Some Tech Progression in Info Era Doesn't Make Sense

[Fish Man]

Tech progression in CiV: G+K is pretty good for ancient to atomic eras. There are no glaring flaws on techs which should, scientifically, require a prerequisite but don't. However, this all changes in the information era.

How do we make Apollo Project without discovering satellites? Doesn't venturing into space come before going to the moon?

I also find it hard to believe the spaceship to Alpha Centauri part. At the rate of technology today, it would take thousands or even millions of years to reach there. Only when we become a Level II civ (Kardashev scale) do we have hope of going there in a reasonable time frame, and that's not gonna come in a couple thousand years, or according to CiV, possible 2-3 new eras and a completely different turn system. So I propose that we change the spaceship destination to Mars for believability, AND put Apollo Program somewhere in the info era (maybe once you've researched advanced ballistics AND satellites).

Sorry if you think these are pointless nitpicks, but I just find these 2 things hard to believe.

 

[TyBoy]

I too find the finish to the game unsatisfying. To me, it's not just the space race. The tech tree ends with just a couple of additional techs beyond the technology we have today (though those missing techs are not things I see happening all that soon). I don't see any "civ" in the world today "winning" any time soon.

The specific example you gave seems ok though. The Apollo program happened in the 60's while satellites as we know them today didn't really come around until microprocessors in the 70's and 80's. I don't know the specifics, but I would guess that at the time of the moon landing there were very few civilian satellites. If you want to define "satellites" so simply that it means anything in orbit (which I realize is the correct definition) then the ordering is off. But if you take the satellites tech to mean the time when satellite technology really started to have a noticeable effect on the lives of people on the ground it seems about right.

 

[joncnunn]

Well, technically you don't quite need Satellites to get to the moon. It's just that if you were to try that without having any communications satellites in orbit, the astronauts would be completely on their own the moment they get out of range of the radio broadcasters.

I might also note that chances are your phone has much more computing power than NASA's entire computer lab in 1969 so if a hypothetical society advanced faster along miniaturization lines than we did, in theory they could have sufficient computing power along with them instead of having it back on earth.

 

[Fish Man]

Well, technically you don't quite need Satellites to get to the moon. It's just that if you were to try that without having any communications satellites in orbit, the astronauts would be completely on their own the moment they get out of range of the radio broadcasters.

I might also note that chances are your phone has much more computing power than NASA's entire computer lab in 1969 so if a hypothetical society advanced faster along miniaturization lines than we did, in theory they could have sufficient computing power along with them instead of having it back on earth.

But what about the spaceship to Alpha Centauri?
"Catherine has completed Hubble Space Telescope"
5 turns later...
"Catherine has won a Science Victory (by journeying 4+ light-years into another star system!)"

 

[VainoValkea]

All Civilizations I've played have had some glaring anachronisms and other weird things in the tech tree. My personal favorite is the one that somehow managed to persist from Civ I to Civ III - Alphabet as a tech, leading to Writing. What the heck did they even use those alphabet for before coming up with the concept of putting words on parchment or stone tablet? Ancient Era Spelling Bees? Sucks to be the kid who has to spell Nebuchadnezzar.

Some other oft repeated examples: gatling guns without gunpowder, Internet without computers, railroads being a Modern Era tech, fighter planes requiring no internal combustion engines...

 

[Yibbledorf]

Funnily enough you can make missile cruisers without sailing.

 

[troublmaker]

It's to START the space race. The space race began in 1957 and didn't end until 1969. During that time they sent satellites into space and did all sorts of amazing things.

The only real complaint might be that the end of the game is Alpha Centauri. Although given if they added in any other technologies in the mean time... they victory mode would be ultimately unachievable

 

[topfoxrider]

its kind of the reason y i stick to vanilla. granted u still have to research rocketry before satellites, but there is a "future era" in the tech tree for the stasis chamber, engine and GDR. In addition I never liked how after GK the atomic era came after the modern era. That made no sense. Idk I get paranoid over these things D: BNW and GK are still fun to dabble occasionally though.

