Vodyani.

Made of Dust/Data? Check.

Vampirism? Check.

Religious/Zealous? Check.

Fleet based (Repent! For tomorrow you die!)? Check.

Cool ship designs? Check.

Human-like enough to be related to (destroyed own planet, find purpose in goal beyond themselves), but not a purely human faction (Ardent Mages are my favourite EL faction)? Check.

Small numbers, elite individuals trope? Check.

Awesome design (including glowing parts, the Cloth being both clothing and plot point, and naming scheme)? Check.

There are other things, but I think I've made my point, and some of those are reasons I don't want to play the other factions anyway (can't bond with Cravers/Necrophages only-war attitude for example).

Only thing I don't really like is the way religion has been made the opponent of science by the devs, especially since the only religion in-universe we've seen so far involves Dust manipulation, living in advanced science-based suits, and using technology of forebears, which doesn't seem anti-science to me logically, but I don't know if that will ultimately be enough of a problem for me to not bond with them with all the other nice sci-fi elements they have that I'm a fan of.

So far Lumeris for me.

I like the aesthetic. :D

Might change once I see the other races though.

lumeris I think.

 I generally hate the colonization aspect of games and always forget to build the proper amount of colony ships (PS PLEASE MAKE TALL BUILDING VIABLE K THX <3).  I'll eventually adapt and remember how to play wide and handle early game colonization without murdering my own start, but in the meantime the idea of "get dust than god and just buy planets, and flip the ones you don't like" seems like it might mesh well with my ideas.

I already played the game so I voted for the ones that were my first pick - Cravers ^_^

I don't really remember why they were my first pick though, in my first game of ES1 I picked Sophons

I would go first on Sophons, to power through the entire tech tree and better see what can be useful or not. And then I would test the unique gameplay of the Vodyani, which seems really interesting.

I think ill go with the Sophons first, i love their ship designs!

I'd have to say the Cravers. Love their ship design. Probably will try the Sophons or Lumeris next, then the Vodyani

Either the Vodyani or the Lumeris. I don't normally go 'peaceful trader', though.