It can take a while to get your empire prepared. If your in a rush you can choose the faster servers, I recommend Real-Time as you can get your research done within half the day.
It is made easier for beginners to have an economy by making exploring cheaper with the fewer amount of planets you have, therefore encouraging growth. Of course everyday you will inevitably encounter battles and usually its not a total war zone when you come out of damage protection.
Collecting decent planets at the start is essential as it is easiest to keep them by exploring border planets.
To become very powerful is difficult as you are given bigger handicaps on the fleet power you may use when battling, but you will be able to sustain much more fleet thus be out of reach for weaker empires.
This game one of the most complex battling systems which will test your skill at creating good fleets with which to win battles since you can't just overpower your target with thousands of ships as you must be within a certain range of the enemy power rating.
GC rewards activeness in the form of research which you can contiually improve to increase economy. It will also reward alertness:
-as you identify which empire/race will attack you thus using rock paper scissors logic you attempt to build a defensive fleet.
-as you find people who have attack you, you can have a 1 time counter attack with no restrictions, which is an easy way to gain planets.
The downside to this game, is if your not careful or active you can lose almost everything.
Also completing the game via the mission requires time and skill and you need to pay.
But if you don't have a paid account you can complete the game via the "ultimate weapon" which imo is crazily difficult, as your damage protection is reduced by a factor of 24, and every empire on the server may attack you. If you survive 2 days the weapon will blow destroying 90% of everyone resources and your name will go on the hall of fame.
Insanely difficult but excellent if your up for a challenge.