JZ Tech Tree [Deleted]

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PROJECT 1 - EXPANDED TECH TREE - COMPLETED

The first project is to flesh out the existing tech tree. I don't like it at all that certain eras only have four or five technologies in them, nor do I think it should be possible to beeline straight to the latter eras without researching fundamentals like Mining or Writing. So in addition to dramatically expanding the tech tree, I want to expand the amount of interconnection between various technologies within an era. Hopefully the endpoint is a tech tree with a lot more oomph to it, that still manages logical and mathematical consistency.

I am aware that in the latter parts of the tech tree, Atomic Era and beyond, some of the connections are absent and/or don't make sense yet. There's just no way to balance that or get a sense of what it needs until previous eras are more fully fleshed out.



PROJECT 2 - ANCIENT ERA WONDERS AND BUILDINGS

The Ancient Era was in desperate need of some additional buildings and wonders. In fact, Civ VI has one of the most barren Ancient Eras of any Civ game in memory. Gone are the Temple of Artemis, the Statue of Zeus, and the Great Wall. Moved to the Classical Era are the Colossus and Colosseum. Which begs the question - why even have an Ancient Era if civs blow through it within the first twenty turns of the game and move on to bigger things?

Anyway, what I've done is spruce up the Ancient Era with a whole bunch of useful buildings and wonders. Here's what I've added so far:

Craft Hut - +1 gold, +1 production
Dock - +1 production, +1 culture, +1 GPP Admiral (requires Harbor)
Garden - +1 food, +1 culture
Herbalist Hut - +1 gold, +1 food
Mural - +1 culture
Papyrus Maker - +1 gold, +1 science
Target Range - +25% ranged unit exp (requires Encampment)

Lascaux Caves - +3 culture, +1 GPP Artist
Jantar Mantar - +2 science, +2 culture, +1GPP Scientist, +1 GPP Artist
Statue of Zeus - +2 science, +2 gold, +2 faith, +1 GPP Engineer

Please keep in mind that the current abilities on these wonders are placeholders in a sense.. The modifier system is still a bit tricky for me, which is how you get all the unique bonuses to different wonders. So currently these new wonders just have bonuses to yields and GPP. I'm super open to suggestions on what their real abilities should be! (especially if you also know how to code those abilities)





PROJECT 3 - ANCIENT ERA UNIT BALANCE

My second major goal at the moment is adding a few new units to the Ancient Era that increase a player's options (particularly in multiplayer!) without upsetting the balance of the game. I am thinking of adding another Ancient Era melee unit that doesn't require Iron, and doesn't upgrade into Swordsmen. But this would functionally mean a second line of melee units throughout the game. I'm hoping it's possible to code melee units that get bonus to all other melee units, like Axemen from Civ IV. It would also be cool to have a unit that was super strong against ranged attacks to counter the archer spam that seems like a dominant multiplayer strategy.

So far I've only added one unit: the Herbalist, an Ancient Era Medic unit that unlocks with the totally optional technology Herbalism. I really like the idea of attaching some strong units to technologies that are not instrumental in the tech tree, or even to dead ends. It should force the kind of strategic choices that I really like from Civ games.
 
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I noticed in the Vanilla game a lot of techs are just a unit or two without a special yield or ability perk. Will you be adding more of these sorts of perks to more existing techs? Also on the topic of new units, while there is already spearmen, I think a new unit to counter horseman spam would be good.
 
I noticed in the Vanilla game a lot of techs are just a unit or two without a special yield or ability perk. Will you be adding more of these sorts of perks to more existing techs? Also on the topic of new units, while there is already spearmen, I think a new unit to counter horseman spam would be good.


Yea, definitely! One just needs to be careful not to let the cumulative weight of these bonuses get out of hand, ie a farm producing 14 food. I think there's a TON of design room for buildings and techs that increase the yields off of specific resources (like herbalism could improve spices). I don't have many of these particularly in mind, but I'm super open to suggestions to that effect.
 
