Messing with the tech tree

[GePap]

OK, so I was wondering if anyone has a full list of which techs are best not touched-I know some, like industrialization or the Automobile lead to graphic changes-refrigeration, railroads, and the government techs should mostly be left alone-just trying to figure out how many techs I have to play with.

Now to the idea, and I am wondering if it has been tried and what experiences have people had.

I a mulling a WW1 Europe scenerio (for a long time) and I have the idea of negative techs-especifically War Weariness and Revolution.

For example these techs would come either at a specific turns, or through the loss of certain cities. The point of these techs would be to make certain wonders and or buildings obselete - so at a certain point, bam, all these hapiness creating buildings no longer work-and them bam, corruption fighitng buildings fail, and then even bigger hit, your financial institutions begin to fail...

The point, of course, is to have the player deal with a state coming under exhaustion from the war- unhappiness growing, the treasury under attack.

I am hoping to have war weariness 1, 2, 3 and then the grand daddy, revolution.

[Palaiologos]

The communism tech decreases happines from the improvement in the cathedral slot. Maybe you can use it.

Also having temples and cathedrals without giving the civ the ceremonial burial and monotheism tech makes them inactive.

You can't make buildings(improvements) obsolete-just wonders.

Invention changes the people to renaissance.
If a civ has no access to the future tech the game crashes.
The navigation and magnetism techs decrease the chance to get lost at sea.

[GePap]

I feared that about buildings....

I assume in ToT you could make them obselete?

I guess I am now fishing for ways to make these techs work besides making wonder's not work-I would have to figure the wonder distribution to make sure all civs would be affected by these things.

[Mercator]

No, you can't make improvements obsolete in ToT. But you can take away technologies. I don't think that actually disables the improvements' functionality though, except for buildings like the Temple, as Palaiologos mentioned.

[GePap]

Well, taking away tech would do, in terms of disabling happyness buildings.

so which event takes away techs?

[Mercator]

TakeTechnology, unsurprisingly.

See the macro.txt (or manual) for a full list and explanation (if you have ToT, that is).

[Catfish]

Originally posted by GePap
OK, so I was wondering if anyone has a full list of which techs are best not touched-I know some, like industrialization or the Automobile lead to graphic changes-refrigeration, railroads, and the government techs should mostly be left alone-just trying to figure out how many techs I have to play with.

Your first port of call should always be the Scenario League's Tips section. There you will find lists for both Fantasy Worlds and Test of Time.

[Boco]

An unsolicited note from Mr. Redundant:

Pay close attention to the techs that reduce payoffs from freights. By using them judiciously you can partially simulate the economic deterioration during the war. You might even want a pair of freight units. Start the war with freight units from the freight slot. Replace them later with a non-freight-slot freight to reduce the bonus. Couple that with some techs that render happy wow's obsolete and reduce the effect of cathedrals, and you may be able to create some misery as well.

[Elok]

Don't forget that Nuclear Fission is required to build nukes. Also, don't you need philosophy AND invention to reach the renaissance? That's what I thought. Speaking of invention, it ends the goody-hut science, if by some chance you didn't know that. As to simulating war-weariness, I agree that your best bet is probably to make 'em dependent on certain wonders that fizzle, e.g. Women's Suffrage.

[Exile]

Here

Civilization II, The Complete Guide to Scenario Building

by John Possidente.

Isbn # 1-56893-904-3

[Elok]

ISBN? You mean somebody actually wrote a physical book on scenario-making? I didn't know the audience was big enough to make it worthwhile...

Yay, I made Prince!

[GePap]

Interesting.

Anyway, next question- I assume that if I make a tech ancient or medeival, that makes it cheaper than a modern tech?

[Mercator]

I don't think so:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2672

I think the tech epoch and category only affect which icon it uses.

Actually, I'm not 100 percent sure. The strategy guys tend to test things only for the standard game. Maybe those bonuses in the first post actually depend one those rules.txt values.

[Boco]

Sadly, epoch has no effect in altered @CIVILIZE's. Just tested it in EA. First tech's cost is 77 for any epoch. How I wish it did have an effect!



Woohoo! Catfish are you reading this? Try (img src=http://apolyton.net/upload/view.php?file=8723_EATechCosts.png) but with <> instead of () to show an upload pic in your post.

[Catfish]

Yeah, I found out about a week ago. I was about to b1tch and moan in this thread over in the Apolyton/Community forum, but then stumbled on this one. Gee, did I forget to tell ya?