Ascendancy is only ever better if you're not over the admin cap. The simple math doesn't lie.
Imperial Perogative better at science than Scientific Ascendancy
- Thread starter Mastikator
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I'm pretty sure that's simply impossible - the transcendence ascension perks require 2 or 3 other ascension perks first.
It was about the first perk of the ascension path, not the second one. It only requires one other perk to have been taken.
Whether you can do it right away when you unlock your second ascension perk depends on a few things, such as how heavily invested you are in research compared to unity, luck (which can be mitigated by factors such as scientist expertise), which one you want (droid tech is arguably a bit harder to get), if you're willing to hold on to the perk without spending it for a little bit because you know you should be getting the tech quite soon.
You should always be over the cap. The wider the base the taller the pyramid. Wide is the tallest game style.
Unless I'm mistaken this is a moot point, Megacorps can't take Imperial Prerogative.
Sorry, but math shows exactly the opposite - in regards to research TA is better than IP. Yes, one could argue that these perks should still be buffed. Imperial Prerogative to 40 - i.e two size 18 planets or a whole lot (20) of star systems and Technological Ascendancy to 10% and +1 more research option or even +15% and the research option, but this is moving the topic.
A relative difference of 1% research speed and a loss of everything else WRT higher Empire Sprawl? You got some weird math.
I'll shamelessly quote myself (post#15 in this thread):
Observe that the empire's initial cost modifier and research speed is retained in the expression.
What this means is that the relative value of a bonus (either reduced tech cost or increased research speed) depends on how much already you have of both.
The relative value of -10% tech cost versus +10% research speed is not a constant. Try calculating the effects of those two bonuses on each of the following three bonuses.
Empire A: Has +10% research speed and +100% tech cost.
Empire B: Has +10% research speed and +500% tech cost.
Empire C: Has +50% research speed and +100% tech cost.
You should reach the conclusion that empire C should prefer IP over TA, and that empire B should prefer TA over IP.
Is it really meaningful to compare the two? You would only take Technological ascendancy as the first perk (not that it's always the right choice to make), and imperial prerogative as the second.
They don't compete.
They don't compete.
Take both. If a Khanate goes all Genghis Khan, you want to meet them with battleships.
It's definitely 200% wrong to say it is always better, because it very demonstrably is not. The question is how often it is better, you say it is probably stronger in most cases, I would say it is rather narrow and only holds true for a very specific play style. It is better if you're playing tall in a way that you are going over the admin cap enough to not waste basically any of the increased cap, but less above than a fairly low ceiling. Basically it's good if you're playing very tall, which is already a play style with a debatable efficiency in my mind.
If you're late game enough to have a total boost of +120% you're going to have significantly more than 1000 science per month, especially in a wide empire 1000 above the cap. Probably in the order of at least 3000, but even more is likely unless research is very neglected. 120% essentially means you have everything, including scientific revolution and a science nexus constructed.
That's a lot of bonuses to stack to actually get to 117%, including three random traits in addition to the gene mod one, so definitely not common. And at that time, I had over 14000 research per month. But really, this late in the game is not very useful because it's long past the point where this choice is meaningful. Instead, I will just draw data from one of my personal games where I am in the happy year of ~2300. My total sprawl is 1061 with a base cap of 90, so I am 971 above for a 291,3% penalty. The average research per month across the three fields is 2942, and the average research bonus% is 60 with TA already taken. My current society tech is Admiralty Support Staff 2, with a base cost of 60000.
With the current setup the tech costs 234780 (60000*3.913) total, with a total progress of 4704 per month (2942*1.6) and it will take 49.9 months to finish.
With an Imperial setup the tech costs 229380 (60000*3.823) total, with a total progress of 4413 per month (2942*1.5) and it will take 52.0 months to finish.
For a baseline setup the tech cost is 234780 (60000*3.913) total, with a total progress of 4413 per month (2942*1.5) and it will take 53.2 months to finish.
Imperial reduces the time needed by 1.2 months. TA reduces the time needed by 3.3 months. For the purposes of research in this case, TA is 2.75 times as strong as Imperial. No, it's not slightly better. In a wide empire Imperial is a garbage fire compared to TA (and how good TA is to begin with can certainly be questioned). Imperial will sometimes be the better choice but saying to always choose imperial is awful advice. If you're playing very tall and you want a research and unity boost, go ahead and take it. If you're playing wide, don't touch Imperial. I am not sure it's wise to compare the two either way just because TA is a tier 0 perk and Imperial is a tier 1 and are open at different times and generally compete against different perks.