 

[MerchantCo]

Just forget about small things such as logic, and enjoy yourself.

 

[PhilBowles]

Tech progression in CiV: G+K is pretty good for ancient to atomic eras. There are no glaring flaws on techs which should, scientifically, require a prerequisite but don't. However, this all changes in the information era.

How do we make Apollo Project without discovering satellites? Doesn't venturing into space come before going to the moon?

I also find it hard to believe the spaceship to Alpha Centauri part. At the rate of technology today, it would take thousands or even millions of years to reach there. Only when we become a Level II civ (Kardashev scale) do we have hope of going there in a reasonable time frame, and that's not gonna come in a couple thousand years, or according to CiV, possible 2-3 new eras and a completely different turn system. So I propose that we change the spaceship destination to Mars for believability, AND put Apollo Program somewhere in the info era (maybe once you've researched advanced ballistics AND satellites).

Sorry if you think these are pointless nitpicks, but I just find these 2 things hard to believe.

Civ was never meant to be a game about realism, and both of these long predate Civ V - the flight to Alpha Centauri is from way back in Civ I (and in any case, the Civ V space victory doesn't appear to specify the intended destination for the spaceship).

The tech names are abstractions and often represent an approximate time period (for instance the Eiffel Tower is not contingent on radio technology, a later development, but was developed at much this time).

Satellites, however, is actually in the right place for what it represents. We think of Sputnik as the first satellite, but it's not a satellite in the sense of a modern instrument sent into a geostationary orbit - it and other early satellites, including the unmanned US satellites, were basically affixed to a rocket and hurled into space. They were in decaying orbits and all burned up in the atmosphere soon after launch (the manned ones of course ended up coming back to Earth; they too were in decaying orbits).

The Satellites tech represents satellites as a useful technological advance rather than - essentially - a proof of concept, and this indeed came to fruition later than Apollo. As noted by another poster above there were earlier communications satellites (as early as 1962), but it wasn't until the early 1970s that satellites came to be used as anything other than transceivers to any significant degree. The Satellites tech effect, in particular, references weather satellites.

 

[tomtom5858]

Why do we need to be a Level II civilization? I'd say that we might need to be a Level I civ, in order to produce sufficient antimatter as to power an Alcubierre drive in order to get there with a single ship, but why would we need a Dyson Construct in order go to the nearest star system?

 

[stii]

There are loads of things like this if you look hard enough like knights without bronze working.

 

[Fish Man]

Why do we need to be a Level II civilization? I'd say that we might need to be a Level I civ, in order to produce sufficient antimatter as to power an Alcubierre drive in order to get there with a single ship, but why would we need a Dyson Construct in order go to the nearest star system?

I have no idea what you're talking about.

But anyways, wouldn't it make more sense for us to harness the power of our own star BEFORE traveling to others?

There's also something else I noticed: every tech column in the G+K tech tree except for agriculture unlocks at least 1 military unit.

 

[themerchant8]

its kind of the reason y i stick to vanilla. granted u still have to research rocketry before satellites, but there is a "future era" in the tech tree for the stasis chamber, engine and GDR. In addition I never liked how after GK the atomic era came after the modern era. That made no sense. Idk I get paranoid over these things D: BNW and GK are still fun to dabble occasionally though.

It really depends on your definition of the modern era. Radios, telephones, cars, refrigeration, widespread use of electricity in general? Compared to the entire history of civilization, THAT'S modernization, and it came before the A bomb.

 

[tomtom5858]

But anyways, wouldn't it make more sense for us to harness the power of our own star BEFORE traveling to others?

