Wat do u want to see in civ 5?

[Brizey]

I would like to see tech disparity removed to a degree. Right now, a lot of the game seems to be focused on tech slingshots and basically getting a huge tech lead (low levels) or not falling hopelessly behind (high levels).

My suggestion is to have certain techs be granted automatically after some portion of the other civs have it. This would add much realism. Sure some tech slingshots are needed as gambits, but there has to be some sort of damper.

In other words, a single leverage type strategy should not work for the whole game. The old CS slingshot was almost fool proof on low to mid levels. They "fixed" it by making it hard to get instead of having game mechanics blunt its effect after time. Really, what would be great is to have to string together gambits to beat the AI at higher levles.

[Kepler63]

My suggestion is to have certain techs be granted automatically after some portion of the other civs have it. This would add much realism. Sure some tech slingshots are needed as gambits, but there has to be some sort of damper.

Even though I love slingshotting, thus is a good idea. Native Americans didn't research guns -- they eventually came by them because of trade (probably illegal) with the dominant civ. There should be implicit piracy and black marketeering which disperses techs -- especially military ones. The closer you are to a border or the closer your trade rleations, the more likely there will be unplanned tech exchange. It would be a little like cultural infection.

[Thedrin]

I don't think that that idea would reduce the effectiveness of slingshots by much. The power in a slingshot is getting to a certain technological level long before anyone else. The idea suggested (which I like for other reasons) will only affect the spread of a given technology when multiple civs have it.

[zeace]

You already get a discount for researching techs if other civs you know have that tech. The discount rate is in the XML file somewhere. You could always increase the discount so that once you know a few civs with a tech you can research it for almost nothing.

I'd like to hear if anyone tries this...

I predict it would make the game a little boring and very war-oriented. There would be very little reason to build a research lead, so instead you would spend your resources on a big army. You'd be able to easily stay about a couple techs behind while building twice the army. Their brand new longbowman will fold easily in the face of 3 swordsman...

But maybe I'm wrong? It would definitely change games where one continent gets a lot more advanced than the other. When they meet, the backwards continent would quickly catch-up.