Tech Tree Revisions

[Vokarya]

I'm not knowledgeable about metallurgy at all, but I do recall that sculpture and metal-casting often go hand in hand, with metal frames or "skeletons" for some particularly big statues. Of course, it does depend on what "metal casting" actually means in-game, as copper-working was going on even before the Bronze Age (obviously).

That's the tricky part. When does something become established enough to count as a "tech"? For example, Music is terribly vague.

Here we have the question of when does Metal Casting become established enough to make a difference in production. Lost-wax casting is millenia old, but that might be better off lumped into the Sculpture tech, rather than be used to determine whatever tech enables the Forge, whether or not it is called Metal Casting.

I think that moving Metal Casting to the Classical Era and keeping the Axeman with it would have a big effect on Ancient Era warfare. Without Axemen, you would have to rely on Chariots and Elephant Riders to be your shock troops, and Spearmen counter them. So you would need lots of Spears and Archers to attack enemy stacks. This might actually be a better simulation of ancient warfare.

I'm not saying this is a bad thing. I like being able to integrate artistic techs into the general tech tree better. Having Sculpture be necessary for Aesthetics and Metal Casting would be great. I have found that artistic techs have a strike against them for being difficult to connect back into the tree rather than be a stand-alone string. (Artistic movements have a second strike for being difficult to find tricks for after a Wonder or Great Person. Artistic media -- Sculpture, Drama, Oil Painting, Photography -- generally come with a good building to work with.)

So here's what I'm looking at.

• Sculpture's prerequisites change to Polytheism + (Ceremonial Burial OR Masonry OR Pottery).
• Metal Casting's prerequisites change to Bronze Working + Pottery + Sculpture. It moves up to the Classical Era and base cost 200.
• Glass Blowing moves up one column and base cost 300.

 

[<Nexus>]

That's the tricky part. When does something become established enough to count as a "tech"? For example, Music is terribly vague.

Here we have the question of when does Metal Casting become established enough to make a difference in production. Lost-wax casting is millenia old, but that might be better off lumped into the Sculpture tech, rather than be used to determine whatever tech enables the Forge, whether or not it is called Metal Casting.

I think that moving Metal Casting to the Classical Era and keeping the Axeman with it would have a big effect on Ancient Era warfare. Without Axemen, you would have to rely on Chariots and Elephant Riders to be your shock troops, and Spearmen counter them. So you would need lots of Spears and Archers to attack enemy stacks. This might actually be a better simulation of ancient warfare.

I'm not saying this is a bad thing. I like being able to integrate artistic techs into the general tech tree better. Having Sculpture be necessary for Aesthetics and Metal Casting would be great. I have found that artistic techs have a strike against them for being difficult to connect back into the tree rather than be a stand-alone string. (Artistic movements have a second strike for being difficult to find tricks for after a Wonder or Great Person. Artistic media -- Sculpture, Drama, Oil Painting, Photography -- generally come with a good building to work with.)

So here's what I'm looking at.

• Sculpture's prerequisites change to Polytheism + (Ceremonial Burial OR Masonry OR Pottery).
• Metal Casting's prerequisites change to Bronze Working + Pottery + Sculpture. It moves up to the Classical Era and base cost 200.
• Glass Blowing moves up one column and base cost 300.

It seems good, but I think think Axeman is a solid ancient era unit, so it should be kept there.

 

[Samson]

I think that moving Metal Casting to the Classical Era and keeping the Axeman with it would have a big effect on Ancient Era warfare. Without Axemen, you would have to rely on Chariots and Elephant Riders to be your shock troops, and Spearmen counter them. So you would need lots of Spears and Archers to attack enemy stacks. This might actually be a better simulation of ancient warfare.

It sounds interesting, but may this make war it harder for the AI? Currently I really like Chariots for early warfare, but when the AI attacks with them they are generally easy to defeat, as you need combined arms and frequently need to keep your fast units with your slow ones. When the AI attacks with axemen they only need to keep another slow unit in the stack, which they tend to be able to do.

 

[Vokarya]

It seems good, but I think think Axeman is a solid ancient era unit, so it should be kept there.

I don't think you really need Axemen in the early eras except as a counter to other Axemen or Swordsmen. So I don't think it would too bad if you waited an era.

The other thing is that I don't think there is any other good place to put Axemen. The revised Bronze Working is too early and Warfare is already overburdened. I think Metal Casting is the only good place left.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

On axeman, Bronze tools, would be too soft, if reality.

You'd need metal casting to 'Alloy' a stronger axe.

It fits more into reality, and spears and archers are enough to defend with.

