A quick Idea: How to fix game pacing

[Ryika]

The Pacing is annoying, right? The game ends, before it has really started and even if you ignore your Victory Condition, where's the fun is getting a tech every 3 turns? Bleh.

I think most of the problem is really the way the tech web works. The Freedom you have is amazing, but at the same time it really only has 3 "levels" of technological progress (with some small exceptions, but overall that's how it works).

So I present to you my reworked techweb - be careful and take precautions, because that graphic may very well blind you if you're not prepared for the awesome photoshop-work that lies beneath.

Spoiler :

(This is of course only a graphic painted roughly onto the current Tech Web - actual technologies would probably best be moved around - but the idea remains the same)

So. A lot of Colors. What have I done here? I have basically divided the tech-web that had 3 tech-levels into a tech-web that has 7 stages. If you look carefully you'll notice that each note only has connections to notes that are exactly one level above or below its own level (well, with that one node in the north - that's an error!), for a very smooth and natural progression that still leaves room for enough personal choices.

The jumps between technology costs and the powercreep between buildings of the next level would be high enough so the player NEEDS to take some of the technologies of "his current level" to progress. Especially the jump between the last few levels would need to be big enough to allow the player to pick up some of the technologies that "lead nowhere", instead of trying to beeline the - way too expensive - Victory wonder. That would make every single one of the red ring-3 techs valid choices, no longer would we have any "dead" technologies.

At the same time, because we now have 7 levels instead of 3 we no longer run into the situation where we have "20" technologies available that can all be researched in only a turn or two - while still leaving room for different choices by the player. This is also why I'd put all 3 Affinity Victories into the same corner - so the rest of the web is mostly "neutral" ground that is viable for all Affinities.

I think this kind of tech-web is also easier to teach the AI. Less abundance of direct choices, a more "direct" progression.

So... what do you guys think?

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I like it....
I wouldn't necessarily have all the Affinity Victories in "one space" connecting through the same red 2ring tech.

I could see the "Gates" both on the same tech... but probably move the "Transcendance" somewhere else, say that bottom right. Or vice Versa, "Gates" on the bottom right and "Transcendance" on the bottom left


Also, the tech web costs are almost set up like this already,
95/80..0 leaf 1 stem
190/249/254/380..1 leaf/cheap 2 stem/computers
770..computer/cheap 2 leaf/expensive 2 stem
1160..expensive 2 leaf/cheap 3 stem
1820..cheap 3 leaf
2480...expensive 3/4 stem
3216..expensive 3/4 leaf

so that's 7 levels, similar to what you have, the difference is the connections (and straightening some of it out)

So if you went approximately
100-Green
200-Yellow
400-Orange
800-Red
1600-Purple
3200-Blue
6400-light blue

That would be similar to what we have, but with the actual level structure, and an additional super expensive level (for the victories)

I like the connection ideas

 

[Ryika]

So if you went approximately
100-Green
200-Yellow
400-Orange
800-Red
1600-Purple
3200-Blue
6400-light blue

I had actually thought about something more like...


100-Green
350-Yellow
700-Orange
1600-Red
3200-Purple
6000-Blue
18000-light blue

Especially that last jump is extremely important to make it so it's a good thing to gather up some purple stuff.

Those numbers may sound extreme at first, but they're not really that far from what we had in Civ 5 - in fact, combined with the amount of technologies that are needed to reach the maximum level they're actually somewhat tame.

Hand in Hand with the Technology Costs would go a complete overhaul of the buildings to make sure each tier is an actual step up, not like it's now where you can just beeline into any ring 3 tech without any infrastructure at all if you want.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I had actually thought about something more like...


100-Green
350-Yellow
700-Orange
1600-Red
3200-Purple
6000-Blue
18000-light blue

Especially that last jump is extremely important to make it so it's a good thing to gather up some purple stuff.

Those numbers may sound extreme at first, but they're not really that far from what we had in Civ 5 - in fact, combined with the amount of technologies that are needed to reach the maximum level they're actually somewhat tame.

Hand in Hand with the Technology Costs would go a complete overhaul of the buildings to make sure each tier is an actual step up, not like it's now where you can just beeline into any ring 3 tech without any infrastructure at all if you want.

Yeah, I was just seeing how a simple x2 each level would work... if you wanted to change the overall pacing, then some faster bump ups are needed.

