Small change in the research system that increases the depth and player decesion.

[Maverikfreak]

Right now we have 3 random research options in each area without player intervention or decision making.

Instead of your card options being shuffled each time you complete a research, in this system the new techs options are not free, you need to invert science to discover it. Completing a bar that is "cheaper" than a normal research, and adds a random card to your list of possible researches when completed.

My proposition is very simple, does not alter the fundamentals of the system, nor is it difficult to implement, but increases the decision making of the player without saturating it.

Divide the science obtained in 2 areas:

1. Investigate Technology.
2. Discover new technologies

Point number 1 is the current system, simply the research points go to the current research selected.

Point number 2 is a different progress bar, every time we complete it we will have at our disposal a new random technology to investigate.





About the balance:

The discovery of new technologies should be cheaper than normal research, to be able to offer a choice every time we investigate the current technology, but should increase exponentially for each technology investigated in their respective area and should multiply X2 for each technology that you have discovered but you keep on the storage. (Thus avoiding the massive accumulation of uninteresting technologies without research)

And obviously all the actual tech cost sould be changed too because we need to split the points on 2 bar now.

Excuse for my english and the shitty Paint photos, and please if you like the idea or do you have any suggestions support them with likes or comments.

 

[Lonely-shark Dan]

you mean like add another bar to show how much of a particular tech tree we've already researched?

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

you mean like add another bar to show how much of a particular tech tree we've already researched?

From what I can parse of their idea, instead of your card options being shuffled each time you complete a research, you'd instead have a research option that is cheaper than a "normal" research, and adds a random card to your list of possible researches when completed.

 

[domein]

Or make all the options available, current random draft only makes you select the cheapest option in order to do a "reroll" for desired card

 

[Aries666]

I sort of like it but I think a better split might be, investigate tech be iterative tech improvements like lasers 2 etc and discover new tech would open up a new branch like torpedoes 1. New techs would be expensive and take longer whilst iterative would be cheap and shorter so you would get choices like do I ramp up my laser tech fast or go quickly for torps but potentially have to deal with someone who rushed lasers.

 

[Maverikfreak]

Added a more clear description of this idea

 

[Magdaki]

I kind of like this suggestion. There's been a few instances in the game when I didn't want to really research any of my three options, so I always pick the cheapest so I can get some new options.

 

[Pchang]

T

I kind of like this suggestion. There's been a few instances in the game when I didn't want to really research any of my three options, so I always pick the cheapest so I can get some new options.

that is a choice too

 

[Maverikfreak]

T

that is a choice too

But what is the reason because i have to investigate a missile 2 with in my laser-army empire with the laser 4 tech already investigated?

 

[scaper12123]

What I feel like you're suggesting is that, at all times, we'd get to choose between researching new or improving something. So... perhaps giving us an initial choice between new technology and looking into a repeatable tech for around or less than the cost at a certain stage? I for one would not mind repeatable technology being a thing from the outset instead of at the end of the tech tree.

 

[Maverikfreak]

What I feel like you're suggesting is that, at all times, we'd get to choose between researching new or improving something. So... perhaps giving us an initial choice between new technology and looking into a repeatable tech for around or less than the cost at a certain stage? I for one would not mind repeatable technology being a thing from the outset instead of at the end of the tech tree.

I'm not speaking about repeatable tech at all.

In this system the new techs options are not free, you need to invert science to discover it in a random order (Like the current system but with player implication)

You have the choice to select a focus:

Invert in a huge variety of tech, and pick the specifics ones you want, but probably slowly because you split the science, or a emphasis on your current selected techs (on a small pool).

For example in a war you probably cannot waste time investigating a food tech, so probably you want to invert in the "New Project" bar to look a useful war tech.

You can change this focus depending of your moment intereses. Also you can skip useless tech for you or store niche techs for a "future".

 

[Riftwalker]

it seems like normal research except with additional steps for no real gain...

 

[Me_]

Adding an extra step does not add anything substantial to the decision making.

 

[Ingros]

Hm i like the base idea about this slider however i would treat the current research as inventing new tech while the rest of the bar is to improve an already existing tech (after finishing the improvement counter you can choose one of the existing techcards and it gets a x% bonus...maybe repeatable maybe only once possible )

 

[Kayden_II]

The Slider-Idea is good, but It makes much more Sense in the Sector-Control to tell your Sector to achieve a particular Research-Point-Production-Ratio.

 

[mudcrabmerchant]

We should just have a clear tech tree in game. You can already see it by looking through the files or on the internet, there's no reason not to include it in game for convenience.

 

[ross-g]

and adds a random card to your list of possible researches when completed.

This is where you lost me.
Aside from the nice idea of budgeting your science into "current research" vs "future options" (tradeoff, adds some strategy) your idea doesn't really use this to add any depth as you stillthen go on to pick random techs from the deck as the current system does.

I would much rather be able to set an optional focus for each science depart (picked from the tech categories) and have that choice weight the next round of randomly drawn techs towards the category I am interested in researching.

Then the sliders you suggest wouldn't just add more random techs to the next round of choice... but would let you trade off current tech research speed for having a higher chance at a tech from a desired research area in the future.


eg
I get +10 physics per month.
I pick a "Voidcraft"

focus.
The research slider lets me devote up to 5 physics/month towards Voidcraft, giving me +50% chance at drawing voidcraft techs BUT halving my current physics research rate.

 

[Magdaki]

I guess I didn't understand the suggestion that clearly. The only change I would make is to get rid of the slider and just have a permanent "Research New Options" (call it whatever fluff makes sense) as an extra research option. It would have to be fairly cheap to be at all useful but subject to all the scaling factors in place. On complete this research project, it is replaced by a new research card. I prefer this because it is more straightforward with less fiddly bits.

 

[Pavane]

Right now we have 3 random research options in each area without player intervention or decision making.

Players can increase the likelihood (weighting) of desired technologies by choosing scientists with expertise in the required field of study. Obviously this is not the control a player would have by simply choosing a technology from a tree, but you can give broad directions to research this way. I like to think that many technologies are being actively researched, but only the most promising at this time are presented to the government so that they can make priorities through resource allocations.

 

[Chilled Legumes]

We should just have a clear tech tree in game. You can already see it by looking through the files or on the internet, there's no reason not to include it in game for convenience.

You can get the same effect by increasing the base number of tech choices to like 20 or 30. It gives you every single technology you've unlocked the prereqs for, essentially treating the game like it has a tech tree instead of a tech stack/deck