Research

[Kruelgor]

What would be helpful to the modding community is if you post how you did this.

 

[Thalassicus]

Spoiler Gradual Research.sql :

-- Simple version:
--  Cost = (Cost - 35) ^ 1.022 + 35

-- Most versions of SQL do not support fractional exponents, so must do:
--  Cost = POW(EXP(LOG(Cost-35)/500),511)+35  -- Note to manually exclude 35 or divide 0 error!

-- Can't seem to find proper pow, exp, log math function names however, so manually setting ranges.
-- Tested by checking one tech from each range.

-- Must also do techs in reverse order due to cost increases causing a tech to potentially cross
-- the next-highest threshold.

UPDATE Technologies
SET 'Cost' = Cost * 1.20
WHERE Cost >= 2100; 

UPDATE Technologies
SET 'Cost' = Cost * 1.17
WHERE Cost >= 1075
AND Cost < 2100; 

UPDATE Technologies
SET 'Cost' = Cost * 1.15
WHERE Cost >= 375
AND Cost < 1075; 

UPDATE Technologies
SET 'Cost' = Cost * 1.10
WHERE Cost >= 130
AND Cost < 375; 

UPDATE Technologies
SET 'Cost' = Cost * 1.05
WHERE Cost >= 60
AND Cost < 130; 


--        From Excel
--
--     Old     New   Inc (%)
--      35      35     0        *
--      60      62     2.5
--      80      84     5        *
--     130     140     7.5
--     200     220    10        *
--     375     422    12.5
--     800     920    15        *
--    1075    1247    16
--    1500    1755    17        *
--    2100    2478    18
--    3000    3570    19        *

Mods are all open source, so if you open the *.sql file within the mod folder, you can see how it's done.

I'm planning on changing this to a more elegant solution with Lua now that I'm learning how to program in that. The version of sql used for Civ doesn't have a power function (^), but Lua does.

 

[clearbeard]

How does the slower tech progression affect research pacts? As it stands, they seem very cheap to me, especially if you are wealthy and at peace with a lot of other civs. My current game, it feels like 50% or more of my techs come from pacts, and an isolated start and rampant peace means I'm out teching everyone else handily on King. If the later techs are even more expensive than in vanilla, it seems like that would become even more of an issue without re-balancing them as well.

 

[Thalassicus]

I'll include an increase to research pact wait time in this mod, there seems to be an overall feeling from many people they're a bit powerful anyway. Thank you for the idea.

 

[marekb]

I have the feeling that the pact is much more powerful at the beginning of game when you can get a tech worth 30+ tuns of research and you are not able to produce great scientist. Later in the game, when develop your civilization well, and you can research every tech in 10-11 turn at most, it is not so powerful. I do not know if it would not be better to rise the price of research agreement, then increasing wait time. For example like that (standard map, standard speed):
classical era -> 200gp -> 300
medieval era -> 250gp -> 400
renaissance era -> 250gp -> 500
industrial era -> 300gp -> 600
modern era -> 350gp -> 700
future era -> ? -> 800gp

On the other hand I would prefer research agreement to work differently. During the agreement both civilization research are boosted by 10% or 15%, but all those beakers (from both civs) are collected and after completed agreement each civilization get 1/2 of the collected science.

Or a little different: both civs choose the technology that both can research and work together putting 15% of their beakers until tech is discovered for both civs.

But I think that these changes are not possible without dll.

 

[Thalassicus]

On the other hand I would prefer research agreement to work differently. During the agreement both civilization research are boosted by 10% or 15%, but all those beakers (from both civs) are collected and after completed agreement each civilization get 1/2 of the collected science.

I like this idea, it's simple and would scale effortlessly to all situations. I'll put it on my to-do list for once we have c++ access.

 

[gandalf51]

....

On the other hand I would prefer research agreement to work differently. During the agreement both civilization research are boosted by 10% or 15%, but all those beakers (from both civs) are collected and after completed agreement each civilization get 1/2 of the collected science.

Or a little different: both civs choose the technology that both can research and work together putting 15% of their beakers until tech is discovered for both civs.

.....

Both will not works if one civ make much more beakers than the other.


What about making Research Pact a Trade Tech Pact ?
Like in previous Civ, but taking some gold and turns

 

[TheBlackHole]

Both will not works if one civ make much more beakers than the other.

I think that's kind of the point. An advanced Civ doesn't have much to gain from a primitive Civ (what can you learn from them anyway?), whereas a primitive Civ has a LOT to gain from an advanced Civ (just sharing ideas at all greatly opens you up to new technologies). So "dividing by two" models that, the advanced Civ puts in a lot and gets a little out of it, but the primitive Civ puts in less contribution but gets a lot out of it. However, for both Civs there is still a net gain, so it's still worth it in the end for both of them, even if one gets much more out of it than the other.

