Tech rushes are so good because

[HFY]

I'm tempted to say that psionic ascension should be pivoted so that the first perk (a) has no tech prereq and (b) is the only way to get any psionic techs at all.

Interesting idea!

Maybe lock all the Psi techs behind Mind Over Matter, which also locks you out of Engineered Evolution and Flesh Is Weak -- so Psi Shields, Precog Interface, etc. are all behind the first AP (... plus other techs, of course, so you can't get Precog Interface as your 1st combat computer).

The 2nd AP (Transcendence) just gets you Shroud access.

The psionic Fallen Empire can have Mind Over Matter but NOT Transcendence, which is why they haven't End of the Cycle'd everyone.

 

[Pancakelord]

One thing that might help reign in tech rushing is creating an anti-snowball system for research speed. As you all know, the technology tree is split up into different tiers which get unlocked after researching X number of techs in a specific category (ie: engineering). The game could create an Era system where it looks at all the empires in the galaxy and looks at the average for what tier people are in. If you are researching tech below that average, you get a boost. If you are teching beyond that average you get a malus. The malus and boosts increase the further out from the average you get.

So lets say the average tier for physics is 2. Tier 1 physic techs get a research boost, but tier 3, 4, and 5 physic techs have a research speed malus.

It's either that, or we convince Paradox to take a hatchet to the gazillion modifiers sprinkled around the game. You want to target the Research Speed ones over the job modifiers.

I think this might work if its framed like a feasibility study, rather than just a straight increase in costs that you can brute force.
A period of "pre-research", where tech progress is locked at 0% for X months, during which time, your scientists study how you would develop a technology.
The period is longer, the further up the tech is from the "galactic tech level", whilst those at, or below it, have no feasibility study time.

On 3.2 I created a test mod adding breakthroughs and setbacks, using a similar process.
I summed up all "default" (not FE etc) empires, summed all empires with 1 tech in each tier, (repeated for P/S/E each) and took an average to get 3 values to establish the galactic standard in each discipline.

• Then if you researched a tech below the "galactic standard tier" you had a larger chance for a breakthrough every 6 months (10% per tier diff), which would randomly boost tech progress by 5-15%.
• Researching in the same tier as the galactic standard gave a small 5% chance for a breakthrough or setback.
• The same going the other way for setbacks, if you were in to T4 engineering techs when everyone else was on T3, you'd be getting frequent setbacks, randomly deleting 5-15% tech progress.
  • If it helps, think of the above 3 lines describing an inverse normal dist for the breakthrough/setback odds.
• The amount added or removed by breakthrough/setback would be doubled if the tier-gap was 2+ (so researching a T5 tech when everyone is on T3 could give a 10-30% setback - or breakthrough [a vanishingly slim possibility])
• A custom notification at the top of the screen (not a popup) would also inform you of this.

It worked pretty well, though its the kind of thing that is easy to construct (and is not actually that intensive) but is not so easy to tune/balance.
It also helped - for me anyway - that it didnt make me feel like I was being penalised because others were behind, subjectively it felt like my scientists were just struggling with advanced technology.

 

[Reman]

The problem isn't just the Researcher job, the problem is the Research Lab building. A single building that gives all research types makes it too easy to spam the same building and improve all 3 research categories at the same time.

As I outlined here: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...h-labs-and-re-do-buildings-generally.1471190/ the solution is to get rid of the Research Lab building and Researcher job type and break them out into several different types of research so that players actually have to make choices about what kind of research to improve, instead of speedrunning their way to battleships + proton launchers + bigger fleet caps.

Hard disagree that letting us prioritize certain research categories would be a nerf in any way. Changing scientists from 4/4/4 to 12/0/0 or the like would actually be a massive increase in the powerlevel of research. For the vast majority of playstyles, engineering > physics > society, so letting empires spec for engineering harder than they already do would make the research rush issue even worse. Changing scientists from 4/4/4 to 4/0/0 would be a nerf only to the extent that you're cutting scientist output by 66%.

 

[Jman5]

I think this might work if its framed like a feasibility study, rather than just a straight increase in costs that you can brute force.
A period of "pre-research", where tech progress is locked at 0% for X months, during which time, your scientists study how you would develop a technology.
The period is longer, the further up the tech is from the "galactic tech level", whilst those at, or below it, have no feasibility study time.

On 3.2 I created a test mod adding breakthroughs and setbacks, using a similar process.
I summed up all "default" (not FE etc) empires, summed all empires with 1 tech in each tier, (repeated for P/S/E each) and took an average to get 3 values to establish the galactic standard in each discipline.

• Then if you researched a tech below the "galactic standard tier" you had a larger chance for a breakthrough every 6 months (10% per tier diff), which would randomly boost tech progress by 5-15%.
• Researching in the same tier as the galactic standard gave a small 5% chance for a breakthrough or setback.
• The same going the other way for setbacks, if you were in to T4 engineering techs when everyone else was on T3, you'd be getting frequent setbacks, randomly deleting 5-15% tech progress.
  • If it helps, think of the above 3 lines describing an inverse normal dist for the breakthrough/setback odds.
• The amount added or removed by breakthrough/setback would be doubled if the tier-gap was 2+ (so researching a T5 tech when everyone is on T3 could give a 10-30% setback - or breakthrough [a vanishingly slim possibility])
• A custom notification at the top of the screen (not a popup) would also inform you of this.

It worked pretty well, though its the kind of thing that is easy to construct (and is not actually that intensive) but is not so easy to tune/balance.
It also helped - for me anyway - that it didnt make me feel like I was being penalised because others were behind, subjectively it felt like my scientists were just struggling with advanced technology.