(Also, in the top right you have a Yellow-Red connection)

analyzing the tree (assuming you make that red an orange)..looking at stems
1-5 green, 1 yellow
2-4 yellow, 5 Orange, 3 red
3-2 orange, 4 red, 6 purple

 

[joncnunn]

I like the part about increasing the difference in beaker price.

But I think that all 3 affinity victories should be in different directions, maybe roughly 120 degrees apart each.

 

[DefiantMars]

I think this would be interesting to investigate. However I must ask, this would tech placement change as well?

My concern is that in changing position of techs will cause the tech web to get wonky in terms of the progression of sciences. For example the line: Ecology > Terraforming > Planetary Engineering, it makes sense as a chain. The parts of the web are connected and different units and buildings are attached to the concepts there within.

So... I'm skeptical about the feasibility of altering the tech placements. That said altering the tech web would be a perfect opportunity to make some of hte affinity units easier to access and to strip stupidly placed unlocks out of techs completely. CARVRs have nothing to do with Autogyros! And Aegis and the Rocktopus could stand to appear sooner.

 

[nimling]

It sucks.

Beelining techs is a natural part of the tech web. It was expected that most games wouldn't fill out the web.

Tying victory conditions to techs (or rather affinities which are tied to tech and more or less random quests) alone, and the ease with which the game's economy and thus science outputs can be broken, is the problem. A lot of subsystems in the game wind up superfluous, like the whole of combat for SP due the AI's ineptitude at strategy and the inherent flaws of 1UPT. Going for a lot of the high-end combat techs winds up being a waste of research, aside from the affinity points attached to them.

Another complication comes from leaf techs often being so expensive that beelining high tech looks like an attractive option. Hard forcing the player to pick up some leaf techs or multiple prerequisites in order to progress to the deep end of the tech web would be helpful. Also helpful would be placing barriers to research that can't be overcome with more beakers, like requiring a project to be completed via production (or food, or culture) in order to unlock sections of the tech web.

I don't see anything wrong with a tech every few turns, especially when backfilling earlier parts of the web. If an empire is putting out huge sci then they can reap the rewards of that, but that is difficult without trading off something. Just because the AI doesn't exploit those costs doesn't mean they don't exist, Academy spam is expensive and a decent human opponent would tear it apart... besides there are better ways to attain better overall output than Academy spam, if trying to play the game against a serious opponent rather than the AI.

 

[Galgus]

I still advocate decoupling affinity points from specific techs, which would help somewhat.

That way players would have some more freedom in how they get to victory level affinity regardless of where the techs were.
_____________________________

The concept of non-tech costs for technology is interesting, but I don't immediately see any ways to use it that would both make sense and be mechanically fitting.

 

[Lord Tirian]

My gut feeling? It's good. Certainly something I'd like to try out.

I'll echo what most said about the affinity victory placement - that it should be spaced out a bit more. Will that drive certain affinities towards certain regions? Yes... but I don't think that's a huge problem if there are enough connections within each "ring" (allowing lateral traversal and naturally leading to hybridisation) and allows to keep the special affinity units in a place where people don't get them without fulfilling the affinity prerequisite (making them feel like "dead techs").

Additionally, I think it'd be good to split the contact techs into three techs, all of them located in the outermost ring but not at the most expensive leaves. Have... say three techs and any two of them required. That way, affinity victories need to go "deep" while contact needs to go "wide".

Practically, the difference is little: affinities need a purple and a light blue tech (3200+18000 in the proposal), while contact needs 2x blue (2x 6000 = 12000) at the cost of needing to grab more prerequisites (2 more purples = 6400 for a total of 18400). That way, the science cost is similar and Contact gives you some extra flexibility in allowing to choose directions at the cost of diluting your affinity which is a fair trade off, I think.

Finally, I'm agreeing with Galgus here, tech needs to provide a little less affinity and other sources a bit more (ideally, virtues would somehow award you more affinity XP directly, making culture and the virtue system interesting in other ways again).

 

[Ryika]

I think this would be interesting to investigate. However I must ask, this would tech placement change as well?

My concern is that in changing position of techs will cause the tech web to get wonky in terms of the progression of sciences. For example the line: Ecology > Terraforming > Planetary Engineering, it makes sense as a chain. The parts of the web are connected and different units and buildings are attached to the concepts there within.

So... I'm skeptical about the feasibility of altering the tech placements. That said altering the tech web would be a perfect opportunity to make some of hte affinity units easier to access and to strip stupidly placed unlocks out of techs completely. CARVRs have nothing to do with Autogyros! And Aegis and the Rocktopus could stand to appear sooner.