The math is extremely fascinating here because it proves an ascension perk that once benefited wide empires is now almost uniformly better for tall empires. I wonder if the devs looked at this with Imperial?
This thread is so mathy i got bored, but in my opinion, the TLDR answer is Imperial Perogative is probably a better pick.
Tech wise it depends on how over cap you are and how research bonus you already have.
If you are going to be playing at 200 over cap, and only have +20% research, then yeah, imperial perogative is weaker.
If you are only 50 over cap and already have +50% research speed (remember your scientist leaders and bunker bots and curator, etc), then its going to be a lot stronger.
But, empire sprawl also affects your unity costs a lot more than research costs. So theres a good chance that if you take Imperial Perogative, dont expand too quickly early game, you will end up with a full tradition tree and an extra ascention pick you might not have otherwise gotten.
So you can get your +10% research pick later (or a better perk) and still have that 9% tech cost reduction. So i would always pick imperal perogative over the tech ascention in early game.
Tech wise it depends on how over cap you are and how research bonus you already have.
If you are going to be playing at 200 over cap, and only have +20% research, then yeah, imperial perogative is weaker.
If you are only 50 over cap and already have +50% research speed (remember your scientist leaders and bunker bots and curator, etc), then its going to be a lot stronger.
But, empire sprawl also affects your unity costs a lot more than research costs. So theres a good chance that if you take Imperial Perogative, dont expand too quickly early game, you will end up with a full tradition tree and an extra ascention pick you might not have otherwise gotten.
So you can get your +10% research pick later (or a better perk) and still have that 9% tech cost reduction. So i would always pick imperal perogative over the tech ascention in early game.
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Pretty much. Given the multitude of research bonuses available from stuff like scientist/leader traits, it makes IP relatively even better than TA in most normal cases for research speed on its own let alone the many other benefits.
So much discussion when the answer is obvious: they're both boring and almost useless with zero flavor, just a minuscule number increase.
This exactly. The thread is quibbling over whether one mediocre perk was better than another mediocre perk by some small amount.
Interstellar Dominion/Executive Vigor/Nihilistic Acquisition/Voidborne/Shared Destiny are all potentially great first picks.
EDIT: TL/DR: If your Admin Cap overage is more than 30 BUT less than [roughly] triple your base science speed bonus then IP is better for teching-up. Otherwise TA is better.
Lets do some math ...
Months to Tech ~= Effective tech cost / Effective Monthly Science Output
Effective Tech Cost = Actual Tech Cost * (1 + Admin Cap Overage * 0.003)
Effective Science Output = Actual Science Output * (1 + (0.01 * bonus speed percentage))
MT = (ATC * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP))
MT(IP) = ATC * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP)))
MT(TA) = (ATC * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (ASO * (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)))
Go figure out when MT(IP) >= MT (SA) we need to find out when the following holds:
ATC * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP))) >= (ATC * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (ASO * (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)))
(1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP))) >= (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (ASO * (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10))) [Div by ATC on both sides]
(1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (1 + (0.01 * BSP)) >= (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) [Mult both by ASO]
(1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) >= (1 + (0.01 * BSP)) (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) [mult both by (1 + (0.01 * BSP))]
(1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) >= (1 + (0.01 * BSP)) * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) [mult both by (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) ]
(100 + BSP + 10) * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) >= (100 + BSP) * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) [mult both by 100]
(100 + BSP + 10) * (1000 + 3ACO - 90) >= (100 + BSP) * (1000 + 3ACO) [mult both by 1000 and combine terms]
(110 + BSP) * (910 + 3ACO) >= (100 + BSP) * (1000 + 3ACO) [combine terms]
100100 + 910BSP + 330ACO + 3ACO(BSP) >= 100000 + 1000 BSP + 300 ACO + 3ACO(BSP) [Expand terms by multiplying through]
100 - 90BSP + 30 ACO >= 0 [Subtract Right side from left]
30 ACO >= 90 BSP - 100 [Sub 100 - 90BSP from both]
ACO >= 3 BSP - (10/3)
So as a very general rule of thumb if you're playing such that your admin cap overage is less than roughly triple the science bonus you are currently getting [but at least 30 overage so IP makes sense??] THEN IP is better at teching up plus you get other benefits.