5 and 50% V's Melee = 7.5, with out any combat promotions. Making them virtually equal to the 4 archers with 25% city defense bonus, with no walls and culture.

 

[Vokarya]

Here's a minor speculation. I don't think Sailing is a good prerequisite for Calendar any more. Calendar is Classical-2; it currently requires Mathematics (Classical-1) and either Fermentation (Ancient-4) or Sailing (Ancient-3). Ancient-3 is pretty far back with all the extra techs we have added. I think Seafaring, which will be Classical-2 once Metal Casting is pushed into the Classical Era, would be more appropriate. The original combination (Mathematics + Sailing) is from original BTS, so I don't think anyone has ever looked at this.

 

[Vokarya]

Here is something else that I have wanted to do. On the F6 screen, I find it very difficult to tell researched techs from unresearched techs during the Classical and Medieval eras. The colors are too similar for my taste, and I do not like this at all. Information screens like the F6 screen are not a place for subtlety.

I found out that you can change the colors of researched techs in CvTechChooser.py. You can determine the red/green/blue values for each panel, and if you set them to 0, you get a nice black that is much easier to pick out.

The result would look like this.


I'm trying out a few other colors to show which techs you are currently researching. I tried a grey (color values of 30) but it looked too similar to the Ancient Era tech colors.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

much better, some of the era's are a bit close to each other as well, I think its medieval and Renaissance

 

[Vokarya]

I have a few more ideas on what I would like to do with the early eras. This is one of them.

I was looking through Pie's Ancient Europe to look for an Ancient/Classical Era tech idea. The Classical Era is currently at exactly 30 techs once Metal Casting is moved back into the Classical. The reason for one more tech is to merge Machinery with Agricultural Tools in the Medieval Era.

I found a tech that I liked, and that is the Mechanics tech. The Classical Era is the age of Aristotelian physics, so I think there is potential here. However, when I looked at the tech, I decided it would work even better as a rename and reflavor of Siege Warfare. There are a couple of reasons for this:

1. I don't like techs that are named X Warfare. Those techs seem very narrow and exhaust themselves quickly unless you choose a very broad topic. We still have Naval Warfare, Mechanized Warfare, Modern Warfare, and Cyberwarfare. I think all of these are broad enough to serve as proper techs (although I'm not completely sold on Naval Warfare as separate from general ship building, but I'll leave it). We have gotten rid of Amphibious Warfare, Guerrilla Warfare, Submarine Warfare, and Biological Warfare.
2. Siege Warfare is a greedy tech. It has a trick count of 7.5. This is higher than I think is good for a tech. As part of the re-flavor, I want to shuffle some tricks off to Vassalage, which is one of the two-trick techs.

Mechanics will keep:

• Catapult
• Siege Ram
• Siege Weapons Workshop
• +1 strength for Archer (minor trick)
• Accuracy promotion (minor trick)

for a trick count of 4.

Vassalage will get:

• City Gatehouse
• High Walls
• Pikeman unit
• +2 Strength to War Elephant (minor trick)

added to the Vassal States and Himeji Castle for a trick count of 5.5. Both of these are in the healthy range.

 

[Vokarya]

The second part of what I want to do with Siege Warfare/Mechanics is to take the siege concept and apply it to a new tech. This tech will be named Siegecraft and will be in the Medieval Era. (I said I didn't like it that much, but that doesn't mean I can't use it if I have a really good reason.)

Adding Siegecraft will serve two purposes:

1. Increase the number of Medieval techs to 30. I really want three more Medieval Era techs. The first increases the count to a round 30. The second will let me merge Perspective with Oil Painting. Perspective is Renaissance Era, not Medieval. The third will let me merge Armored Cavalry with Chivalry. Armored Cavalry is incredibly narrow and I would love to weed it out.
2. Remove a few tricks from Engineering. Engineering has 9 tricks thanks to the Expanded Castles module that has since been integrated into the main mod. This is more than just about any other tech.

Siegecraft will be a Medieval-3 tech. It will require Architecture and lead to Gunpowder. Its trick list is:

• Trebuchet (taken from Invention)
• Castle Gatehouse (taken from Engineering)
• Castle Keep (taken from Engineering)
• Edinburgh Castle (taken from Engineering)

Engineering keeps the Castle, Ballista Turret, Herbalist, Moat, Carpenter's Guild, and Crossbowman for a healthy trick count of 6. Invention keeps Rider, Artesian Well and Venetian Arsenal for 3 tricks, which is still viable.

 

[Arakhor]

Any there many techs left that have just two or three tricks? Even three seems quite miserly.

 

[Vokarya]

Any there many techs left that have just two or three tricks? Even three seems quite miserly.

