Technology Costs

[Zechnophobe]

So, due to a debate on costs with someone, in regards to how expensive one tech was compared to another, I wrote a program today that allowed me to input a Civ Tech tree, and have it tell me a technologies total cost.

A few notes here: This does correctly only count each used tech once. For the few cases (Omniscience) where a tech has multiple possible prereqs, the smallest is used.

These costs are based on Chieften difficulty, so use them for comparison purposes, not to figure out the exact amount of time it takes to get a tech.

I've Highlighted a few that I thought were interesting for comparison purposes.

Agriculture: 120
Alteration: 1485
Ancient Chants: 120
Animal Handling: 2042
Animal Husbandry: 315
Animal Mastery: 8597
Arcane Lore: 5043
Archery: 704
Arete: 1897
Armored Cavalry: 16809
Astronomy: 3408
Blasting Powder: 10328
Bowyers: 3749
Bronze Working: 705
Calendar: 315
Cartography: 290
Code of Laws: 873
Commune with Nature: 8450
Construction: 680
Corruption of Spirit: 2264
Crafting: 120
Currency: 1750
Deception: 3407
Divination: 1485
Divine Essence: 29243
Drama: 1653
Education: 483
Elementalism: 1485
Engineering: 3893
Exploration: 120
Fanaticism: 3798
Feral Bond: 3602
Festivals: 510
Feudalism: 3505
Fishing: 315
Guilds: 7600
Hidden Paths: 1994
Honor: 3407
Horseback Riding: 607
Hunting: 412
Infernal Pact: 3579
Iron Working: 3435
Knowledge of the Ether: 705
Machinery: 10642
Malevolent Designs: 7210
Masonry: 290
Mathematics: 1653
Medicine: 3383
Mercantilism: 7600
Message from the Deep: 1117
Military Strategy: 2746
Mind Stapling: 1897
Mining: 315
Mithril Weapons: 22808
Mithril Working: 13448
Mysticism: 315
Necromancy: 1485
Omniscience: 23372
Optics: 1485
Orders from Heaven: 2627
Pass Through the Ether: 14403
Philosophy: 705
Poison: 1582
Precision: 12030
Priesthood: 1848
Rage: 10353
Religious Law: 3798
Righteousness: 7210
Sailing: 705
Sanitation: 1340
Smelting: 1875
Sorcery: 3483
Stirrups: 4014
Strength of Will: 11283
Taxation: 4480
Theology: 6918
Tracking: 802
Trade: 1750
Warfare: 1528
Warhorses: 7134
Way of the EarthMother: 1117
Way of the Forest: 1214
Way of the Wicked: 997
Way of the Wise: 997
Writing: 873

Notice Animal Master, which provides Tier 4 BeastMasters, is pretty cheap compared to other Tier 4 enablers. Guilds is too, but it has the likely need to get Deception too, to have a city to train shadows in.

Armored Cavalry is more expensive than Mithril Working, by a good deal. Yet the former gives you 4 decent horsemen, while the latter upgrades all your melee, chariot, and some other units. (I admit, Mithril is rather rare, however).

Anyhow, I'm not really passing much judgement here, just wanted the list to be somewhere visible.

 

[Zechnophobe]

Same list, ordered by Cost:

Agriculture 120
Ancient Chants 120
Crafting 120
Exploration 120
Cartography 290
Masonry 290
Animal Husbandry 315
Calendar 315
Fishing 315
Mining 315
Mysticism 315
Hunting 412
Education 483
Festivals 510
Horseback Riding 607
Construction 680
Archery 704
Bronze Working 705
Knowledge of the Ether 705
Philosophy 705
Sailing 705
Tracking 802
Code of Laws 873
Writing 873
Way of the Wicked 997
Way of the Wise 997
Message from the Deep 1117
Way of the EarthMother 1117
Way of the Forest 1214
Sanitation 1340
Alteration 1485
Divination 1485
Elementalism 1485
Necromancy 1485
Optics 1485
Warfare 1528
Poison 1582
Drama 1653
Mathematics 1653
Currency 1750
Trade 1750
Priesthood 1848
Smelting 1875
Arete 1897
Mind Stapling 1897
Hidden Paths 1994
Animal Handling 2042
Corruption of Spirit 2264
Orders from Heaven 2627
Military Strategy 2746
Medicine 3383
Deception 3407
Honor 3407
Astronomy 3408
Iron Working 3435
Sorcery 3483
Feudalism 3505
Infernal Pact 3579
Feral Bond 3602
Bowyers 3749
Fanaticism 3798
Religious Law 3798
Engineering 3893
Stirrups 4014
Taxation 4480
Arcane Lore 5043
Theology 6918
Warhorses 7134
Malevolent Designs 7210
Righteousness 7210
Guilds 7600
Mercantilism 7600
Commune with Nature 8450
Animal Mastery 8597
Blasting Powder 10328
Rage 10353
Machinery 10642
Strength of Will 11283
Precision 12030
Mithril Working 13448
Pass Through the Ether 14403
Armored Cavalry 16809
Mithril Weapons 22808
Omniscience 23372
Divine Essence 29243

