[C4AC] New techtree?

[Blake]

I was against a new tech tree, but now that we have our sights on a hybrid I'm starting to think we would benefit from a CIV style tech tree.

After the "conversation" with Time Traveler I was inspired...

Usual "Very first draft" disclaimer.


Corner-Corner diagonal links indicate AND, other links are OR.

Some notes on techs:

Military Tech:

Doctrine:Mobility. This tech would unlock the Scout Rover, 2-2. It's an important tech and the blurb should mention the value of vehicles for life support. Applied Physics would unlock the Laser Turret for Rovers.

Doctrine:Loyalty. This tech can be arrived at either by Social Psych or Mobility. Sort of a dead end, but required for most units, think of it as Archery. Wouldn't be expensive, lets you round up some workable military with whatever's handy.
Synthetical Garrison w/ Industrial Base.
Laser Infantry w/ Industrial Lasers.
Would also have the Command Center.

Industrial Lasers: New tech. No direct military applications (by itself) but an important hub tech and maybe enable Mines or Drill to Aquifer.

Particle Accelerators: Replaces Non-linear Mathematics. Would unlock the "Impact Battery" upgrade for infantry (although you'd only have Scout Patrols if beelined) and the Impact Rover in combination with Doctrine:Mobility.

High Energy Chemistry: Possibly enable Plasma Infantry even without Doctrine:Loyalty, if you give men quality armor they'll be happier going into battle and not need motivating to fight with whatever crap could be cobbled together . Should be a fairly expensive tech.


Chiron/Social Techs:

Social Pysch -> Ethical Calculus. This is the "Human" route to Biogenetics, loaded with buildery goodness. (I'd favor having Fundie on Social Pysch)

Centauri Ecology - everyone will probably research this, but it wont be entirely essential... I'm thinking it'd be moderately possible to get away without it for a while, but difficult to grow food.

Centauri Biology. This is basically the old biogenetics and would include Biolab. It could feasibly have Mindworms on it. Mindworms would then be the only military option down at the bottom. Obviously a reasonably expensive tech considering what it enables.

Biogenetics. Now a more advanced tech, but would still have Recycling Tanks (maybe buffed to suit). There are two ways to get to it, the route with lots of "Is this stuff moral"isms or the route of pure biology.
A good place for HGP SP.

Secrets of the Brain heads off to more Chrion techs, namely Cent.Empathy and would be an AND-req to Neural Grafting.

Gene Splicing would be a pivotal tech, as a tech it would enable farm-anywhere and the Research Hospital. Probably more important it would lead to the techs of Bioengineering, Synthetic Fossil Fuels and Ecological Engineering.


Buildering/Discovery stuff:

Industrial Base is an essential and pivotal tech. You can't do much without it (at least not in the way of industry), although you could field Impact Scout Patrols or Mind Worms...

Industrial Economics would be important mainly for Free Market and as a AND-req to Industrial Automation and eventually Environmental Economics.
An ideal home for the Merchant Exchange.

Planetary Networks has only the single re-req of Information Networks, making it cheap to get to and of course it would have Planned and Probe Teams. It would lead eventually to more social/economic stuff but wouldn't be that important as a pre-req.
Virtual World here? Possibly... (another idea, have it on a new next pure-tech tech, combining Plan.Net and Opti.Computers for a "Cybergrid" or something).

Optical Computers becomes an earlier and more pivotal tech, since more computing power is good. It leads to Discover and Conquer type stuff. Much less loaded than Plan.Nets but leads to more stuff.

Industrial Automation can be had with either Planetary Networks or Optical Computers. It will likely have Wealth and some other powerful aspects. Were someone to beeline it they would have no military at all, except probes (with the plan net route)


Having done this stuff so far, I have to say that I really like the idea of having a more beelinable tech tree. Obviously there are some missing things like sea power and some names could be better maybe.

Thoughts?

[GeoModder]

How about renaming industrial lasers to Industrial Applications?
On the sound of it, it covers more the merging of both preq techs, and would imply the specialisation of production lines.

Personally, I would put the Virtual World on polysoft, since a perfect VR-environment would need quite a bit of adaptive software.
Perhaps MilAlg could take the Command Nexus in this draft.

I agree with the beeline thing. Two ways (or more) to reach key techs from which the tech tree can split again sounds like the way to go.

[TimeTraveler]

That's a very daring spot for Biogenetics. o.o

[GeoModder]

Why?

[TimeTraveler]

Originally posted by GeoModder
Why?

I figure mainly because everything it leads to may be pushed farther back? And I don't really think of Genetics as something that hard to reach on Planet? o.O

And it gets me to wonder what Lal's starting tech(s) will be in this case. Social Psych and Ethical Calculus, perhaps?

[Rubin]

Blake, are you suggesting a general reduction in technology prerequisites?

A reduction would certainly make way for a b-line technology tree with only a few key technologies ("AND" prerequisites). If balanced correctly this would make specialized approaches much easier!

I think this could work in combination with technology restrictions on facilities, units, terraforming, etc.

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by TimeTraveler
I figure mainly because everything it leads to may be pushed farther back? And I don't really think of Genetics as something that hard to reach on Planet? o.O

And it gets me to wonder what Lal's starting tech(s) will be in this case. Social Psych and Ethical Calculus, perhaps?

The contents of the perhaps "pushed" techs don't necessarily need to stay there.
And I seem to recall that in SMAC the factions have only 1 starting tech.