On the topic of Horseman spam, I'm not sure what to do about it! The spearman should be perfectly suited to deal with mass cavalry, yet doesn't quite fill the role successfully. I think it might be worthwhile to up the power on the spearman a bit, from 25 to 28 or so. One other thing that I want to try is giving the spearman (and probably other anti-cavalry as well) a small damage 1 tile ranged attack, so they can poke at nearby enemy units without engaging with them directly. For instance, spearman would be:

Attack: 25
Ranged Attack: 10
Range: 1

So it would always be a lot more effective to attack melee...but you have the additional strategic option of spear-poking. This would make spearman a way more useful unit in general.
 
Good.
Some questions:
1.
Paper. Why Industrial Era? :eek:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper
The pulp papermaking process is ascribed to Cai Lun, a 2nd-century AD Han court eunuch.[2] With paper as an effective substitute for silk in many applications, China could export silk in greater quantity, contributing to a Golden Age. Its knowledge and uses spread from China through the Middle East to medieval Europe in the 13th century, where the first water powered paper mills were built.
Paper tech must be in Classical or Medieval Era.

2. I think you need new civics in the Civic Tree for a balance between trees.
Any ideas:
A) Jurisprudence (Classiacal Era)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurisprudence
Prerequisite Techs: Political Philosophy, Drama and Poetry
Leads to Techs: Civil Service, Parliaments
Unlocks: Courthouse (building), Jail (building). These buildings you construct in the City Center (but you can create new District, for example, Administration District)
B) Quality of life (Atomic Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_life
Prerequisite Techs: Ideology
Leads to Techs: Consumerism
Unlocks: Compulsory Education (economic policy), Universal Healthcare (economic policy)
C) Classicism (Renaissance Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classicism
Prerequisite Techs: Humanism
Leads to Techs: Opera and ballet, Civil engineering
Unlocks: Villa La Rotonda (Wonder), Brandenburg Gate (Wonder).
D) Consumerism (Atomic Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumerism
Prerequisite Techs: Quality of life
Leads to Techs: Globalization
Unlocks: Multinational corporations (economic or diplomatic policy), Petronas Towers (Wonder)
Other: Awards 1 Envoy
E) Modernism (Modern Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modernism
Prerequisite Techs: Opera nad ballet, Urbanization
Leads to Techs: Ideology
Unlocks: Shukhov Tower (Wonder), Bauhaus (Wonder)
F) Marxism (Industrial Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism
Prerequisite Techs: Civil engineering
Leads to Techs: Mobilization
Unlocks: Trade Union (economic policy), Eight-hour day Monument (Wonder) http://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/culture/social/display/32235-eight-hour-day-monument
G) Parliaments (Medieval Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliament
Prerequisite Techs: Defensive tactics, Jurisprudence
Leads to Techs: Guilds
Unlocks: Magna Carta (economic policy)
Other: Awards 1 Envoy
H) Mail (Classical Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail
Prerequisite Techs: Early Empire
Leads to Techs: Recorded History
Unlocks: Angarum (economic or military card) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angarum
Other: Awards 1 Envoy
I) Counterculture (Atomic Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterculture
Prerequisite Techs: Cold War
Leads to Techs: Globalization, Social Media
Unlocks: Minority Rights (economic policy), Rock and roll (wildcard)
Spoiler :




3. Since Civ 5 we have losted Medicine. Since Civ 6 we have losted Hospital :(. People without medicine and hospitals = machines or gods?
So, 3 new buildings for your mod:
1) Pharmacy or Apotheca
Prerequisite Techs: Alchemy
Bonus: Amenity, Science, GSP (great scientist points)
2) Hospital
Prerequisite Techs: Natural Science
Bonus: Amenity, Science, GSP
3) Medical Lab
Prerequisite Techs: Computers
Bonus: Amenity, Science, GSP
These buildings you can construct in the City Center. But you can create new District type: Health Center.

