Personally,I do like fiddling with colonies,but they take the fun out of the game when they re fully equipped. Nothing can get past a fortified colony with a Star Fortress and multiple fleets patrolling it. Obviously, they will have a use in future updates,but I feel that the fact that OUR colonies can get so powerful and self suffucient,Core World faction colonies feel relatively weak.Not saying that the should all be pumping out capital ships,but giving at least capital worlds a really good fleet would make them more realistic.
Not to mention,when player colonies are fully set up,money becomes a non issue,so part of the fun of exploring to make ends meet is taken away. You just have functionally infinite money.Again,future updates are likely to change that,but unless there is some real money sink in the future AND the colonies don't produce enough credits to eclipse every other form of income, they will still remain a relatively shallow aspect of the game,which is a damn shame.I am sure many players,myself among them,love seeing their colony flourish from a small outpost to a self sufficient fortress. The story points change was a major step in the right direction IMO.