Actually, there are currently 31 techs with only two tricks each and 12 with 2.5, so about 17% of the total. These are the techs that I'm looking to improve or cut, but there are some very good concept techs at the 2-level, like Archery, Humanism, Physics, Superconductors, and Interstellar Travel. Some of these techs are going to get better when I update; Smithing is getting Workshop, Replaceable Parts is getting Ironworks, and Thought Scanning is going to get a Hive civic.

It's the dozen or so techs with 8+ tricks that are the best ground for finding stuff to move, but most of the tricks are where they are for a reason. Creating a new tech works sometimes; that's why Siegecraft is practically spun off Engineering.

 

[Vokarya]

I found something that might work for adding a tech to the Classical Era so that Machinery can be moved back to the Medieval while still keeping the Classical at 30 techs. This is to move Naval Warfare from the Ancient Era to the Classical.

Seafaring would wind up looking like this, placed at Classical-1 with a trick count of 4.5:

• Requires Ship Building + Trade.
  • Drop the Metal Casting requirement from Seafaring to move it back one column. MC will be required for Naval Warfare.
• Allows War Galley, Port, Shipyard, Great Lighthouse, Navigation I promotion.
  • War Galley is moved to here because it is the second available ship unit. Ship Building gives you the first with Galley.
  • Great Lighthouse is moved here because I realized Ship Building has 6.5 tricks and could spare this one.

Naval Warfare would look like this, placed at Classical-2 with a trick count of 4:

• Requires Seafaring + Metal Casting + Warfare.
• Allows Trireme, Siege Quinquireme, Amphibious, Coastal Assault I, Coastal Guard I, Piracy promotions.
  • Gets the Trireme and Siege Quinquireme as the emblematic early ships of war. Just about all Civ ships are either transport units or warships, and these are the first real warships.
  • Piracy needs to be here to keep it with its prerequisite of Coastal Assault II. Coastal Assault I is at Naval Warfare. Piracy could also lose its tech requirement completely or be moved somewhere else. It would technically be redundant if it was here.

The wrinkle is what should I do with Scriptures. As I have it now, Naval Warfare and Scriptures are the only techs in the Ancient-5 column. I don't really want Scriptures being all by itself, and I'm thinking there are two things I could do with it. Scriptures demands Writing, and Writing is pinned to Ancient-4 by its prerequisites (Priesthood OR Trade) so moving Scriptures backwards on the tech tree isn't possible.

• Cut Scriptures entirely. Divine Cult would probably go to Monotheism and Scriptorium could be cut or moved to Meditation or Literature. The problem here is that I think it might be too easy to go directly from Monotheism to Meditation and found both Judaism and Buddhism. Meditation would still require Writing, so a player that goes Writing first could build School of Scribes in several cities and use that to then push to Monotheism and from there to Meditation.
• Move Scriptures into the Classical Era. This would push Meditation up by 1 level to Classical-2. Meditation leads only to Philosophy, which is already Classical-3 because it requires Alphabet-Literature. The problem here would be that then the Classical Era would be 31 techs after bumping Machinery, and I really want the round 30. There are a few techs that I don't think are very strong; Glass Blowing and Sanitation are hard to tie into the tree and exhausted after 2 tricks. Another option would be moving Music back into the Medieval Era rather than currently having it in the Classical. Music is Medieval in BTS and was made Classical in RoM 2.7. Music's placement does affect Theology; I don't want Theology moved up, but that makes Music a bit of a backwater and Theology becomes an easy way into the Medieval. Theo would only require Philosophy (Classical-3) and none of the other Classical-4 techs (Sanitation, Smithing, Vassalage) make sense.

I'm actually not sure what the best route to take is. Do you see a lot of doubling-up of religions by the AI? It's something that we do not want to encourage, although I find that with Revolutions on, founding more than one religion really increases the frequency of revolts.

 

[Rezca]

I've often been playing with the option that prevents a nation from founding a religion if they already own a Holy City, so personally I haven't seen much religion hoarding except for when the AI go about warmongering with their neighbors.

 

[<Nexus>]

The wrinkle is what should I do with Scriptures. As I have it now, Naval Warfare and Scriptures are the only techs in the Ancient-5 column. I don't really want Scriptures being all by itself, and I'm thinking there are two things I could do with it. Scriptures demands Writing, and Writing is pinned to Ancient-4 by its prerequisites (Priesthood OR Trade) so moving Scriptures backwards on the tech tree isn't possible.