4. Possible buildings for other techs:
Public discourse: School (building)
Windmills: Windmill :lol: (building or improvement)
Clockwork: Spasskaya Tower or Kremlin (Wonder) (According to a number of historical accounts, the clock on the Spasskaya Tower appeared between 1491 and 1585. It is usually referred to as the Kremlin chimes (Кремлёвские куранты) and designates official Moscow Time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spasskaya_Tower
Natural Science: Royal Academy of Sciences (Wonder), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Swedish_Academy_of_Sciences
Locomotives: Railways (?)
Quantum Mechanics: Atomium (Wonder) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomium
Special Operations: The Pentagon (Wonder)
Particle Physics: Large Hadron Collider (Wonder)
Renewables: Solar Plant (Building or improvement), Wind Farm (Building or improvement)
Cybernetics: Golden Shield (Project) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Shield_Project
World Wide Web: Wikipedia (Project)
Bastions: Himeji Castle (Wonder) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Himeji_Castle

Can you use Civ 5 models for wonder?
 
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Re: Paper. The tech's name probably needs clarification, but it is a very nice highlight of history and makes a ton of sense as an industrial era tech. The current type of paper were using (wood pulp paper) wasn't invented before the 1840's, as it requires a chemical reaction to obtain cellulose fibers, as opposed to a lengthy physical reaction required by hemp paper. However, when it appeared, it was much faster and cheaper to create, and thus it phased out the traditional paper obtained from textiles very quickly and made printing dirt cheap in comparison to prior centuries. The drawback is that it is very fragile and unreliable, compared to the old hemp paper.
 
First that comes in my mind:
Buildings: pharmacy, hospital, national bank, public schools, military base...
Units: b2 bomber, fighter jets (5th generation)...
I would like to participate. Codding is not the problem, but 3d objects are.
If you are interested contact me private message.
 
In regards to the art assets the only thing that can be done right now is to reuse existing game icons. If you take a look at the MOAR units mod you will see how its done. I've experimented myself and I'm able to reuse existing icons for new buildings. The base game icons are so generic looking that they can be used for more than one thing.
 
So, after many many tries with that not just slightly tarded vanilla map generator, I finally got a semi-useful map to actually play the game past classical era. I chose Japan, and in the end I was stuck on a relatively small island for half the game. As for my observations of the game:

- I was completely isolated on Antartica continent, with barely enough space for 4 cities (tho I put 5th city on the remaining 4 hexes of land), sitting on tundra even (3/5 of the continent)
- despite isolation (since I found first other civ only in renaissance and was able to connect trade route to them only after industrial era), I quickly rose from last in every victory condition to first in science and culture by a LARGE margin (aka entering modern era at ~1400 AD with 160+ science per turn and 260+ culture per turn )

- I can say that from starting at ancient era, the ancient and classical eras are more or less kind of okay-ish. The problem comes later, when you practically FTL through renaissance and industrial eras in a matter of 50 turns or so (with that amount of science and inspiration, even on Epic it takes only 4-5 turns per tech).

- as Japan... despite the fact that Samurai were supposed to be used for about a thousand years, I only managed to pop a SINGLE samurai unit before I could already research Rifling that upgrades Samurai into Musketmen. Maybe the problem with Samurai is that they do NOT actually replace Swordsmen, instead they come in a fairly late technology (along with Pikemen) and are SEPARATE completely, only merging to Musketmen for infantry line.

- by the time I finally researched Frigate to upgrade my Quintriremes to them, I already had Aviation available for research.

- renaissance and industrial era are practically nonexistent, which is even worse than in Civ5. There's a reason why I loved playing the Anno Domini mod - the era progression was MUCH longer and quite linear, not to mention multitudes of unit upgrades along the ages.. I think there were more upgrades from start of the game to mere Legion than there are for the infantry line alltogether in Civ6...


