You don't have that issue, so you need to be aggressive to take advantage of it. Most factions can assimilate distant planets, but they may have colonization issues in surrounding systems. This means that you can scout far and wide. This is risky, but because you have Dictatorship-Ecologist, you can colonize all non-gas planets from the start. Closer outposts means faster expansions and a better economy. You can colonize anything, so there is less of a need to push to far outposts like other factions sometimes do.
You tend to be good with food, so staying close means that the outposts turn to colonies faster.
This was only my second time playing them (and first on Endless), and I'm pretty sure I played various things sub-optimally. There is literally no reason (other than the developers hate the Horatio) for their ships to be as weak as they are, but It's far from impossible to win with them. Other than that, I don't think they are so bad though. The biggest thing to keep in mind is that you have hilariously weak ships. It was closer that it would be with another faction (and I'm pretty sure I made a mistake when I went after the strongest faction after the mid-game), but it's entirely doable. I think I've heard almost every faction be described as being good and bad from various people, but universally Horatio is thought to be (and I agree) a low-tier faction.