Tech Tree Reworking

[Sureshot]

Shadow Tech Tree Rework


First I went through moving around techs:
-Blasting Powder requires Iron Working and Engineering,
but theres more room around Iron Working than Engineering
-Honor and Deception moved with other religion techs since
theres no a lot of room where they were
-Machinery, since it required Bowyers and gives a unit that
longbows upgrade to
-Feudalism over to trade rather than its code of laws pre-req,
since feudalism provides a horse unit

I integrated Warfare with Archery line.. to help infuse the archery
tech line with some useful techs, military strategy came along as
well, both warfare and military strat had problematic spots before,
and military strat was required for precision anyways. made bowyers slightly cheaper.

I changed the prereqs on the religion techs:
-Orders from Heaven Requiring Feudalism. Order seems more about
following orders from your lord than about wisdom.
-Honor Requiring Way of the Wise. Empyrean is about wisdom.
-Deception Requiring Way of the Wicked.
-Corruption of Spirit Requiring Summoning. This means you need
Elementalism or Necromancy to start summoning Demons for their religion,
and makes summoning Hyborem later more sensical.

The main reason for these changes is to put those 4 religions farther
from each other. The 3 early religions are decently displaced, but before
these changes all 4 of the late religions where much too close together.

I changed the council membership availability to the Way of Wise of and
Way of Wicked techs, so theres a proper place for them without allowing
Grigori, for instance, to found the religions, but still able to adopt the councils.

I made Fanaticism require Feudalism rather than Code of Laws for a few
reasons.. to better synergize that tech line with Order, and so Vampires
had a more sensical path (no more Brujahs and Losha before Vampires)

I deleted Domesticate Elephants, and instead put what was in that tech
into Animal Mastery, and doubled the cost of Animal Mastery. Now its a
decent tech with proper costs for tier4 units. I also removed the ability
of horse archers to upgrade to War Elephants.. thinking it should be the
domain of capture Elephants only.

I shifted around the horse techs a bit:
-moved poisons up to there as well.
-renamed Stirrups to Leather Working and put it off of Trade. made
assassins require this tech instead, and halved the cost. now this tech
provides 2 units atleast.
-renamed Poisons to Acids and Poisons (acids are used in tanning and
leatherworking) and require Leather Working. made Shadows require this tech,
also doubled its cost.

I made Engineering lead to Guilds as a second option since it allows Guild
of Hammers, so makes sense that you can research guilds if you have that.


Generally these changes put things together a bit better i find.
At the top, you have the horse line techs, with a small recon bit keeping
assassins and shadows closer (so you're not researching all over the place
for proper ordering).
Next is the melee/mining line.
Then Siege line.
Then Ship line.
Then Archery line.
Then Recon line.
Then mostly economy and guilds.
Then Mages.
Then Disciples.

generally tiers of units follow tech lines (with fewer exceptions):
1st line of techs has no units.
2nd/3rd line of techs have tier2 units.
4th/5th line of techs have tier3 units
6th/7th line of techs have tier4 units.

And generally keeps some useful techs intermixed with unit lines so you're
not just researching plain techs for units (a big problem previously with
horse and archery lines).

Plus its generally pleasing looking, less odd lines going multiple techs in
disappearing behind other techs.

might be worth making way of wise and way of wicked more expensive.

Any feedback is welcome.

 

[DeaExMachina]

I like the way this looks and will love testing it out. Thanks so much I really wasn't a fan of our current tree.

 

[gibbon_malus]

A lot of the changes make good sense. I particularly dig the place feudalism is at, and the dual access to guilds. But the best change is probably the combination of the archery and military strategy branches. It makes an archer strategy a lot stronger (the synergy is very good since you would want your archers to take the city garrison promotions more often than not), in particular if the cost of Bowyers is reduced slightly.

