3 groups of tech meaning 3 branches? Tech tree already has 5 or more as I recall things (Magic/religion/recon/melee/mounted/financial...). Or do you mean making it such that you can work on 3 things at once?
Not branches, but trees which means yes, at once. Thats an outdated though i just thought of better, inspired by Dungeon Siege lvl up system.
Reason: i find it quite amusing to imagine how elderly seelie councillors are sitting around cosy fire and inventing mithril golem crafting, etc
So:
Each tech must require a specific type of research points which are generated based upon associated type specialists and in-game events
-farming: these rps shall receive boost when new farms, windmills, plantations, granaries, smokehouses, ... are built, shall increase slowly each turn based on worked tiles with these improvements and be diverted only into agrary techs such as agriculture, calendar and like
-hunting: camps, fishing boats, hunter lodges, ...; worked tiles with'em; hunters killing/taking animals; number of hunters;
-crafting: engineers, forges, mines, ...
-commerce
-arcane
- alignment-based divine
-...
There also shall be synergies, such as sages delving in both arcane and divine mysteries, farmers contributing to commerce, ...
Each major tech shall have mini-techs inside providing stat boosts to existing features - though i have doubts about technically implementing it
And automatic branch switches based upon empire status and player decisions both...
Wow, as this ruleset unfolds into my mind i see a whole new economic system that sends Sid's omnibuck altogether with omnihammer straight to hell. (or more precise, to the plane of oblivion)
So, if someone is interested and possibly considering to implement all this i may move it all to a new thread and start to fill those brief outlines with more and more details. Tell me so i shall not waste my time for naught.
P.S. Always wanted to live in society that manages without the whole money concept and instantly disliked MoO]I[ for silicoids and clackons paying taxes...
P.P.S.
Imo money taxes and other like stuff must have place only in heavily Mammon influenced cultures - dwarves are for gold and barter, elves can shoot anything they cannot handmade (and in case of unseelie steal/loot the rest) and so on and so forth. Purge the wicked Mammon delusions! (from this game and as i mentioned not completely)
Someone noticed that this culture feature is basically a domain/dominion of god/wizard ruler and has nothing to do with workable tiles but must determine spellcasting possibility/amplification? and transformation/maintaining enchantments too? Nodes... casters... wonders as relays/amplifiers...
So to say workable city area should expand size- not culture-based
So to summarize today's ravings: Sid and brian had gave us an excellent graphical and scripting engine but
purposefully filled it with stupid stuff - anyone who played alpha should see it.
And enlarge the maps for not all of us are running the relics from beginnings of current millenia