• Cut Scriptures entirely. Divine Cult would probably go to Monotheism and Scriptorium could be cut or moved to Meditation or Literature. The problem here is that I think it might be too easy to go directly from Monotheism to Meditation and found both Judaism and Buddhism. Meditation would still require Writing, so a player that goes Writing first could build School of Scribes in several cities and use that to then push to Monotheism and from there to Meditation.
• Move Scriptures into the Classical Era. This would push Meditation up by 1 level to Classical-2. Meditation leads only to Philosophy, which is already Classical-3 because it requires Alphabet-Literature. The problem here would be that then the Classical Era would be 31 techs after bumping Machinery, and I really want the round 30. There are a few techs that I don't think are very strong; Glass Blowing and Sanitation are hard to tie into the tree and exhausted after 2 tricks. Another option would be moving Music back into the Medieval Era rather than currently having it in the Classical. Music is Medieval in BTS and was made Classical in RoM 2.7. Music's placement does affect Theology; I don't want Theology moved up, but that makes Music a bit of a backwater and Theology becomes an easy way into the Medieval. Theo would only require Philosophy (Classical-3) and none of the other Classical-4 techs (Sanitation, Smithing, Vassalage) make sense.

I'm actually not sure what the best route to take is. Do you see a lot of doubling-up of religions by the AI? It's something that we do not want to encourage, although I find that with Revolutions on, founding more than one religion really increases the frequency of revolts.

I like Scriptures as it is a good tech with a solid concept. Scriptures always reminds me of the early history of the Israelites receiving the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai and later the Mosaic Law. It's the perfect place to found Judaism. So just merge Monotheism into it.

Moving Divine Cult to Monotheism sounds terrible. DC is about "Pharaohs", the son of the gods. Monotheism is just the opposite.

 

[Arakhor]

I think I agree with Zeta, here.

 

[Vokarya]

I like Scriptures as it is a good tech with a solid concept. Scriptures always reminds me of the early history of the Israelites receiving the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai and later the Mosaic Law. It's the perfect place to found Judaism. So just merge Monotheism into it.

Moving Divine Cult to Monotheism sounds terrible. DC is about "Pharaohs", the son of the gods. Monotheism is just the opposite.

I think of Polytheism/Monotheism/Dualism as a triad, and if one of them goes, all of them have to go. Polytheism could be merged into Priesthood, but what happens specifically to Zoroastrianism? Dualism has issues on its own, since its only exit point is Theology (skipping the entire Classical Era) and its tricks are two Zoroastrian things and the Hanging Gardens, which should probably be in the Classical Era itself.

Merging Monotheism into Scriptures doesn't solve the other problem, which is Scriptures being alone in its column like this:

I do not want eras to share columns, so we would have Scriptures all by itself unless Scriptures moves up to the Classical Era. The chain to Writing is pretty well locked in and I don't think we can move Writing backwards without making it too easy to enter the Classical Era via Mathematics or Alphabet. I'd have a very hard time accepting Scriptures without Writing.

It's not something I haven't considered, but it's not super-straightforward.

 

[Arakhor]

I think it's really important that the religious techs have something other than religions or temples. As it stands, Monotheism has negative utility unless you found Judaism.

 

[<Nexus>]

I think of Polytheism/Monotheism/Dualism as a triad, and if one of them goes, all of them have to go. Polytheism could be merged into Priesthood, but what happens specifically to Zoroastrianism? Dualism has issues on its own, since its only exit point is Theology (skipping the entire Classical Era) and its tricks are two Zoroastrian things and the Hanging Gardens, which should probably be in the Classical Era itself.

Dualism: In my module I renamed it to Ethics so I could add some tricks to it (City States civic iirc).
Polytheism: I always thought of it as Mythology (and plan to rename it in my module). I think Mythology can cover everything that Polytheism can and even more.

Merging Monotheism into Scriptures doesn't solve the other problem, which is Scriptures being alone in its column like this:
View attachment 411177
I do not want eras to share columns, so we would have Scriptures all by itself unless Scriptures moves up to the Classical Era. The chain to Writing is pretty well locked in and I don't think we can move Writing backwards without making it too easy to enter the Classical Era via Mathematics or Alphabet. I'd have a very hard time accepting Scriptures without Writing.

Ship Building, Fermentation, Sculpture and Warfare are 4 of the 7 techs in that column that can be moved. Move any 3 of them and we have 2 columns having 4-4 techs.

(Or am I missing something important?)

 

[Rezca]

I think it's really important that the religious techs have something other than religions or temples. As it stands, Monotheism has negative utility unless you found Judaism.

I never really understood why the Shrine went obsolete so early anyway... I always push it up a bit further, since I kinda felt it should get longer use.