Virtual World should take longer to get

[bvanevery]

It's powerful.  I don't think factions should be able to obtain it just by starting on some other Secret Project and switching to it later.  I think a faction should actually have to work hard at Discovering stuff to get it.  I'm moving it to Optical Computers, the otherwise annoying "speed bump" tech that just dilutes people's research.  It wouldn't shock me if it was there to begin with at some point in SMAC's design, and they moved it earlier in the tech tree.  It would explain the stupid gaping hole at any rate.  This will be in conjunction with a lot of other tech requirement reshufflings to make them more rational.  The bottom line is though, if you want a Virtual World, you're going to have to do a lot of Discover research.  Roze is not going to get it just by starting the game.

Planetary Networks will still have plenty of value, as that's how you will get Probe Teams.  I'm taking Planned economy out of that though.  It makes no sense at all.  A Planned economy is an industrial Builder's concern, not a research scientist's.  I'm doing a lot of other Societal Engineering mods and my current plan is to put it in Industrial Base.  Although ideally, I'd like a tech that depends on Industrial Base and Social Psych, that isn't Industrial Economics.  I might repurpose and rename Adaptive Economics.

[PvtHudson]

+1. I'm also shifted VW to Optical Computers long ago. Besides, Zak, being avid discoverer, is more likely to get it, and that's fitting thematically.

[bvanevery]

I didn't rename Adaptive Economics, but I did repurpose it to hold the Planned social engineering choice.  The Planetary Energy Grid, I've moved to Environmental Economics.  That's when energy restrictions are removed and I thought it somewhat appropriate.  I also moved The Weather Paradigm to Ecological Engineering.  It's not much beneficial for early land raising anymore, since you're only 1 tech away, but you've still got the terraforming speed boost and in my experience that is a big deal.

As for Zhakarov, he has almost nothing to do now.  I've recategorized all techs according to the benefits they actually give.  The game is frankly mostly Conquer techs, then a lot of Build techs.  There are a few pure Discover techs, that give you things like labs.  There are almost no Explore techs.  It remains to be seen what effect this has on AI behavior as I haven't played a test game yet.  I've been tearing up everything and shuffling it around pretty hard, trying to make the progressions more logical and thematically consistent.  I'm tired of weapons skipping over each other for instance.

[Green1]

+1. I'm also shifted VW to Optical Computers long ago. Besides, Zak, being avid discoverer, is more likely to get it, and that's fitting thematically.

That sounds like a very good modification to the game. I may go into the alphax to change that.

Optical Computers always was such an unexciting tech that needed more of a reason to exist other than being a pre-req.

While "virtual worlds" of some sort have been around since the multi user dungeons on 1970s college mainframes, a true VR ultra-real graphics near Star Trek holodeck experience would need a hell of a machine like an optical computer.