So to sum it up, I'd be immensely grateful for any kind of gameplay overhaul, especially those that completely redo whole technology tree and stop AI from cheating (as there is nothing of a "bottleneck" (like needing 2-3 techs as prequisites instead of 1 only) and you can usually keep researching a single line... in the end I found Sparta, who was at the losing end in Science victory, roaming the seas with IRONCLADS (while I was still using Quintriremes) while all Gorgo's other techs were still at classical era at most (using archers and spearmen on ground)
 
Re: Paper. The tech's name probably needs clarification, but it is a very nice highlight of history and makes a ton of sense as an industrial era tech. The current type of paper were using (wood pulp paper) wasn't invented before the 1840's, as it requires a chemical reaction to obtain cellulose fibers, as opposed to a lengthy physical reaction required by hemp paper. However, when it appeared, it was much faster and cheaper to create, and thus it phased out the traditional paper obtained from textiles very quickly and made printing dirt cheap in comparison to prior centuries. The drawback is that it is very fragile and unreliable, compared to the old hemp paper.

Do you think the tech name would make more sense as Paper Manufacturing or something of the sort? There's a few techs in there that I personally am super proud of but a bit worried that the connection might not be obvious enough. My personal favorite: a prerequisite for Insurance is the Compass. Historically, the insurance industry arose in Liverpool and London out of the Triangle Trade because such long and dangerous voyages needed to be underwritten for the investors.
 
Good.
Some questions:
1.
Paper. Why Industrial Era? :eek:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper
The pulp papermaking process is ascribed to Cai Lun, a 2nd-century AD Han court eunuch.[2] With paper as an effective substitute for silk in many applications, China could export silk in greater quantity, contributing to a Golden Age. Its knowledge and uses spread from China through the Middle East to medieval Europe in the 13th century, where the first water powered paper mills were built.
Paper tech must be in Classical or Medieval Era.

2. I think you need new civics in the Civic Tree for a balance between trees.
Any ideas:
A) Jurisprudence (Classiacal Era)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurisprudence
Prerequisite Techs: Political Philosophy, Drama and Poetry
Leads to Techs: Civil Service, Parliaments
Unlocks: Courthouse (building), Jail (building). These buildings you construct in the City Center (but you can create new District, for example, Administration District)
B) Quality of life (Atomic Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_life
Prerequisite Techs: Ideology
Leads to Techs: Consumerism
Unlocks: Compulsory Education (economic policy), Universal Healthcare (economic policy)
C) Classicism (Renaissance Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classicism
Prerequisite Techs: Humanism
Leads to Techs: Opera and ballet, Civil engineering
Unlocks: Villa La Rotonda (Wonder), Brandenburg Gate (Wonder).
D) Consumerism (Atomic Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumerism
Prerequisite Techs: Quality of life
Leads to Techs: Globalization
Unlocks: Multinational corporations (economic or diplomatic policy), Petronas Towers (Wonder)
Other: Awards 1 Envoy
E) Modernism (Modern Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modernism
Prerequisite Techs: Opera nad ballet, Urbanization
Leads to Techs: Ideology
Unlocks: Shukhov Tower (Wonder), Bauhaus (Wonder)
F) Marxism (Industrial Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism
Prerequisite Techs: Civil engineering
Leads to Techs: Mobilization
Unlocks: Trade Union (economic policy), Eight-hour day Monument (Wonder) http://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/culture/social/display/32235-eight-hour-day-monument
G) Parliaments (Medieval Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliament
Prerequisite Techs: Defensive tactics
Leads to Techs: Guilds
Unlocks: Magna Carta (economic policy)
Other: Awards 1 Envoy
H) Mail (Classical Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail
Prerequisite Techs: Early Empire
Leads to Techs: Recorded History
Unlocks: Angarum (economic or military card) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angarum
Other: Awards 1 Envoy
I) Counterculture (Atomic Era) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterculture
Prerequisite Techs: Cold War
Leads to Techs: Globalization, Social Media
Unlocks: Minority Rights (economic policy), Rock and roll (wildcard)

3. Since Civ 5 we have losted Medicine. Since Civ 6 we have losted Hospital :(. People without medicine and hospitals = machines or gods?
So, 3 new buildings for your mod:
1) Pharmacy or Apotheca
Prerequisite Techs: Alchemy
Bonus: Amenity, Science, GSP (great scientist points)
2) Hospital
Prerequisite Techs: Natural Science
Bonus: Amenity, Science, GSP
3) Medical Lab
Prerequisite Techs: Computers
Bonus: Amenity, Science, GSP
These buildings you can construct in the City Center. But you can create new District type: Health Center.

