I found it!

[Melboz99]

Well, I've been searching to find out how many bases can be built. I started a customized map 250x250 and 90% ocean as the Pirates. Around 2400 I was building another city, or so I thought. It asked what to name it and then acted like I had just skipped my colony pods turn. Well I went down the list of bases one page at a time. I counted 100 pages with 6 on each page. Pretty logical eh? Oh, also, in the security nexus where it listed how many bases were building cruiser colony pods, the number rolled back to zero at arornd thre hundred bases like an old odometer at 100,000 miles! So anyway 600 bases is the limit. To bad obitital power transmitters don't work right in that situation!

[LoD]

Geez, 600 bases! How long lasted a turn?

LoD

[Melboz99]

Operating on a 700 athlon it took maybe 3-6 seconds, but the teraformers took another 5-10. Anywho, I just tried something that expands on my 100 page theory. It turns out that when you double your resolution it doubles how many bases fit in a page, which doubles how many bases can be built. So at least I know how many can be built. I don't think i want to build another 600 bases though. Oh, and I beat the game a couple hours after I posted the last message. I trancended, then bought around 20 planet busters and wipped all other facions off the face of planet. I was making roughly 25000 energy credits at the end with tech all the way down at 3per turn. average base had a prodution of 100-200. tell about 20 of them to make orbital power transmitters and let the cash roll in!