While the APs are interesting they do come with an opportunity cost of NOT being able to choose something else. It's possible that the some other choice could snowball so you are able to wind up with more researchers / unity generators to balance out the bonuses from either of these perks.
Note: TA gave me roughly a 5-8% bonus through most of the game when it gets lumped in with other bonuses. This doesn't cosider opportunity cost of course.
Lets do some math ...
Months to Tech ~= Effective tech cost / Effective Monthly Science Output
Effective Tech Cost = Actual Tech Cost * (1 + Admin Cap Overage * 0.003)
Effective Science Output = Actual Science Output * (1 + (0.01 * bonus speed percentage))
MT = (ATC * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP))
MT(IP) = ATC * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP)))
MT(TA) = (ATC * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (ASO * (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)))
Go figure out when MT(IP) >= MT (SA) we need to find out when the following holds:
ATC * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP))) >= (ATC * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (ASO * (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)))
(1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (ASO * (1 + (0.01 * BSP))) >= (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (ASO * (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10))) [Div by ATC on both sides]
(1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) / (1 + (0.01 * BSP)) >= (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) [Mult both by ASO]
(1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) >= (1 + (0.01 * BSP)) (1 + ACO * 0.003)) / (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) [mult both by (1 + (0.01 * BSP))]
(1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) >= (1 + (0.01 * BSP)) * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) [mult both by (1 + 0.01 * (BSP + 10)) ]
(100 + BSP + 10) * (1 + (ACO - 30) * 0.003) >= (100 + BSP) * (1 + ACO * 0.003)) [mult both by 100]
(100 + BSP + 10) * (1000 + 3ACO - 90) >= (100 + BSP) * (1000 + 3ACO) [mult both by 1000 and combine terms]
(110 + BSP) * (910 + 3ACO) >= (100 + BSP) * (1000 + 3ACO) [combine terms]
100100 + 910BSP + 330ACO + 3ACO(BSP) >= 100000 + 1000 BSP + 300 ACO + 3ACO(BSP) [Expand terms by multiplying through]
100 - 90BSP + 30 ACO >= 0 [Subtract Right side from left]
30 ACO >= 90 BSP - 100 [Sub 100 - 90BSP from both]
ACO >= 3 BSP - (10/3)
So as a very general rule of thumb if you're playing such that your admin cap overage is less than roughly triple the science bonus you are currently getting [but at least 30 overage so IP makes sense??] THEN IP is better at teching up plus you get other benefits.
While the APs are interesting they do come with an opportunity cost of NOT being able to choose something else. It's possible that the some other choice could snowball so you are able to wind up with more researchers / unity generators to balance out the bonuses from either of these perks.
Note: TA gave me roughly a 5-8% bonus through most of the game when it gets lumped in with other bonuses. This doesn't cosider opportunity cost of course.
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I'm still trying to figure out my new play style since 2.2. Under the old system IP was one of my default choices since I don't mind micromanaging my planets. I kind of click IP by default... but being over the cap doesn't scare me that much since I can usually keep up tech and unity-wise if I manage my buildings nicely and manage my growth.
It's almost like I'm picking IP out of habit. Basically I'm thinking I might be better servered picking executive vigor early on so I can store influence and keep research grants/capacity overload/etc running more. It's actually melting my brain.
It's almost like I'm picking IP out of habit. Basically I'm thinking I might be better servered picking executive vigor early on so I can store influence and keep research grants/capacity overload/etc running more. It's actually melting my brain.
It is a matter of proportionality. 10% faster is a greater proportional increase than is taking 9 percentage points off something that will be in the hundreds of percent. For example 300% penalty reduced by 9% is unfortunately 291%. If it were multiplicative and yielded a result of 273% instead of 291% then the OP would be correct.
I go the other way. I tend to play "tall-ish" and used to pick +10% research speed out of habit. Now if you're not "too far" above your admin CAP but you already decent bonuses to research then IP makes more sense.