Wouldn't it make more sense to harness all possible geothermal, solar, wind, etc. power in the Old World before going to the Americas? Wouldn't it make more sense to build every possible building and wonder in a city before settling a new one? If something is possible, we (as a species) should do it at least once to see if it's a good idea. Good ideas include the wheel, flint and steel, the microtransistor, and (probably) going to other star systems. Bad ideas include jumping off cliffs, trepanning, and DDT.

 

[digrosz]

Internet without computers, Missile Cruisers without Sailing, Knights without bronze working, the tech tree has always been a mess, also in previous Civs.
But, if it should make sense, it would be too hard to research certain techs without needing to have knowledge of certain backwards (an maybe useless) techs.

 

[themerchant8]

Wouldn't it make more sense to harness all possible geothermal, solar, wind, etc. power in the Old World before going to the Americas? Wouldn't it make more sense to build every possible building and wonder in a city before settling a new one? If something is possible, we (as a species) should do it at least once to see if it's a good idea. Good ideas include the wheel, flint and steel, the microtransistor, and (probably) going to other star systems. Bad ideas include jumping off cliffs, trepanning, and DDT.

This comparison doesn't really work. Crossing the ocean and slaughtering spear-wielding natives for their land is a LOT safer than fighting your cannon-toting European neighbors whom can actually strike back. Traveling out to another star system with no way to get back when we don't even know if the planets there are capable of supporting life is suicide. In fact, it's DOUBLE suicide because even if it supports life there's no guarantee that the local plants/animals there are edible to humans.

Also, a "bad idea" is depends on the circumstances. Jumping and falling hundreds of feet? Paratroopers/special forces tend to do it a lot. Trepanning? It's hard to do brain surgery without access to the brain. DDT? If thousands of your troops are dropping dead from malaria in the middle of a warzone you don't have many options.

 

[Walter R]

Has the tech tree changed much in BNW?

 

[Fish Man]

Has the tech tree changed much in BNW?

Not really; as far as I know the only tech they added was the Internet.

This comparison doesn't really work. Crossing the ocean and slaughtering spear-wielding natives for their land is a LOT safer than fighting your cannon-toting European neighbors whom can actually strike back. Traveling out to another star system with no way to get back when we don't even know if the planets there are capable of supporting life is suicide. In fact, it's DOUBLE suicide because even if it supports life there's no guarantee that the local plants/animals there are edible to humans.

Also, a "bad idea" is depends on the circumstances. Jumping and falling hundreds of feet? Paratroopers/special forces tend to do it a lot. Trepanning? It's hard to do brain surgery without access to the brain. DDT? If thousands of your troops are dropping dead from malaria in the middle of a warzone you don't have many options.

5this

 

[TyBoy]

This comparison doesn't really work. Crossing the ocean and slaughtering spear-wielding natives for their land is a LOT safer than fighting your cannon-toting European neighbors whom can actually strike back. Traveling out to another star system with no way to get back when we don't even know if the planets there are capable of supporting life is suicide. In fact, it's DOUBLE suicide because even if it supports life there's no guarantee that the local plants/animals there are edible to humans.

It works fine. You confuse the analogy quite a lot without adding anything to it by switching from resource exploitation to politics. Much like journeying to the new world, all it would take for us to go to another world before we've completely exploited the energy potential of this one is for the necessary exploration technologies (artificial biospheres, propulsion, maybe stasis) to come along before the necessary resource exploitation technologies (maybe large scale space construction?) which is perfectly feasible.
Columbus didn't have any way to get back if America hadn't existed. He didn't know if there was life-supporting land. It was suicide. He went anyway. It's actually likely that when we do take a stab at sending people to another world it will be a heck of a lot less of a gamble than the one those guys were taking.


For what it's worth, it's pretty much a given that any local life we found on another planet wouldn't be edible. For all the diversity of life on earth, if you look at it on the molecular level every single organism is made out of a really limited variety of building blocks and those are what we get energy from. We generally can't get anything from even slight variations on those building blocks. The odds that life on another world would have the same building blocks are incredibly slim. None of that matters though since we'd just bring our own biome with us.