SMAX - The Will to Power - mod

[Nexii]

I went through all the techs and re-read their quotes. I think a big reason the tree is confusing is that for many techs, their quote/speaker doesn't really match the priority (conquer, build, discover, explore) it had been assigned. Prime example is Superconductor. Has Morgan as a speaker about the economic criticality of superconductors. But it's somehow a conquer tech? I ended up re-categorizing a lot of techs into different priorities. Only problem was a few too many ended up in the discover pile. So a couple have to be moved over.

[Nexii]

Weapon too far ahead leads to a cakewalk, a colonial style slaughter.

Armor too far ahead doesn't lead to much of anything.  Territory remains more static.

Yea this. I found that in the stock tech tree, you'd get Plasma-3 early enough. Which works fine against Impact-4 and Missile-6. The problem arose when weapon tech would rise up to Shard-13 before any more armor upgrades. I think because that branch had Advanced Spaceflight, Fusion Power and the like. Going for Photon-6 defense just wasn't as effective. It was a reason many people considered air units "OP" when often what was going on was that armor just wasn't keeping up.

I'm not saying they have to always be 2:1 exactly all game or anything. Or 1:1 if that's what your mod is built around. But it is a consideration

The other thing is if armor lags behind it becomes even less valuable as a tech to pursue. As well as any defensive modifier techs. If you're going to get smashed by 3:1 weapons anyways what's the point in AAA for example.

If weapons are hopelessly low, then it diminishes the value of morale facilities/SEs and faster chassis. If there's nothing to pick off then you might as well just build lots of defensive infantry, and then go economic

[bvanevery]

They both will have strong weapon and weak armor.

In AI vs. AI combat this leads to volatile warfare where 1 faction can totally tip over and overrun the other.  Particularly on smaller maps where combatants fight at close range.  This arises because even though factions may have similar offensive weapons, they do not have similar productivity.  Big offense and no defense basically leads to "time to die" conditions for someone.

It is not desirable from the standpoint of challenging the human player.  It tends to result in maps where the AI factions have wiped each other out, making it easier for the human player to sweep in and clean up.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Here is substantially reduced list. Only 50 techs out of 85. The rest are completely free of any rigid association. I picked only irrefutable association with either common word (Monopole Magnets -> Mag tube) or something directly related (Retroviral Engineering -> Genejack factory, supposedly they engineer viruses to jack genes) or some very common association (Doctrine: Flexibility -> Foil) or some very important milestone features (Ecological Engineering -> advanced terraforming).

type   feature   a   d   technolgy   pri
1 unit types   Foil chassis
Troop transport, Pressure dome         Doctrine: Flexibility   1
1 unit types   Speeder chassis         Doctrine: Mobility   1
1 unit types   Cruiser chassis         Doctrine: Initiative   1
1 unit types   Needlejet chassis, Air base         Doctrine: Air Power   1
1 unit types   Gravship chassis         Graviton Theory   1
2 ability   Hypnotic trance         Secrets of the Human Brain   1
2 ability   Empath song         Centauri Empathy   1
3 terraforming   basic terraforming, Terraform unit, restrictions lifted         Centauri Ecology   1
3 terraforming   advanced terraforming         Ecological Engineering   1
3 terraforming   Mag tube         Monopole Magnets   1
3 terraforming   Soil enricher         Adv. Ecological Engineering   1
4a facility - military   Perimeter defense         Doctrine: Loyalty   1
4d facility - energy   Network node         Information Networks   1
4e facility - ecodamage   Centauri preserve         Centauri Meditation   1
4f facility - minerals   Genejack factory         Retroviral Engineering   1
4g facility - space station   Sky hydroponics lab         Orbital Spaceflight   1
4g facility - space station   Orbital power transmitter         Advanced Spaceflight   1
4i facility - movement   Psi gate         Matter Transmission   1
5 reactor   Fusion Reactor         Fusion Power   1
5 reactor   Quantum Chamber         Quantum Power   1
5 reactor   Singularity Engine         Singularity Mechanics   1
6 secret project   The Human Genome Project         Biogenetics   1
6 secret project   The Planetary Datalinks         Cyberethics   1
6 secret project   The Supercollider         Applied Relativity   1
6 secret project   The Planetary Energy Grid         Adaptive Economics   1
6 secret project   The Theory of Everything         Unified Field Theory   1
6 secret project   The Hunter-Seeker Algorithm         Pre-Sentient Algorithms   1
6 secret project   The Nano Factory         Industrial Nanorobotics   1
6 secret project   The Longevity Vaccine         Bio-Engineering   1
6 secret project   The Neural Amplifier         Neural Grafting   1
6 secret project   The Pholus Mutagen         Centauri Genetics   1
6 secret project   The Cyborg Factory         Mind/Machine Interface   1
6 secret project   The Network Backbone         Digital Sentience   1
6 secret project   The Self-Aware Colony         Self-Aware Machines   1
6 secret project   The Bulk Matter Transmitter         Matter Transmission   1
6 secret project   The Cloning Vats         Biomachinery   1
6 secret project   The Voice of Planet, The Ascent to Transcendence         Threshold of Transcendence   1
7 weapon   Laser   1      Applied Physics   1
7 weapon   Quantum laser   9      Quantum Machinery   1
7 weapon   Graviton gun   10      Applied Gravitonics   1
7 weapon   Singularity laser   11      Controlled Singularity   1
7 weapon   String disruptor   12      String Resonance   1
8 armor   Silksteel armor      3   Silksteel Alloys   1
8 armor   Photon wall      4   Photon/Wave Mechanics   1
8 armor   Probability sheath      5   Probability Mechanics   1
8 armor   Stasis generator      8   Temporal Mechanics   1
9 social enginering 42   Eudaimonic         Eudaimonia   1

