Starting is the hardest part at higher difficulties...

[HellishFiend]

At harder Starting positions it mostly halps to kill every jump gate expect 1 aroud you planets so you know ehere the first waves are coming from. Then i love to get the havybeam turrets and some emp mines.

The set up is then that the EMp mines buy the time for the turrets to take down huge potions of the incomming ships. The other turrets are reserched after i see what starting ships the Ai's have so i know what will be coming through the wormholes.

Ah use the Rane on the turrets so some Ai ships can't shoot at then but they can shoot at the EMpd ships the tractor beamy have some nice HP, so then wil live a bit at the portal, perhaps in a very hard wve i send 1-2 Shild gens over to protect the tractor turrets with some bonus hp and give the wave something toi shoot at, so my turrets will live a bit longer. But don't use the gen from you home station for it ^^.

Then perhaps don't build to many ships at the start that cost to mutsh ress ( figates / Starships ) you will need some but not all of them. So a bit more fighters and bombers to kil figates and bombers are better, the AI fighter will have problem with you forcefield from you home station bt a 500 Bomber wave can be realy hard to counter with 150 Frigates build

Interesting dictation but very good tips. 

[Tusoalsob]

Ah forgott one thing 

In a Big enemy wave or when CPA's doing to overlapp withregular waves is can be realy helpfull to part a Rocket at the incomming gate of have a roket in the system to quikly reduce the number of ships breaking through the defences. In early game it costs only 1 KI-Progress and kills mostly a complete wave to have a roket siting next to the jumpgate so that thi incomming ships open fire on it and aktivate the roket.

For that you shoud det the roket up in the direction in incomming ships wil leavt the jumpgate and fly to the command center.
                                     T
                                     T
        ( Jumpgate )R  x       T                                                                                  ( Command station )
                                     T
                                     T

with R= Roket / x= Trectorbeams with the jumpgate in range / T = Turrets with the jumpgate in reach

[Winter Born]

What you have not indicated is the type of map and # of wormholes into your home system or your prefered bonus ship. As I move up in dificulty I tend to pick starting planets with fewer wormholes -- the extreme for me is a spoke on a spokes map (one WH to defend) As for the bonus ship some seem to be more defense oriented (teleport battle stations can get anywhere very fast, some bonus ships deal engine damage)

Some other thoughts on starting strats.
Now that mines are mine "fields" I put a ring around the WH and add more later based on how the AI ships disperse.
An Ion cannon from the Zenith trader is an AI ship magnet even if only 1% complete.

Now that Home world starts have 3 clusters to defend the # of home world WH and whether the AI has teleporting and or shield ignoring ships definatly dictates how many and what kind of turrets I build 1st. I also tend to move the FF from over my metal and crystal converters to dbl up on the human cryo pods as they seem to pop real easy and cause AIP.
I will also on occasion build 10  mercenary parasites to get AI ships early along with a rally post at my cryo center and the control node to pull those ships I cap under cover until repaired.
I also am a big fan of the MRS and tend to unlock it fairly early I will park one within repair range of the rally point to repair capped ships. I build (1) 100% tug to repair my fleet during lulls. and a few 66% and 33% tugs to help reduce losses during attacks.