Two questions:



1) When going for a diplomatic victory, you create alliances and keep peace as much as possible. but by doing this, are you not also bringing the other AI races closer to diplomatic victory? If so, how do you prevent them from achieving a diplomatic victory before you do?



2) When going for an economic victory, does raising your tax rate increase your victory points towards that ends? or is it your over-all wealth, before taxes are factored in, which determines how fast you gain points towards an economic victory?



Thanks in advance.

I won with an economic victory once, and it felt as if it was the overall wealth that counted.

earlier in the game I had spent quite a bit of dust and the victory percentage varied a bit in answer to that, but I hardly changed my tax at all.

but perhaps you should trust later answers from people who really know.