Mxzs: I think Sets are a good idea. Ultimately, though, I think they're better suited for scenarios or a more limited time-frame game (Colonization 2 (oh please oh please oh please), Europa Universalis, or maybe one of the 1603AD games). I think extending it to a game with the timeframe of Civilization causes way too many problems as the sheer volume of possible sets over 6000+ years is overwhelming.
That's one reason this proposal would be a danger and a snare to mod-makers. It would be very easy to fool yourself into thinking that because the Battleship-producing tech is a tenth-order set it would only appear late in the game. But if you accidentally arranged the intervening sets on narrow base of (say) eleven basic techs, you would get it quite early in the game if those happened to be the eleven techs you first acquired.
In fact, the only sure way to keep the most advanced techs from developing early would be to make sure that they had as their most elemental constituents a maximum number of basic techs. Whatever tech generated Stealth Bombers, for instance, would be best analyzed down so that it contained at least 80 basic techs.
I confess that, as a technical exercise, it still has some fascination for me. But it's too problematic to actually be used.
You pose a very extreme example, but let's use a more realistic one. Say, ironclads in 100AD.
First off, is this a problem? I don't mean to denigrate, but why do we have to assume it is a problem? Let's determine whether it is one.
Conceptually with the "storyline", I have absolutely no qualms about this. In fact, I would be excited about it. Why does my world have to be enforced to be exactly similar in tech progress to the real one? Who's to say I can't have my industrial revolution in 500BC? Why does my world have to match the tech progress of the real one, which had a real dearth of scientific progress for thousands of years? If I want to focus on research and science, and ignore religion, drama, culture, etc. why can't I? Why do I have to have Music in order to make Cavalry (that's ludicrous and is just one example of the totally artificial cross-requirements in the tech tree which are there purely to keep tech pacing parallel)?
Now, for gameplay, there are a couple of concerns/thoughts. For one, military might get too strong for the player who focuses on that (and darn tootin they will). This, however, can be balanced by huge unhappiness penalties (which otherwise could be easily solved with theatres etc.), health penalties, and such. In addition, even making ironclads requires a LOT of disparate technological innovations. Making a simple lathe is a very complex problem. You need the tools to make the tools to make the tools to make the thing. Properly done, the military would be kept in check.
Just thinking out loud, as usual. Let's see what others think before I ramble on some more.
When I say "Battleship," I mean whatever ship the mod-maker provided that in combat terms is equivalent to a Battleship: some naval unit with a strength of approximately 40. It hardly matters whether the mod-maker calls it a "Battleship," a "Floating Fortress" or a "Giant Death Canoe." The presence of a modern-era-strength unit in a pre-modern environment would hugely unbalance things.
The "extreme" case I mention is extreme only in its effects, not as a low probability event. I fear mod-makers would too easily produce such an event by accident by failing to keep track of the basic techs and their connections.
Why does my world have to match the tech progress of the real one, which had a real dearth of scientific progress for thousands of years? If I want to focus on research and science, and ignore religion, drama, culture, etc. why can't I? Why do I have to have Music in order to make Cavalry (that's ludicrous and is just one example of the totally artificial cross-requirements in the tech tree which are there purely to keep tech pacing parallel)?
If the civs that concentrated on Cavalry didn't have a nasty tendency to squash the civs that concentrate on Music, there wouldn't be a problem. Personally, I think the solution is to ditch the "conquer/dominate the world" goal and also uncouple the civilizational aspects from the political: unhitch the "civilization" from the "empire." But until that day ...
even making ironclads requires a LOT of disparate technological innovations. Making a simple lathe is a very complex problem. You need the tools to make the tools to make the tools to make the thing. Properly done, the military would be kept in check.
This was definitely one of the devices I would use in managing advances when designing such a system.
...
You know, just for funsies, I probably will try designing part of a set-model for a Civ game. I've made up the index cards and actually have notes on the very earliest techs and units ...
I must admit to lurking here for a while and being mostly silent. However, seeing this idea spurs me into voice, perhaps controversially, thus:
In my eyes, many of the ideas here already exist in the game. Or perhaps, one implementation of Mxzs' ideas is the very system used in Civ4.
