outposts, military shipyards, refuel stations... The only thing that seem to work is making them all-in-one research centers. If i put stuff from other types of station in it, it never get used by the civilians (ie trade, resort,ship building). What are starbases supposed to be?

[torrenal]

I've seen the dockyards get used to build ships, both civilian and any military orders that got assigned....

There is a hazard to retrofitting fleets at one, however... the star base manages inventory poorly and never gets all the components built to retrofit the first ship, so none of the remaining ships clear the queue. I'd say this base could probably be put to better use, but I usually play maps with a high star count, where such bases would have little utility (a 100 (or whichever the count is) star map and a 1400 star map are the same size -- it takes a ship just as long to travel from A1 to H10, the only difference is in the density of the systems, how closely packed they are).

//Torrenal

[Foraven]

I guess it wasn't happening because i had plenty of spaceports all over the place... Now that i cleared out the extra ones, might have the means to experiment a bit with them..

[torrenal]

Given the choice of a space port in deep space and one at a planet, I always choose one at a planet. You have immediate access to supplies on the planet, and it's someplace ships will already want to visit.

The only thing I've ever placed in deep space is monitoring stations, and most ports I find in deep space, if they don't have long range sensors, get scrapped. Unless I've missed something, you can upgrade ports at a planet but not ports in deep space... (and I'm big on reaping those command center bonuses).

I'll put monitoring stations in deep space when I want to watch multiple nebula for pirates. If I have a star, I'll put the station there (go-go solar panels). There's no advantage to putting the station in a nebula, and placing it within the nebula makes it a target, so deep space is where they wind up.
//Torrenal