Oh neat!

I hadn't thought about it before, but borrowing the same mechanic you have for archeology, first contact, and espionage could work super well for teching. You could have tech output pushing the bar forward faster or slower instead of it just being timer based. You could just use the insight value for the "catch-up" mechanic.


Definitely would require a pretty hefty rework, but conceptually sounds interesting.

 

[DC E1G]

Meanwhile, a single technology can add +20% to a certain resource, and you can get them multiple times, usually stacking up to +60% for many of them. Even alloys and consumer goods get +20% spread across two techs. There's also little to no opportunity cost here, since technologies aren't mutually exclusive while traditions are (even if you can generally get every tree you really care about eventually).

I think the key thing that needs to happen is the removal of all of these free +X% to job output technologies and instead, roll some (but not all) of that bonus into the resource buffing buildings. So you don't get a building line that gives you +15/25% to energy and an additional +60% for free from technologies. Instead, you get a building that offers +20%/40% to energy.

This has a multitude of benefits. It reduces the power of technology because the improvements you get are smaller and you don't get them for free (you have to build the building first and for the second tier, pay a strategic resource). It reduces the number of additive bonuses in the game, meaning the bonuses that are left are more meaningful. It eliminates an issue with the game where your ratio of rural to urban worlds needs to be a certain ratio in the early game and then it totally shifts once you get into mid and late game, meaning you have to totally rework several of your worlds or end up with excessive amounts of extra basic resources floating around.

I'd love to see those techs replaced with options for (strong) buildings that can be used to improve your economy. It's better balanced, more interactive, and more interesting.

Does anyone remember what patch introduced those resource bonus techs? I think it was somewhere early in the 2.X line, but I can't remember exactly when. I would be curious to go back and look at the rationale for their inclusion.

 

[Ludaire]

I'd love to see those techs replaced with options for (strong) buildings that can be used to improve your economy. It's better balanced, more interactive, and more interesting.

Does anyone remember what patch introduced those resource bonus techs? I think it was somewhere early in the 2.X line, but I can't remember exactly when. I would be curious to go back and look at the rationale for their inclusion.

It was the patch that introduced districts and buildings system, so I think the patch that coincided with Megacorp. They used to be the techs that gave upgrades for buildings used in the tile system. With the swap to districts/buildings, they converted them to bonuses to output instead. It seemed reasonable at the time, since it meant less tedious clicking. However, it ended up making teching up way too strong since there was no delay, no cost, or anything for getting those benefits.

 

[GuardianGI]

Because technology makes zero sense in this game and there are no catchup mechanics that actually do anything.

A protectorate under a Science Federation will never come close to catching up to the player.

Yet a conquered/integrated empire that is released as a vassal gets all the player's technologies in an instant.

 

[MrGuyPerson]

On 3.2 I created a test mod adding breakthroughs and setbacks, using a similar process.
I summed up all "default" (not FE etc) empires, summed all empires with 1 tech in each tier, (repeated for P/S/E each) and took an average to get 3 values to establish the galactic standard in each discipline.

Did you use the archaeology system for this? It could be an interesting way to approach research stages.

 

[Pancakelord]

Did you use the archaeology system for this? It could be an interesting way to approach research stages.

I got the idea for it from there, but didn't use that, as it can't really be directly applied to techs. It's more or less hard coded to work with digsites, which need to be attached somewhere in the galaxy. Though it might actually be a good source to tune the numbers against. Maybe I should redo this for 3.3...

I used on actions (the biannual one) to

1. fire script country_events that update the galactic counters +
2. loop through each valid country and (basically) roll 2 weighted dice
   1. should we have a tech progress event or not and
   2. if it should be positive or negative
   3. [3x one for each science field, omitted if doing a special project or no researchers assigned].
3. Based on that the tech progress % is adjusted (roll a random number in a range) and
4. A notification fires on the top bar.

 

[MrGuyPerson]

I got the idea for it from there, but didn't use that, as it can't really be directly applied to techs. It's more or less hard coded to work with digsites, which need to be attached somewhere in the galaxy. Though it might actually be a good source to tune the numbers against. Maybe I should redo this for 3.3...

I used on actions (the biannual one) to

1. fire script country_events that update the galactic counters +
2. loop through each valid country and (basically) roll 2 weighted dice
   1. should we have a tech progress event or not and
   2. if it should be positive or negative
   3. [3x one for each science field, omitted if doing a special project or no researchers assigned].
3. Based on that the tech progress % is adjusted (roll a random number in a range) and
4. A notification fires on the top bar.

That makes sense. I've never looked into the game files, but I guess that explains why the first contact stuff works the way it does. If a location is required, perhaps one could tie the research projects to the capital system? I'm not sure how that would work if the capital changed hands, but perhaps research would simply be disrupted for a period of time and then restart at the new capital, which would at least make sense thematically.

 

[pttaylor]

I got the idea for it from there, but didn't use that, as it can't really be directly applied to techs. It's more or less hard coded to work with digsites, which need to be attached somewhere in the galaxy. Though it might actually be a good source to tune the numbers against. Maybe I should redo this for 3.3

Maybe just tie all tech to the capital planet, or capital system, if you need a "site"? The first Contact interface is probably slightly more applicable than the Archaeology one, for all that they're extremely similar, and I think that one doesn't have a specific in-system location and also doesn't require you to own the system, so it wouldn't break if you lost your capital.