 

[Trickster7135]

I'll include an increase to research pact wait time in this mod, there seems to be an overall feeling from many people they're a bit powerful anyway. Thank you for the idea.

I think the wait time for research is just fine in vanilla Civ5, it is the fact that the cost doesn't scale with the ages. 250 gold in the Classical age is much, much different than in the Industrial Age. I think you should return the time to normal and change the costs so that it costs 250 gold for being in the Ancient and Classical age, and increases by an additional 250 gold per age after that.

 

[Thalassicus]

True about it not scaling with era, though the cost does increase each time you sign a research pact. One thought that comes to mind is an era cost might have the effect of penalizing "lonely" start locations compared to "crowded" ones though. (Lonely starts can't get as much use out of pacts until late game.) Perhaps it'd be better to have the gold cost ramp up more each time a pact is signed? Maybe something like 100-200-300-400-etc...

The unfortunate thing is I've been unable to find modifiers for anything other than wait time, which is why I changed that value; other changes will require the full sdk.

 

[marekb]

True about it not scaling with era, though the cost does increase each time you sign a research pact.

I do not think it is true. I usually sign out a lot of research agreements and costs very clearly depends on era. If I manage to sign the agreement during classical era I pay 200gp. If not, and I am in medieval era I pay 250gp. For the first agreement. Then I always pay 250gp until I enter industrial era when cost increases to 300gp. I never paid for RA fore then 350gp (in modern era).

 

[Thalassicus]

Hmm that's interesting... darn thing is, I can't figure out where the values are stored to see just what the scaling of research pacts is precisely. I think it might be hardcoded. At the very least, it doesn't show up with searches across the xml for keywords like "research" and I looked in some of the XML files. :\

 

[marekb]

In GlobalDefines.xml there are following statements:

        <Row Name="RESEARCH_AGREEMENT_TIMER">
           <Value>20</Value>
       </Row>
       <Row Name="RESEARCH_AGREEMENT_MOD">
            <Value>0</Value>
        </Row>

Maybe changing RESEARCH_AGREEMENT_MOD will change the cost of RA?

 

[Thalassicus]

Maybe, I have no idea what exactly that value does. When I have time I'll set up a test map with research pacts on 1 turn, figure out what exactly the modifier mods.

 

[DC0]

Thanks for your efforts for balancing a gameplay. But in this case I think I'll leave all as it is. Rationale: in industrial era technology made many astounding breakthroughs. In modern era with its computers technology has gained even more progress.
Conclusion: technological progress is not even.

 

[Gedemon]

Conclusion: technological progress is not even.

yes, but it's already reflected by the uneven timeline.

 

[Gusss]

Very good job. I love all of your mods!

 

[a barbarian]

Very good idea with the gradual increase in tech costs! With another mod which just raised the tech costs by the same multiplier for all ages I had the problem that teching at the beginning was too slow and in result, there was very little to build in the cities for quite a while.

Otherwise I always imagine having a tech tree split in 2 parts (civil and military research) and having the possibility of global 'arms deals' so that you can buy and sell advanced arms to all the backward dictatorships, like in the real world

 

[BladeRnr]

With another mod which just raised the tech costs by the same multiplier for all ages I had the problem that research at the beginning was too slow and in result, there was very little to build in the cities for quite a while.

First, I agree with a barbarian, great mod. I can't believe that Firaxis still didn't manage to tweak the build to tech ratio just right, which you nearly perfectly did. However, I wonder about the weird jump to 117% for Industrial, is there any particular reasons for it instead of going to 120%?

If I can offer a suggestion, it would be to change the later parts of the tech tree to:

• 120% - Industrial
• 125% - Modern
• 150% - Future

The reason is that, while I found that research speeds are just right at the beginning and middle of the tech tree, by the end of it, any decent civ science just powers through any tech in 4-6 turns, even with your modifications. So I think that the final techs just be boosted a bit more, especially since there's so many units there that the techs go so fast and don't allow us to enjoy using the new units (or even finish building them!) before they become obsolete.

 

[Thalassicus]

The seeming "jump" is because I'm not actually doing the techs by era, I'm using the formula listed below them (and the list is also rounded here for easier reading, but not rounded in the mod file).

I finally got into a decent modern-era game now thanks to the various AI changes in the latest patch (and these balance changes) that finally seem to make warfare challenging... and I agree it still seems to go by a little too fast. While 150% is probably too high, I'll adjust the formula so that the maximum is 130%, up from 120%.