My personal guide for early game in galaxies with 20+ systems per player.
Flat bonuses (nascent AI and adaptive autom.) are everything at the start regardless the species.
Therefore, my base starting research queue is always as this:
Code:
// Main techs (research and production)
Algorithmic elegance
Nascent AI
Robotic production
Nanotech production
Adaptive automation
// Secondary techs (growth for even more research and production)
Planetary Ecology
Subterranean Habitation
Simbiotic Biology
// Tertiary techs (military power for even more research and production)
Laser weapons
Force-Field Harmonics
Zortrium armour
Military robotic control
This is not the order in which I get them, but the order in which I queue them.
I use the starting colony to get the "best" nearby planet with good habitability. What's best: if there are more than one candidates, I'll get the one that is further away from my homeworld if it will be supply connected after colonisation, otherwise just the closest one.
My first item in the production queue would be a colony or an outpost ship, depending on the proximity and habitability of the second-to-get planet. If it will be supply-connected, outpost ship is the way to go, otherwise colony ship.
Given that in order to get the most from the flat bonuses you need the most planets, growth techs may be upped a few spots if I need them to put into use the colony/outpost ships. That is, if there is no good-habitability planet that will be supply-connected for my starting colony, but there are some adequate planets that will, planetary ecology gets bumped up between alg. elegance and nascent AI except for bad research species for which I put it the first in the queue (i.e. start putting some RPs on it from the first turn). If there are not even adequate planets but there are some poor, then Subt. hab. and Simb. Bio. must be upped too.
I get mass drivers only if (i) playing with a bad research + good(or better) production species, (ii) there is a nearby planet guarded by easy monsters (usually sentries) and (iii) there is no other nearby planet candidate for colonisation. For those species, if I've had bad luck with the nearby planets, I also put The Physical Brain at some place among the first three spots of the queue (the worse the luck, the upper I place it) to get Historical Archives (+5 RPs!) early on.
If I'm not one of those species with bad research and great prod., but I still need one such monster-guarded planet (because there is no other available in the proximities), I just say "live sucks" and stick to the starting plan, scouting for better, further away planets and placing outpost ships on not-yet-habitable planets to expand my supply and to prepare for future colonisation once I get the necessary growth techs.
I place Force-Field Harmonics before Zortrium Armour because that +3 shield can make it damn easy (with proper weapons) to get down some guarding monsters and colonise very nice planets. Otherwise (i.e. I don't need to get down any monster), I just don't care which of the four starting military techs I get first since I won't be producing any ship until I get all four.
Finally, I only queue Orbital Construction (at the right spot so that it gets completed at the precise time I will need it) if I will be colonising/outposting a planet that is just 1 system away from my supply range. Otherwise, it can be delayed until I plan to get anything that requires it.