4. Possible buildings for other techs:
Public discourse: School (building)
Windmills: Windmill :lol: (building or improvement)
Clockwork: Spasskaya Tower or Kremlin (Wonder) (According to a number of historical accounts, the clock on the Spasskaya Tower appeared between 1491 and 1585. It is usually referred to as the Kremlin chimes (Кремлёвские куранты) and designates official Moscow Time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spasskaya_Tower
Natural Science: Royal Academy of Sciences (Wonder), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Swedish_Academy_of_Sciences
Locomotives: Railways (?)
Quantum Mechanics: Atomium (Wonder) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomium
Special Operations: The Pentagon (Wonder)
Particle Physics: Large Hadron Collider (Wonder)
Renewables: Solar Plant (Building or improvement), Wind Farm (Building or improvement)s
Cybernetics: Golden Shield (Project) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Shield_Project
World Wide Web: Wikipedia (Project)
Bastions: Himeji Castle (Wonder) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Himeji_Castle

Can you use Civ 5 models for wonder?




Thanks so much for the detailed post! I'll try to go line-by-line through it for you :)

1. Paper - janboruta summed it up pretty nicely. Paper in some form has been around for most of human history, but the ubiquity and cheapness of modern paper products is a very recent phenomenon. Before they came up with a process to constantly print a single long, continuous sheet of paper which can then be chopped up into whatever size pieces, paper making was expensive and time consuming and paper was subsequently an elite consumer good. So your average family might only own one book - The Bible - and pass it down from generation to generation. The modern paper manufacturing process is largely responsible for this change.

2. I most certainly will do this exact same thing to the Civics tree! And your suggestions are wonderful. I just haven't opened that can of worms yet because I know it's gonna be big, and I want to have the tech tree more locked down before I move on. If you'd like to work your ideas into something a little bit more formal, I recommend you go over to draw.io and try your hand at a graphical representation of the civics tree. The only thing to keep in mind is that there should be some attempt at consistency when it comes to the number of prereq techs for any given era. ie, try to avoid situations where one of the civics in the Industrial era requires 12 pre-reqs and the one below it requires 22. Thinking about the problem like this will be a tremendous help when it comes time to actually write the Civics Tree.

3. Love all three of the medical buildings, they're going in for sure. I'm gonna make the Apotheca (apothecary?) give bonuses from Mercury hahaha.

4. Love the buildings too. Some of the later era ones are gonna have to wait til I get to that part of the tree, but they're all great ideas. In particular I didn't know that about the Kremlin (Spasskaya Tower) and it's so cool it absolutely needs to be in the game.
 
So, after many many tries with that not just slightly tarded vanilla map generator, I finally got a semi-useful map to actually play the game past classical era. I chose Japan, and in the end I was stuck on a relatively small island for half the game. As for my observations of the game:

- I was completely isolated on Antartica continent, with barely enough space for 4 cities (tho I put 5th city on the remaining 4 hexes of land), sitting on tundra even (3/5 of the continent)
- despite isolation (since I found first other civ only in renaissance and was able to connect trade route to them only after industrial era), I quickly rose from last in every victory condition to first in science and culture by a LARGE margin (aka entering modern era at ~1400 AD with 160+ science per turn and 260+ culture per turn )

- I can say that from starting at ancient era, the ancient and classical eras are more or less kind of okay-ish. The problem comes later, when you practically FTL through renaissance and industrial eras in a matter of 50 turns or so (with that amount of science and inspiration, even on Epic it takes only 4-5 turns per tech).