I'm pretty sure that given the fact that this version of the tech web would be more of a "timeline" it wouldn't be too hard to sort the technologies by how advanced they are. Keeping good combinations together would then only be a matter of keeping "pairs" on the same "string" of technologies.

It sucks.

Beelining techs is a natural part of the tech web. It was expected that most games wouldn't fill out the web.

Tying victory conditions to techs (or rather affinities which are tied to tech and more or less random quests) alone, and the ease with which the game's economy and thus science outputs can be broken, is the problem. A lot of subsystems in the game wind up superfluous, like the whole of combat for SP due the AI's ineptitude at strategy and the inherent flaws of 1UPT. Going for a lot of the high-end combat techs winds up being a waste of research, aside from the affinity points attached to them.

Another complication comes from leaf techs often being so expensive that beelining high tech looks like an attractive option. Hard forcing the player to pick up some leaf techs or multiple prerequisites in order to progress to the deep end of the tech web would be helpful. Also helpful would be placing barriers to research that can't be overcome with more beakers, like requiring a project to be completed via production (or food, or culture) in order to unlock sections of the tech web.

I don't see anything wrong with a tech every few turns, especially when backfilling earlier parts of the web. If an empire is putting out huge sci then they can reap the rewards of that, but that is difficult without trading off something. Just because the AI doesn't exploit those costs doesn't mean they don't exist, Academy spam is expensive and a decent human opponent would tear it apart... besides there are better ways to attain better overall output than Academy spam, if trying to play the game against a serious opponent rather than the AI.

Well, beelining into more expensive techs would still exist, just not beelining into the most expensive techs while you're in the early part of the midgame. I'd argue that my version of the tech web could even offer greater rewards for beelining, because overall the investment is also bigger.

I mean, it would be similar to CiV - that game also has beelining into specific more expensive technologies although the tech costs increase by a lot - just because the reward is great enough. All Beelining has to offer in "Play to win quickly!"-ish Beyond Earth - and I'm talking about singleplayer here - is Affinity. Nothing really interesting that's actually worth using.

At the same time I'm not arguing that one should be required to fill out the whole tech web, I'm arguing for actual progression unlocked by the tech web. There basically is almost none after the first half of the game, and that may not be as much as a problem in Multiplayer, but it certainly is in Singleplayer.

My gut feeling? It's good. Certainly something I'd like to try out.

I'll echo what most said about the affinity victory placement - that it should be spaced out a bit more. Will that drive certain affinities towards certain regions? Yes... but I don't think that's a huge problem if there are enough connections within each "ring" (allowing lateral traversal and naturally leading to hybridisation) and allows to keep the special affinity units in a place where people don't get them without fulfilling the affinity prerequisite (making them feel like "dead techs").

I think both have positives and negatives. If all Affinity Victories are in the same part of the tech web, then that part could be made a bit weaker than similiar techs on purpose, so beelining towards victory would be a weaker choice overall, but of course have the chance of getting you to win the game before that even causes problems. But of course it would look rather silly and it would probably be hard to - thematically - justify why all 3 Affinities want those exact same prereq-techs.

Additionally, I think it'd be good to split the contact techs into three techs, all of them located in the outermost ring but not at the most expensive leaves. Have... say three techs and any two of them required. That way, affinity victories need to go "deep" while contact needs to go "wide".

Practically, the difference is little: affinities need a purple and a light blue tech (3200+18000 in the proposal), while contact needs 2x blue (2x 6000 = 12000) at the cost of needing to grab more prerequisites (2 more purples = 6400 for a total of 18400). That way, the science cost is similar and Contact gives you some extra flexibility in allowing to choose directions at the cost of diluting your affinity which is a fair trade off, I think.

I'm not so sure about that. I actually think Contact should need to invest MORE into high-end technologies, because after all they can completely ignore affinity techs after a certain point if they want. That's a lot of optional stuff that they don't need on leaf technologies, and leaf technologies are more expensive than their branch-technologies.

Finally, I'm agreeing with Galgus here, tech needs to provide a little less affinity and other sources a bit more (ideally, virtues would somehow award you more affinity XP directly, making culture and the virtue system interesting in other ways again).

Yes, I'm still for that, too. I think it could certainly go hand-in-hand with something like I proposed.