I dont mean to belittle anything above by saying that as this discussion has fascinated me, rather I wonder if an implementation of these ideas is staring us in the face (even if it wasn't meant to be so). Indulge me a little if you will, as this strays from techs slightly to begin with
Take the horse archer in a standard Warlords game:
1) What are horse archers enabled by, if not the set (archery [tech], horse riding [tech], horse [resource])?
2) And what enables slightly experienced horse archers, if not the set (archery [tech], horse riding [tech], stable [building], horse [resource])?
3) And how do I get to build even more experienced horse archers, if not with the set (archery [tech], horse riding [tech], stable [building], theocracy [civic], vassalage [civic], horse [resource])?
Do you follow? The current Civ4 game already allows for much of this idea of sets. The composite/advanced techs that solely enable units are abstracted to such a degree that they simply don't exist in game (which given that they would be automatically gained in the 'techs as sets' idea is perhaps not a great loss). Add in some of the excellent mod components and we have many more options for prerequisites, even for free promotions of units, free upgrade/construction of buildings and free discoveries of further techs.
I also believe the current Civ4 system reasonably overcomes the problem of cascading technologies in a gamer friendly manner. By having basic technologies ultimately dependent on other basic technologies, the structure of technology advancement has its own, in-built, limitations without the need to depend on external factors. Moreover, the many, many basic techs to you have to research in order to be able to build, say, a battleship, are succinctly hidden behind the two basic techs that are its immediate prerequisites.
There is, of course, no technical reason why a given tech could only be available for research after a building is constructed, or a civic adopted, but using those mechanisms may only serve to confuse.
Mxzs: I hope haven't misunderstood your proposal too much, nor kicked a man when he's down. I'd rather spark another round of discussion on this.
Finally a quick anecdote, if you wish:
Spoiler:
Over a pint, and after exhausting most normal conversation, someone once started to explain to me Peano arithmetic and how it is possible, if you're mad enough, to reconstruct (i.e. prove) all the maths classes you had as a kid by starting from a handful of postulates and a bit of set theory. For a brief moment, I had a glimpse of the "beauty in numbers" that those old bespectacled maths professors went on about. I stopped for a moment, gazing into the depths of my empty glass.
It then occurred to me that, in fact, all that beautiful complexity was neatly abstracted behind the simple counting I had done as a child. Sets or no sets, I still had my fingers (and toes) and they could be used to count just fine. So off I went to the bar to buy the next round; number of beers counted on my left hand, number of sodas on my right . . .
The "extreme" case I mention is extreme only in its effects, not as a low probability event. I fear mod-makers would too easily produce such an event by accident by failing to keep track of the basic techs and their connections.
Assuming they could squash them. The Music civ would have higher research, higher production, and be able to support more units. The units individually are of lesser strength, but fighting 2 for 1 is still a balanced game.
Personally, I think the solution is to ditch the "conquer/dominate the world" goal and also uncouple the civilizational aspects from the political: unhitch the "civilization" from the "empire." But until that day ...
That's a big hairy can of worms, and you know it. Feel free to start a thread to discuss it.
Monty: I don't think any of us are arguing anything as Ultimate Truth(tm). But, we're all willing to debate it over a beer. I daresay each of us are even willing to pay for the pints.
The current Civ4 game already allows for much of this idea of sets. The composite/advanced techs that solely enable units are abstracted to such a degree that they simply don't exist in game (which given that they would be automatically gained in the 'techs as sets' idea is perhaps not a great loss). Add in some of the excellent mod components and we have many more options for prerequisites, even for free promotions of units, free upgrade/construction of buildings and free discoveries of further techs.
Okay, I've broken down and looked very closely at the XML documents and read through the wiki and consulted some of the "how to" pages in the mod forums, and ... You're absolutely right. I hadn't recognized the degree to which Civ4 already uses this kind of technique.
It doesn't take it as far as I would take it: for instance, by using the concept of an ordered set to "hide" certain alternate techs. The tech tree also sticks to the classic "narrow base" design in which only a handful of techs appear as researchable basics; I would have used the "set" concept as an excuse to broaden that list. It stuck to classic tech names and stuck them in the same old places, while I would have used the system to create a more modular approach: "Hey, let's stick Biology and Steam Power and Mysticism all at the same level, so the modders will see just how flexible the system is, and regular players will appreciate how contingent technological development can be."