- as Japan... despite the fact that Samurai were supposed to be used for about a thousand years, I only managed to pop a SINGLE samurai unit before I could already research Rifling that upgrades Samurai into Musketmen. Maybe the problem with Samurai is that they do NOT actually replace Swordsmen, instead they come in a fairly late technology (along with Pikemen) and are SEPARATE completely, only merging to Musketmen for infantry line.

- by the time I finally researched Frigate to upgrade my Quintriremes to them, I already had Aviation available for research.

- renaissance and industrial era are practically nonexistent, which is even worse than in Civ5. There's a reason why I loved playing the Anno Domini mod - the era progression was MUCH longer and quite linear, not to mention multitudes of unit upgrades along the ages.. I think there were more upgrades from start of the game to mere Legion than there are for the infantry line alltogether in Civ6...


So to sum it up, I'd be immensely grateful for any kind of gameplay overhaul, especially those that completely redo whole technology tree and stop AI from cheating (as there is nothing of a "bottleneck" (like needing 2-3 techs as prequisites instead of 1 only) and you can usually keep researching a single line... in the end I found Sparta, who was at the losing end in Science victory, roaming the seas with IRONCLADS (while I was still using Quintriremes) while all Gorgo's other techs were still at classical era at most (using archers and spearmen on ground)

I think you summed up many of my frustrations with Vanilla, and a lot of what I hope to accomplish with this mod. I am inspired by Anno Domini, but have no desire to limit myself to the pre-Industrial era. In fact, I think it could be really exciting to go into the next fifty years of human history. But Anno Domini is super well-made and I can tell you y design philosophy along those points is pretty similar. I can also tell you that with this mod, already, it takes about 2x as many techs to change era as Vanilla, and at least 3x for Atomic era and beyond.
 
2. I most certainly will do this exact same thing to the Civics tree! And your suggestions are wonderful. I just haven't opened that can of worms yet because I know it's gonna be big, and I want to have the tech tree more locked down before I move on. If you'd like to work your ideas into something a little bit more formal, I recommend you go over to draw.io and try your hand at a graphical representation of the civics tree. The only thing to keep in mind is that there should be some attempt at consistency when it comes to the number of prereq techs for any given era. ie, try to avoid situations where one of the civics in the Industrial era requires 12 pre-reqs and the one below it requires 22. Thinking about the problem like this will be a tremendous help when it comes time to actually write the Civics Tree.
Yes, but I just added my civics to an existing screenshot of civic tree. Spoiler in the first comment.
 
Thank you so much for this work. It's people like you who are making this a great game. It'll be nice to play a less depressing information era that's not just "kill people brutally" techs.
 
thank you! There's so much going on the Information era, it's kind of ridiculous that the devs boiled it down to the eight techs that they did. I could type up a long rant about it but I won't bother. It just boggles the mind how people could miss so much about the time they are currently living in.

If I have time to write up the next era of technologies, that's when horsehocky's gonna get reallllllly depressing. I'm thinking Age of Scarcity.
 
thank you! There's so much going on the Information era, it's kind of ridiculous that the devs boiled it down to the eight techs that they did. I could type up a long rant about it but I won't bother. It just boggles the mind how people could miss so much about the time they are currently living in.

If I have time to write up the next era of technologies, that's when ****'s gonna get reallllllly depressing. I'm thinking Age of Scarcity.
Reminds me of the quote about how world war 4 would be fought with spears and rocks again. I always have felt that Civ could do a better job at depicting mankind's self-destructive behavior and destruction of the environment. Especially in civ 6, where so much of the environment is destroyed because of human stuff like wonders and districts.
 
I'm hoping its possible to code a bunch of end of the world disasters. Like all city growth goes exponential until there aren't enough amenities in the world and revolts happen everywhere. Or bee colonies collapse and all farms receive -6 food. Or the oceans rise and terrain starts randomly swapping. Or you slowly start to lose control of your own government and/or military. Things like that!
 
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