 

[Lord Tirian]

I'm not so sure about that. I actually think Contact should need to invest MORE into high-end technologies, because after all they can completely ignore affinity techs after a certain point if they want. That's a lot of optional stuff that they don't need on leaf technologies, and leaf technologies are more expensive than their branch-technologies.

On the other hand, they will be a lot less focussed in terms of gained affinity levels, meaning they'll miss out on some progression (unless they make some effort to reach the hybrid units). That way, they might have a shot at winning early at the cost of making themselves vulnerable to opportunity attacks.

Hrm, I think that is kind of a thing that's hard to do on paper and would probably warrant some play testing to see what results in the more fun gameplay.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Well I think another key thing is having the Affinity Victories be more truly multistep, not just Affinity+tech

Purity+Supremacy seem that way, but could be made more so

Purity Victory Quests
open initially
1a. Contact Earth to see how they are doing (result; "they are surviving, but struggling" How can we help them?)..this can be the research, build cheapish thing, wait***however Lasercom satellites should interfere with each other, the more there are, the longer you have to wait
(opens quest 'reach X Purity')

1b. Opens at X Purity (regardless of 1a)....Terraform planet (should be ongoing mechanic, but at a certain point you can say, "we have made the planet reasonably like Earth")...by making this struggle a key part, you have an early 'achievement', that is not just research tech, build cheap building, wait..Terraforming satellites require X Purity

Once Both are complete.... a new quest pops up
3. "Perhaps we can bring them here to help fill this new Earth we are creating?"
Is that something we want to try and do? ..Quest reach 15 Purity
once you have "Lets do it"

4.Research, build, use Gate (roughly the same...but I'd only allow 1 Earth Settler to be put in Each city, but including cities you have already, so you really have to expand)**Also Emancipation Gate will interfere with yours, the more units they send through, the greater the chance a settler won't come through this turn, Or there is only 1 Gate per world, period.


For Supremacy Victory Quests open in this order
1. Develop a new technological form for Humanity that can survive..research some techs,

2. Form developed... do we really want to implement this? reach X Supremacy and a 'national wonder' that requires level X Supremacy
once that is complete then

3. Contact Earth... if Earth is still alive, we can save them through these new forms we have developed***however Lasercom satellites should interfere with each other, the more there are, the longer you have to wait...result"a few small enclaves are implementing our technology, but they are being oppressed by the Earth powers that want to enslave people to their flesh.. how can we help them?"

4. We might be able to send forces through a Gate, are we sure we want to do this?..reach Level 15 Supremacy

5. research Build Gate..roughly the same, but with more troops required, possibly allowing you to send multiple troops through per turn***Although Exodus Gate will interfere with yours, the more Settlers they settle, the greater the resistance you face, Or there is only 1 Gate per world, period.
Possibly also require some Culture requirement to 'convert' the conquered areas to your thinking. (reducing the 'rebel' production)


For Harmony Victory Quests

1. strive to work with the Environment.. reach X Harmony
Opens 2a, 2b, makes 2 c able to be opened

2a. Learn about the natives and their planetwide linkage (research tech...and then explore some native sites made visible with HarmonyX)

2b. Modify yourself to work with the environment (research tech, build buildings cities with % of your cities)..buildings require X Harmony

2c. protect the environment (appears if any Purity player starts terraforming, you need to "anti-terraform")

5. once 2 a+b complete... recognize the possibility of modifying humanity to interact with the planet directly.... do you want to do this?..Reach 15 Harmony

6. Roughly the same, research tech, build structure, adds X points to try and reach the total
.... buildings add additional points per turn, Terraforming state of the world Hurts (can reverse your progress if the world gets too terraformed), miasma on the planet helps, makes all natives angry with everyone and adds continual anger to them against everyone (but you get a small happiness bonus with them based on how complete you are.)**assuming aliens can be made an actual military factor in the late game.


Contact...
about the same, but
Rather than a piece of the signal being something you discover, a piece of the signal is something you Might get from putting 3 Progenitor artifacts together.

Rather than 30 turns, it actually counts up your excess energy and needs somewhere between 100k and 1 million energy.
Deep Space Telescope/Beacon and Lasercom Satellites/Gates interfere with each other
Activating the Beacon causes unhealth in every faction not 'sharing a victory' with you (and Fear in all the AI Factions not doing so.).. The Unhealth is proportional to your energy generation, and decreased if the faction is sanctioning/at war with you.


Have the "Final Tech" in each case be a light blue tech, but have the others sort of scattered around.