 

[MaxAstro]

The one that sticks out for me is Bowyers being more expensive than Iron Working. When you compare what you get out of all the techs leading to Bowyers with the value of the techs leading to Iron Working (things like Mining and Bronze Working), Iron Working seems vastly superior, yet Bowyers costs a full 300 more.

 

[jedibob5]

Personally, I think many of the tech costs should be reduced, especially the earlier ones. FFH has so many more techs than regular Civ4, and it takes way too long to work your way up the tech tree.

 

[MrPopov]

is the program you wrote parsing the XML files or something else?

 

[Zechnophobe]

No, I inputted the tech tree by hand, heh. I didn't want to have to deal with regular expressions. Of course, if I'd just used Actionscript, or another language with native XML support, it would have been easier. But I don't have an IDE for that (Like CS3) so I just hammered it out in Java using eclipse.

 

[Blackmantle]

I for one think that Mithril Weapons and Divine Essence are obscenely to expensive. While i can understand the hump to Mithril Working very well, i think like Arcane Lore after Sorcery Mithril Weapons and Divine Essence should if anything be cheaper than mithril Working or at maximum equal in cost.

And i concurr on Boyers and Precision. Those should be half price each perhaps. (or metal Upgrades: Copper for Archers, Copper + Iron for Longbows, all ip to Mithril for Tier 3/4 Archers and a staying hump at Boyers with equal price for Precision.)

Oh and the mithril requirement to Marksmen should just be dropped imo. Makes no visible sense on any level. (and furtherly adds! to the cost of Precision even if thats not visible from the tech-tree per se which makes the "real cost" of this tech a whopping 20000+ :eek i belive: . Which is just stupid for a non-special unit that has no special interesting unique mechanics sported nowhere else whatsoever. Perhaps it should get. Handpicking a unit to attack might be nice enough and fit the flavor. Maybe that might return when targeted Spells for the player do later on. Hopefully.)

Mounted seems fine even if Armored Cavalry could perhaps use some sort of beef-up like a nice wonder / building or something like that.


@ Zechnophobe: To be fair, if anything you have to compare Warhorses with Animal mastery though.
War Charriots are not really worse than knights and very clearly Tier 4 (Bestmasters are though nice a bit weaker even though the Path leading up to it in full is much more decent than the way up to Stirups. With "only" the very start and Trade really nice on the way.) and the Tech offers a lot else of quality.
The jump to Armored Cavalry is only really worthwhile for Civs Running / planning for a switch to CoE which get 2 decent Tier-4 national Units out of it (or if you indeed have built the ride or can get that tech from Warhorses via ToDivination or Grimmoire- Jump in a blink. Best of course a combination of all 3 though. ).

So the metal Path in Full up to tier 4 is far more expensive but offers far more utility especially midway along the path + other nice features and prerequisites to a lot of other important late-game techs on the way.
Only the Archery path is rather handicapped / crippled by missing anything really interesting (save Arcebuses and Engineering which are on a different path though more or less... and at least Arquebusiers can be gained independently of the rest and building-requirements.)

 

[Zechnophobe]

That's actually a pretty good point. Oddly, I've noticed this the most when playing the Clan, since Ogres are, in fact, the bees knees. Even with their tech penalty, a good late game run is to War Horses to get your chariot replacements of doom. (and you get stirrups along the way, for normal ogres.)