I am not a big fan of the merged assassin/horse branch, since it suffers from the flaws of the original cavalry path: too many units and too few buildings / econ perks. My suggestions for this branch are below:

1. Eliminate tracking (see below for details)
2. Eliminate the Leather Working / Stirrups tech: move horse archers to Warhorses. If this would make the Warhorses tech too strong, you might want to consider moving Ride of the Nine back to Armored Cavalry.
3. Re-Add the Poisons tech: and make it require Hunting, and Currency.
4. Put Shadows in Deception: it makes sense thematically, and it reinforces a weak tech (since it only gives you one nightwatch and the Trojan Horse). I am aware that this would overpower Deception (since it would grant exceptionally early T4 units), but in your revision, that tech comes way too early (see below for more).

I am also slightly concerned about the pre-reqs of the Order, Veil vs. Emp and CoE. Specifically, I think that Emp and CoE are much too early under your setup (they wouldn't be much later than OO, Leaves and RoK... maybe 10-15 turns later if you rush for it), while Order and Veil are too late (since they both require tier5 techs).

The feudalism pre-req is especially rough on the order as it forces you to go relatively deep down the cavalry line (which may not be what you want to do, since the Order has a strong synergy with the disciple line via Social Order, Basilicas, Crusaders and Sphener)

Now, I am not entirely sure how to fix this, but the way I see it, you need to make sure that all four techs have roughly the same cost.

To me that would probably entail one of two things: either keeping Order/Veil with current pre-reqs and moving Empyrean back to Writing AND Way of the Wise, or moving Emp/CoE back somewhat so that they are as late as Order/Veil.

Finally a few misc suggestions:

1. Make Warfare require Education AND (Archery OR Bronze): that way one can still take it as part of a melee-centric strategy. Of course, if you did this, you would have to change Bowyers to require Warfare AND Archery.
2. Eliminate Tracking: move Sentry to cartography, and increase the cost of Animal Handling. That way you eliminate a useless tech and increase the attractive of Cartography.

 

[Sureshot]

for Emp and Esus coming too early i think the solution is to make Way of Wise and Way of Wicked much more expensive. including some other expensive techs could work, but nothing fit well and i think just making the way of techs more expensive helps. im not certain they're specifically supposed to be much later than Order/Av, so i aimed at getting them be around the same time (and wicked/wise fit perfectly, more so than for order/av)

to maintain the Order/fanaticism synergy i switched the prereq on fanaticism from code of laws to feudalism, but that might not be enough

not sure i want to remove Tracking, since its needed if only as filler for recon line.. it certainly could use a boost to fill it out, but i dont know what.

i kinda want to take the Bronzeworking req off warfare completely.. and change Archery's name to Drill or Practice or some such.

about horse/recon mix, im not certain what to do, but i like the current setup i have better than the standard version. the other option for that area i considered was:
-get rid of Stirrups/Leather Working and Poisons completely
-move assassins to Currency, keep Shadows on Guilds.

i havent played around with changing too many costs, but i suspect a few problems could be fixed by doing that. atm my layout of the tree is nice tho, so i dont really want to make any changes that will disturb it other than prereqs and costs, and moving units around or deleting endbranch techs.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I'm not sure I like the Leather working tech, or chanign poisons to acids and poisons


I think the Order should require Divination instead or Feudalism. Or it could provide an alternate path to the divination tech. (I'm undecided about whether I like that you took away the Way of the Wise requirement, but the religion doesn't seem particularly philosophical so not having the philosophy prereq might be good. Or there's always the possibility of more "Or" requirements!)

Also, Divination seems to me like it fit equally well in the Arcane and Religious tech lines. I think it should be a requirement (or maybe "OR" requirement) for several religious techs (Divine Right, Fanaticism, Religious Law). Maybe it could fit just before or after Priesthood? (not saying you need to move it, but I think it should tie into the religious line as well)


Ir seems to me like Runes are a system of writing, so the Way of the Earthmother (which founds the Runes of Kilmorph) could use writing as a prereq. I also think that it should require mining or masonry (partialt thematically, partially so the Luchuirp can get it faster without having to put off Barnaxus)

Corruption of Spirit should definitely still require Way of the Wicked. Requiring Summoning seems a little much too (although it does make sense). It should still definately have prereqs in the Arcane branch though. Since the civilopedia entry for the religion says in was found by Mages deep in mediation, maybe it could require either sorcery OR summoning. Or maybe Necromancy and Divination (their mediataion was a form of Divination too)




I really don't see the point of Ancient chants now that the anti-racial promotions have been removed. I'd either remove it, unless you can think of something new to add to the tech. If so, I think Education might be a bit early though. I'd consider switching Education and Writing (moving the free grat sage to education).

