1. Take an EE with you. If you have space for a weapon, you might as well use it.
2. Too many rustlers. Take 3-4 max. You don't need it the first few turns, but approx. Mid-game.
3. Dragoon's right. Quanta production is slow. Replace the rustlers you took out with life pillars.
Note: These are pillars because you need the quanta for the FFQs. Pendulums will cause you to not have any every 2 turns
With this, the air quanta isn't wasted even after it is used to make FFQs (EE), the Rustlers will NOT dominate the field, there will be a more stable amount of quanta production, etc etc.