So i been playing with the map designer in the game and find it nice to make my own game against the NPC's on Hard

i have 3 questions related to the map designer though.

1) if i create a large map 4 stars and around 100-200 planets if i put in lets say 3 pirate bases per star does that make much larger pirate raids? or is it just the closest one to there target move out?

2)On the slider for neutral colonies if i put that all the way to the top and put no pirates in my map does that make just all the planets have a neutral colonies or does it make the ones that does have large fleets in them?

3)I would really like to not have the pirate bidding war going on in AI games to easy to defeat the pirates and to easy to defeat the AI using the bidding. I know this has been mentioned many times with the pirates but mine a bit different. Do neutral colonies ever attack or do they just stay put and wait for me to come wipe them out? and if they dont is there a way to mod them to do so or a mod that does do this?

Edit:) just loaded map editor and use the neutral slider and the colonies have a small fleet and base so in my mind the longer it takes me to get to the next planet to colonize the bigger that colony will be due to them building (I think lol). if this is how it works i could make the game interesting wihtout have pirate bidding if those colonize increase in size.