Still, there's no excuse for my not having noticed the following, as it is exactly the way I was going to realize one part of my idea:
Let the (new) Horse Archer tech be identical to the following set: (Archery, Horseback Riding). The moment the player has acquired both those techs, he acquires the Horse Archer tech.
The Horse Archer unit, in turn, requires that the player possess the set (Horse Archer [tech], Horses [resource]).
The simplest way to realize this structure is to do as Civ4 does and give the Horse Archer have three prerequisites: Archery, Horseback Riding, and Horses.
This, btw, is why I kept insisting that a set-model structure would not require the player to come up with lots of new techs; the 90 in the game would be more than sufficient to come up with however many you wanted because the "new" techs that are built out of the 90 basic ones can disappear as relations between the basic techs and the units.
Now that I've reinvented the Wheel, is there anything else around here that needs reinventing?
Wodan: I'm now inclined to think that a clever modder could use Civ4 to give you 90% of what you've been hankering for, as far as "alternate world" developments go.
LATER: Well this just sucks. I'd started playing around with actual structures and was coming up with all kinds of ideas. But if the central idea of this thread is already implicit in Civ4, then most all of those ideas become relatively trivial. F'r'nstance, I think it would be neat if many of the early techs were discovered not through research but by making improvements to the terrain (e.g., you discover Archery not through a lot of thumbsucking but by building a road into the jungle or forest). Is an idea like that even worth mentioning anymore? Will someone point out that that can be modded into the current game?
I think we all got a little excited before we started to break this idea down to its raw components. Techs are already sets, in some ways. The difference is that the tech tree involves a lot of techs building on each other, as opposed to having 50% of the technologies being at the "basic" or "atomic" level. Having that many "atoms" makes learning the formulas for composite techs more complicated. Hence why the Civ 4 tech tree is narrow and long, rather than wide.
That said, there's plenty of other ways to innovate. Go back to the drawing board with techs. (I also think you have some interesting ideas about separating empire from civilization, but that notion would have to be developed.)
LATER: Well this just sucks. I'd started playing around with actual structures and was coming up with all kinds of ideas. But if the central idea of this thread is already implicit in Civ4, then most all of those ideas become relatively trivial. F'r'nstance, I think it would be neat if many of the early techs were discovered not through research but by making improvements to the terrain (e.g., you discover Archery not through a lot of thumbsucking but by building a road into the jungle or forest). Is an idea like that even worth mentioning anymore? Will someone point out that that can be modded into the current game?
I think this is the remaining nugget of interest. I know this is within modder's reach, but it's a cool enough idea that it could generate a lot of popularity. A simple "tech discount" mod:
- every tech gets a potential 25% discount
- some discounts are proportional to the number of turns at war (e.g.: military tradition, archery...)
- some discounts are proportional to the number of turns at peace (e.g.: philosophy, drama, music...)
- some discounts are proportional to your resources and tile improvements (e.g.: horseback riding, iron working)
- in general, there should only be one discount per tech (for simplicity)
I am sorry, but I think I have to give the idea of "sets" another shot into the almost dead body:
Let me first express that personally, I like the idea of "sets" very much. It would be really challenging to discover the best use and sequence of certain combinations to finally master the game.
Yet, with this approach we are already facing the ultimate problem:
Fun.
Why is this a problem? Didn't I just tell, it would be fun to find out how to make use of all the components?
Sure, I did. It would be fun.
But now look at Civ4. One of the main aspects of Civ4 is its moddability.
For me - and I am pretty sure, for many, many others - the "standard game" has lost its attraction a long time ago already.
I am exclusively playing it with some modifications now.
And now think about how much effort it will be to mod a pure "set-based" concept. You and others have touched this topic already.
Yet, there is a second problem connected to the first one, and this second one has not yet been mentioned - the AI.
Within any given structure of sets, the human will find the "golden path" - sooner or later. If it would take to long, he might lose interest.
How should the AI in the near future ever be capable to compete with the human in that aspect?
As far as I see it, the only solution would be to pre-determine certain research paths for the AI. This would lead to even higher efforts for the modders, since now you would not only have to determine research, but building paths as well.
To make a long story short: Your idea is very appealing, yet I don't see it work for modding. In fact, it would kill modding, by that killing a significant part of the experience for the players.
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Personally, I think the solution is to ditch the "conquer/dominate the world" goal and also uncouple the civilizational aspects from the political: unhitch the "civilization" from the "empire." But until that day ...