[TimeTraveler]

Originally posted by GeoModder


The contents of the perhaps "pushed" techs don't necessarily need to stay there.
And I seem to recall that in SMAC the factions have only 1 starting tech.

I don't think it's possible to get the genome project without genetics. Unless perhaps if a faction without the technology conquers the base with that project. If that even makes sense.

The factions of Vanilla SMAC did start with one tech each (except for the University, due to getting another free tech of their choice at the start of the game). The SMAX factions mostly started with two each, except for the Drones (Industrial Base only) and the Progenitors (four techs each).

I would somewhat like to see the factions start with two advances each. At least then it would make more sense for Yang to start the game with Doctrine: Loyalty.

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by TimeTraveler
I don't think it's possible to get the genome project without genetics.

I meant stuff that came with techs after biogenetics, not the HGP itself.
I concur this project fits too well on the tech, but it's not that bad if it comes a bit later in the techtree. Infact, on the spot biogen is now in Blake's draft, the project could easily be renamed to Genome Project since it can be both genetic research into humans, or into Chiron's native flora/fauna.

Hey, how about this? According to the beeline a faction follows to a keytech like biogen, it can in this case either construct the HGP, or one of the "centaurian" secret projects!
It pressures to "specialize" a faction, to help it make it's own identity as a distinct culture.

[TimeTraveler]

Originally posted by GeoModder


I meant stuff that came with techs after biogenetics, not the HGP itself.
I concur this project fits too well on the tech, but it's not that bad if it comes a bit later in the techtree. Infact, on the spot biogen is now in Blake's draft, the project could easily be renamed to Genome Project since it can be both genetic research into humans, or into Chiron's native flora/fauna.

Hey, how about this? According to the beeline a faction follows to a keytech like biogen, it can in this case either construct the HGP, or one of the "centaurian" secret projects!
It pressures to "specialize" a faction, to help it make it's own identity as a distinct culture.

Sounds like the idea of the HGP requiring BioGen and Ethical Calculus and maybe the Weather Paradigm requiring Centauri Biology and BioGen.

In any case, if that change is going to happen, I hope it works well enough to be worthwhile.

[Rubin]

Technology Tree Tool

GeoModder has directed me to The Lopez's techtree editor.

I made a custom CvTechChooser.py file to go with the tool. Simply copy the techtree editor files into the 0207 base mod (perhaps do a backup of the mod files first) and replaced the CvTechChooser.py with the CvTechChooser.py file attached below.

I've experimented a bit and this tool makes visualizing the technology tree much easier and much faster.

If you want to try this out you can attach your saved CIV4TechInfos.xml file here.

Here's a screenshot of a quick sample revision: Edit: Image deleted

[Rubin]

Here's an image of an early game technology tree draft. I've combined several approaches. The main approaches have been to reduce the "AND" prerequisites and preserve the distinct branches using "OR" prerequisites.

Some comments:

- Reduced number of tier 1 technologies from 8 to 6.

- Superconductor is a tier 2 technology (in the discover branch) replacing Planetary Networks and enabling an energy improvement (solar collector). Industrial Base and Centauri Ecology would enable mines and farms respectively.

- Probe Teams become available with Polymorphic Software.

- Progenitor Psych may be renamed. The idea of this technology is a tier 2 explore technology; it could be something like Centauri Biology, Centauri History, Progenitor Origins, Resonance Fields, Fungal farms, etc.

- Social Psych and Doctrine Mobility are not specifically tied to any of the four branches and are not intended for a (major) b-line approach.



Edit: Here is a second attempt. The later technologies are almost randomly placed.

[GeoModder]

Heheh, it indeed makes things go faster.

[Rubin]

Here's a slightly cleaned up CIV4TechInfos.xml file with the new layout.

Edit: I should probably note a few things:

- It is best to view the new technology tree using the techtree editor with the custom .py file. Otherwise the arrows and pre-req icons may not show correctly.

- The main strengths of the editor at this point is the ease with which it allows for repositioning of the technologies and changing the technology prerequisites.

- Editing is done dynamically within the game which is very helpful for making and viewing major changes.

- Once installed, the tool is very, VERY easy to use. Try it out!

[murielwasser]

My approach to tree structure would be:

1) Keep the main branches - industry, physics, social, biology, computing - fairly independent in their core progressions.

2) Have ancillary branches that form "ladders" with the main branches, requiring their parents but not being required for them. So, to be flavorless and simplistic* about it, with Bio 1 leading to Bio 2 leading to Bio 3 and so on, Bio 2 would lead to, for example, Psi 1, and Psi 2 would require Psi 1 and Bio 4, but no Bio would require Psi.

3) Techs requiring more than 1 main branch should be esoteric dead ends which are useful in some but not all situations. Or, if they're not dead ends, they should be the start of a miniature branch of some theme. Additional techs in that succession could have other foreign prerequisites.

Examples of branchworthy themes might be: the sea, the air, probe team stuff, &c.

The general goal of this is to maximize the extent to which factions of "equal" tech levels differ from each other. (Since this pretty vastly increases the gains from trade, there might be some value to increasing the degree to which having more techs inhibits research.)

* Obviously the main progressions could be less linear. Each has obvious subthemes that can constitute branches that rely on each other a little more than the outside branches: politics, economics, and culture for social, f'rex; ecology and genetics for biology.