It would also make sense for Mathematics to require Philosophy.

I'm thinking that Cartography would make a good prereq for Astronomy since that involved mapping the heavens and it would make the tech not be a dead end.


It seems to me that Honor should perhaps be a prereq of Righteousness (or an OR requirement)

Likewise, I think that Deception would make a good (possibly "OR") prereq for Malevolent Designs.


I think that trade should require either Horseback Riding or Sailing. (The mounted units it allows should be moved elsewhere)

I'm thinking Calender should require either Agriculture or Seafaring (or maybe fishing instead if you don't want to give the Lanun a huge advantage)



(Now what I'd really like is if certain techs, alignments, and/or state religion could modify the actual costs of other techs, but I don't think that's possible.)

 

[thFrgttn]

I haven't been playing FfH long enough to be able to judge just what affects these changes would make, but I would like to ask the questions that occurred to me when I first looked at the current tech tree.

In Civ IV ignoring to many early techs makes later techs slower to build, so is the locations of the religious techs a purely cosmetic or do they affect the build times of other techs?
Either way I think that the later religions would be better placed further along the tree (similar to flight in Civ IV).

If it is cosmetic then I think that the tree might look better if the techs were staggered in there layout to give the the appearance of more depth.

 

[Nikis-Knight]

I think I like it overall.
Cosmetically, move the religions up so deception can go under honor.
I'd change acids and poisons to alchemy, sounds a bit better.
(honor always required way of the wise, afaik)
I think corruption of spirit should return to how it was, though. Hyborem coming too late is less interesting, he needs some room.

I really don't see the point of Ancient chants now that the anti-racial promotions have been removed. I'd either remove it, unless you can think of something new to add to the tech. If so, I think Education might be a bit early though. I'd consider switching Education and Writing (moving the free grat sage to education).

IT's no more empty than crafting or exploration. The first techs are more way points. Agriculture is the only loaded one. I'm almost tempted to advise moving agriculture the civic to calendar (makes snese there as well.)

Also, I think you should remove the agriculture requirement from education. It comes from a time when cottages were so much more powerful from specialists, and agriculture didn't do too much. Now, agriculture is it's own reward, I don't think requiring it for education makes as much sense.

Here's my ideas about archery, fwiw

What if we moved windmills from engineering to archery or bowyers? It's a bit of a stretch, I admit, but would help improve archery and engineering has plenty of goodies.
Also, precision could give +1 food, +1 commerce to camps.

 

[it-ogo]

"We hate patterns" (c)Kael

I made Engineering lead to Guilds as a second option since it allows Guild
of Hammers, so makes sense that you can research guilds if you have that.

IMO engineering branch in Shadow is unbalanced already. Now I do not see an effective game strategy without rush to engineering. Then not-so-expensive Guilds... I am afraid other branches lose strongly.

Again AV&StW was supposed to weaken a bit. Instead it got a civic with unlimited 2-3 hammer specialists.

PS Have a problem with image.

 

[Caradoc]

Agree with MC about Leather Working. How could it be same tier as Iron Working? Speaking of which, it's always seemed to me that Smelting and Iron Working are pretty redundant.

My chief complaint on the tech tree is Cartography. It does nothing much for you and it takes you nowhere. And what the heck does it have to do with Giants?

The other area I'd like to look at is the Education branch. Does Education lead to Writing or should it be the other way around? What does Agriculture have to do with Education? And why doesn't Currency need Mathematics? Could we bring back Alchemy in this branch. Finally, this area needs a better top than Guilds. (Why do Guilds need Engineering anyway?) Maybe something like the University?

