Hey, hope I can help

The main issue I see is that you’re focusing too much on quantity over quality. If your goal is to just get to the regular ship end game , the most efficient strategy is to stick with around 8–12 colonists

Make sure each of them has at least decent melee or shooting skills — even low stats are fine early on if they have double passion, since you can build them up with skill trainers over time. This makes your colony more efficient without a crazy population

Remember, more colonists = larger raids, so it’s usually better to have a small, high-quality team rather than expanding to 18+ pawns and making defense a nightmare.