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

I went through all the techs and re-read their quotes. I think a big reason the tree is confusing is that for many techs, their quote/speaker doesn't really match the priority (conquer, build, discover, explore) it had been assigned. Prime example is Superconductor. Has Morgan as a speaker about the economic criticality of superconductors. But it's somehow a conquer tech? I ended up re-categorizing a lot of techs into different priorities. Only problem was a few too many ended up in the discover pile. So a couple have to be moved over.

Technology is a box to place features. It means nothing by itself. Superconductor enables weapon. Thus it is a conquer technology so conquest oriented faction can get to this weapon. It doesn't matter what Morgan said about it. This is just a scenery.

I agree it does sound more scientific or maybe science-industry application related. So we can repurpose it for some other feature and keep research instead. That's all.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Thank you everybody for valuable notes. I think I understand what to do. Will postpone the actual implementation, though, as I am currently working on terraforming AI. Cannot do two things at once.

[Nexii]

The next step I'm taking is to rank each tech on how high of tech it seems from 1-5. Obviously these will expand out to 2-3 tiers each.

Yes, there are some like Silksteel Alloys as a good example. It has to be Discover since armor is discover in my model, and there's no other tech to match Silksteel armor with. I was able to slot an equal amount of techs into each priority with a little bit of tweaking.

I feel like there's much less than 50 of these 'hard-associations' in the game. Maybe 25 or so but I'll see as I go through. There might actually be more since there's so many benefits. I think it's best to first categorize every tech and every benefit as conquer, discover, build, explore. That helps with matching techs to benefits. An explore tech should give only explore benefits for example.

It's definitely a lot of work to redo a whole tech tree. I'll pass mine on when I'm done. It will probably make a lot of sense to me but perhaps not others. Sometimes writing up a bit of 'how' techs are categorized can help too.

[Nexii]

Technology is a box to place features. It means nothing by itself. Superconductor enables weapon. Thus it is a conquer technology so conquest oriented faction can get to this weapon. It doesn't matter what Morgan said about it. This is just a scenery.

I agree it does sound more scientific or maybe science-industry application related. So we can repurpose it for some other feature and keep research instead. That's all.

Yea my point is that the weapon would then be placed on a tech that sounds more conquer. There's no 'reason' that Superconductor has to grant Gatling Laser unless I'm missing something in the lore? Techs do have meaning as they have quotes. Quotes by Morgan should lean build, war quotes from Sparta should lean conquer, theoretical ones from Zak should lean discover. And so on.

[bvanevery]

Before getting into anything else...

(Retroviral Engineering -> Genejack factory, supposedly they engineer viruses to jack genes)

To be pedantic, the "GENEtically enGineered worker, or GENEJack" is Chairman Yang's gift to industry.   He explains it as a contraction, not necessarily as a mechanism.  I suppose you could infer the method is retroviral, based on when the Genejack Factory appears.  But, the preceding tech is Bio-Engineering, and that's when Yang gives his big pitch about "Why do you insist the human genetic code is sacred or taboo?  It is a chemical process and nothing more."  Retroviral Engineering just has some spokesperson for the University lying through his teeth to a commission of inquiry.  Since it's Yang's baby, and some kind of genetic engineering, I felt perfectly comfortable giving it with Bio-Engineering.

And I thought it was dumb that Clean Reactor was given with Bio-Engineering.  Like, wat?

[bvanevery]

There's no 'reason' that Superconductor has to grant Gatling Laser unless I'm missing something in the lore?

