My Haman account is actually staying pretty manageable, and that's despite fighting constant wars.
The trick is to have plenty of active allies you can collaborate with, and to look for lopsided wars. I take out small players pretty routinely--- not inactives mind you, but little outlying empires. I'm about to crush a fifth, and I've already got my sixth conquest picked out. From there, I arc-spam the surrounding pace until I link up with my main empire. Once a week, I log on to put on upgrades for my planets. Takes about 30 minutes to an hour.
Again, you've just got to limit your borders. Get solid allies on most sides, limit wars to one or two areas. I may be about to have my first big war here soon, but we'll see...