 

[Sureshot]

i made a few changes to the tree im trying out:
removing leather working and poisons altogether, putting assassins on Currency and Shadows back on guilds, also making medicine an alternate route to blasting powder (mainly to keep the siege line continuous as an option). also removed the Bronzeworking option from warfare, and moved armored cavalry to be available with feudalism (never liked that you have to get a separate tier4 unit tech to get knights)


moved deception below honor, and trying lessened tech reqs on Order and AV.. also upped the costs of way of wise and way of wicked, removed the agriculture req from education

 

[Sureshot]

cartography is actually a must have tech now that it has open borders

 

[Caradoc]

cartography is actually a must have tech now that it has open borders

I missed that. Any ideas about the Giants?

 

[daladinn]

i really like what you have done with this tech tree.

one minor suggestion though...

can we change the requirement for warfare from bronzeworking to construction.

my reasoning is that its in the archery line and you can make arrows by banging a few rocks together , however all of your city attack and defense promos are there and the plausable link to that in my mind is forts and construction.

 

[oyzar]

All the AI's get cartography soon enough so it is no reason to research this otherwise useless tech as it doesn't help anything towards developing and expanding your empire and is hence rather useless. This also doesn't fix the major problems with the current tech three(that it is too slow in the early game). There is still no time to explore most of the tech three in most games..

 

[thFrgttn]

This also doesn't fix the major problems with the current tech three(that it is too slow in the early game).

I was just wonder about this - is there a reason that the early techs cost more than three times what CivIV early techs do?
My biggest complaint is that take so long be able to clear a forest (by reaching bronze working). In some games this can give a player a huge early advantage just because they have more room to build improvements than others.

 

[Aroldo]

Interesting changes.

As for the rest, this isn´t vanilla. Slower tech progress - especially at the beginning - and a broader tech tree are some of the main features of the mod, not problems.

 

[Grey Fox]

You are supposed to have to make a choice of what path to take, not take em all. That's why techs are more costly.

And the early techs aren't that bad. On standard map size, emperor level (not sure if that affects costs) a worker takes 19 turns to finish with a normal location city (not plains hill) with a 3f or 2f 1p tile. And agriculture takes 19 turns to finish with 1 commerce from the working tile.

Ofc, this means that you have to be even more careful of not over expanding, especially at the higher levels (which I yet again learned in my Faeryl Viconia gamestory) before you get some means of increasing science output (cottages and/or sages) and lowering costs and increasing gold income (cottages and/or merchants and/or courthouses).

 

[felwar]

Just a thought, but putting techs that are actually good in a line with units that are considered weak doesn't actually make those units any better. It just means people have to research techs they may not want and doesn't actually solve the initial problem.

And I was always under the impression that warfare follows on bronze working because it not only historically makes sense, but involves the form of the titan being made of bronze.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Here's the real problem with putting The Order and The Ashan Veil that much later - the AV is useful immediately, while The Order takes a long time for their subtle power to come into being. Especially since the summoning tech can be easily lightbulbed by Great Scientists (at least part of the way), while there's no quick way of getting feudalism. It's not like feudalism unlocks any useful units anyway.

I have no problems in forcing archery for warfare. It can be argued that formations and tactics really came into being after ranged attacks began, which is much earlier than bronze.

Suggestion: You get a free acolyte every time The Order spreads to a city, whether it be naturally or not. In a foreign city, you get that free acolyte as long as you have open borders. You need to spread The Order fast enough to stop AV from blowing up the world right?

 

[gibbon_malus]

I like what you did with Warhorses and Armored Cavalry, it always felt awkward that you had to get a T4 unit tech (warhorses) before getting knights. Where did you place Horse Archers btw? Feudalism seems the most logical place.

Also, could you post the XML files for the re-worked tree? I would like to play-test it (and am too lazy to do that much XML mod atm ).

Thanks.