In fact, the quote / voice acting is Morgan going on about how "superconducting fiber alone makes our present economy possible".  It could be repurposed as a Build tech.  I'm not sure this observation is of use to me, as I'd need to put the Gatling Laser somewhere else, but it might bear some contemplation.


Synthetic Fossil Fuels is also Morganic quote / voice acting.  Again, not sure how it helps me, because I need to give the Missile Launcher somewhere.  "More fuel = more missiles" is an ok hand wave.  I've had it under Doctrine: Air Power at times, but that tech gets too crowded.

[bvanevery]

It will probably make a lot of sense to me but perhaps not others.

A lot of your Discover techs are not going to make sense.  It's not about armor, it's about faster research.  There's no more reason for Discover to be about armor, than for Explore or Build to be about armor.  Why should I be forced to study Discover to have a viable defense in the game?

[Nexii]

Discover is the most scant priority. That's the main reason. Otherwise I end up with 2x more conquer techs than other priorities which I don't want. Also conquer factions should be focusing more on speed and weapons, offensive military. Armor should be only a moderate priority when you have to smash base defenses. Conquer factions never have the infrastructure to realistically pursue every 'conquer' tech. It's better that they focus.

Plus Discover has a problem that Explore and Build don't. Explore gets a big population, and Build gets higher productivity per population. Both of these give them a chance against Conquer. Whereas Discover gets nothing to increase its chances. At least not directly. Being a bit ahead in pure techs won't in practice give it enough staying power. That's how I see it.

[bvanevery]

Discover is supposed to get all the other techs faster.  If it isn't doing that, then it may need adjustment.  I am not certain about Discover rate in my own mod right now.  There have been times when I felt like various combos of factions in my mod, were behaving like a tech stagnation game.  I greatly shortened my Discover tech tree to try to compensate.  Then Bearu revealed the Pre-Sentient Algorithms AI "cheat / pull" and I had to retool some things.  I started to get the feeling that maybe I'd overdone it.  I took the free Biology Labs away from the University because I no longer though they needed the boost.  Now with my new faction research foci regime, there are going to be more factions with Discover as part of their research.  That's probably going to inject more tech into the trading economy.

I think if you don't want Conquer to be about defense, it makes far more sense to sprinkle the defensive techs evenly through Explore, Discover, and Build.  Of course, you could determine what works out in practice.  If your Explore and Build factions get slaughtered, you'll have your answer.
 
Incidentally I'm in the middle of implementing your "Industrial Base should be for Formers" idea.  If it works out, and I've got the attribution correct (I do), I'll acknowledge you in my readme_mod.txt.  I'm repurposing Superconductor as a Build tech.  I put the Gatling Laser in Conquer 5 Doctrine: Air Power.  Totally reasonable for planes to have gatling guns.  Not too much point to flying them around without some armament, and they are directly on my weapons sequence to Missile Launchers anyways.  Weapons and Needlejets are expensive in my mod, so it's not a given you'll want to arm them with Gatling Lasers, even if you can.

Generally speaking, recycling Conquer techs where possible, by consolidating them, might be a good strategy for cutting down their sheer bulk in the tree.  I don't think it's going to disrupt this stage of my game.

[Nexii]

With only 21-22 conquer techs I'm finding many of them will need to give both a chassis and a weapon. Or a weapon and 1-2 abilities. I suppose that's alright.

The resonance weapons might end up being explore, but requiring more tech to get than their conquer equivalents.

Have to start matching most techs with what they will give. Then the order will kind of fall out of that. At least I hope. A complete tech tree rebuild is definitely a lot of work.

The ecological engineering techs are tricky to place. Even the stock game wasn't sure. Ecological engineering was explore but advanced ecological engineering was build. Same with environmental economics. A lot could go either way. Probably it'll be Tree Farm, Hybrid Forest, Aquafarm = explore (main benefit is nutrients). Whereas terraforming improvements will fall into build, aside from maybe Condensor/Enricher. Even those might end up as build.

And yea some facilities are tough to place. Bio Lab is about 50% discover and 50% explore.

[bvanevery]

I generally give both the weapon and the armor in the higher tech tiers.

I don't usually give a vehicle and a weapon.  It's what I needed to do to free up Superconductor, and I don't think it will "hurt".

I have flip-flopped on Ecological Engineering many times.  Currently I've got it as the thing that lifts nutrient restrictions, so it's Explore.  But it's like wealth=3, growth=4.

You can make something tech=4, growth=3, like the Biology Lab.  I also give all the indigenous life form stuff power=1, because you can kick someone's ass with a mindworm.  I just mainly want it to be Explore with only a small chance of being picked up by Conquer.  I have a lot of 1, x, x, 4 techs in the Explore part of my tree.