Thank you.  I had read the thread before posting, but I was not aware of that faq.

Ok first off, I'm not putting down the game or the project.  I love the effort into renovating a quality game. 

I know it's quality because I enjoyed Star Control 3 and the consensus is that 3 is a pale imation of 2 (from what I hear).

I just burned 3-4 hours trying to find what makes it fun.  The only ships I can build are human crusiers, the only ships I can fight are Ilwrath and the virus like ships with the lightning attacks, both of which are uniquely suited against a long range/slow firing/homing missle ship like the humans.

So it seems like the only thing left to do is mine until my mothership is powered up.   So I mined for about three hours.  I've got manuvering jets maxes, 3/4 of the thrusters in place, 3 ion cannons, and it still can't survive either of those two enemies charging in and blasting away at close range.

What am I missing here?  I really enjoyed SC3, and I want to enjoy SC2, but it seems that my only options in the campaign are endless mining (not what I am playing this for), or continuous suicide by Ilwrath.