posted a preview of the tech tree I am working on to the newsgroup

take a look at this entry I just added for Star Democracy. It has implications that could solve some of our production issues we talked about.

Baresh B'talga made history today when the peace
talks he initiated between earth and and it's in-
system colonies resulted in an agreement that will
merge the trade and resource production abilities
of ALL the colonies into one pool. The vote passed
8 to 1 with only Mars dissenting. Mars however will
comply with the decision.

Effect: All planets in a system will share resources
military and social production.

That's a really good one.

When I saw Trade, Diplomacy, Nice, Mean and Alliances in the Tech-tree, my first thought was "Are we starting from Adam and Eve?"

On second thoughts, I realized that Trade could be explained as a process for getting inter-planetary and inter-stellar trade organized. So the entry would be something like:

The Senate passed the Hansen Bill in its session today. Having been under way for [months spend in reaserch], the Bill formalizes the issues of taxes paid on commerce between the Earth, her colonies and the Alien Races.
The Bill was passed by an overwhelming majority, due to a varity of issues and the confusion that has plagued the authorities for so many years.
According to government spokesbeings and diplomatic envoys, the effects of the Bill will be an estimated 15%
increase in the volume of commerce.

Effect: Production and Economy is increased by 15% on all your planets.

The same approach could be used for the other "simplistic" techs: That the procedures has to be formalized. This would especially explain Diplomacy, Nice and Mean - since they would be the adoptation of a formalized way of communicating political messages and conducting foreign policy.

You're on the right track. Looks way cool

it's gonna be huge. I am already at 39" x 28" size. and I don't think it will fit on that.

and since I am about to do the trade tech right now I will use your suggestion for the text.

anyone want to make more suggestions on the descriptions for the tech I would appreciate them.

I could use a set of descriptions for the Cold Fusion line wich I will do after I am done the translator line ( includes the trade line)

I'll post Cold Fusion, Diplomacy, Mean and Nice. The latter two I would love to have some clue to, game-wise.

Tech: Cold Fusion

While Fission was realized during the Second World War and Fusion gained a commercial breakthrough in 2031, Cold Fusion wasn't shown to be a reality before the Star Gate was finally made operational and scientific studies was exchanged with the Alien Races.

Where "Hot" Fusion requires very high pressure and an equally large amount of energy to start, Cold Fusion makes it possible to create immense amounts of energy "in a cup of water at room temperature", so to speak.
Instead of the plants needed for Hot Fusion, it requires a comparatively simple and cheap setup to run Cold Fusion - and with only a minimal amount of pollution generated in the process.

It is speculated that Cold Fusion will have serious impact on both the economically and sociologically structure of Earth, but the benefits outweight any arguments against it.

Effect: You can now research Impulse Drive and Organic Piecing.

the mean and nice are kinda weird. lets figure out new names to them. I think they should have a subject related to trade with aliens. wether we are generous in trade agreements or greedy. this having the effect of determining how hard it will be to get the aliens to agree to an agreement. but if you succedd and are greedy you make more money off them.

and what the hell is organic piecing?

Tech: Diplomacy

The cultural and physological differences between Humans and the Alien Races requires a complex set of rules for conducting diplomatic negotiations.

The necessity of this was stressed during the Schmidt-Talks, where the human envoy gravely insulted all members of the Arceanian mission by brushing dust of his jacket. Only by a great show of humility and the most serious apologies was a major diplomatic incident avoided.

The Veronica Protecol stipulates which gestures are to be interpretated how, during diplomatic negotiations.

Effect: You can now research Alliances.

Re: Nice, Mean, Organic Piecing
---
Nice:
Leads to nothing. I like your suggestion. Generous is a good lable for that.
If you are Generous, the concequences for breaking a deal are more severe for the one that breaks it.

Mean:
Leads to nothing. How about calling it Strict?

Organic Piecing:
Leads to Genetic Mapping. I have no clue to what it's supposed to mean - but since it has to do with medical science, we could call it "Viral Vaccines". I'll be happy to explain what's so special about Viral Vaccines, if you wish.

Genetic Mapping:
AFAIR we have already mapped the humane genome. Perhaps this should be something more impressive..

Tech: Generous

After the conclusion of the session of the Sentient Races Commitee this afternoon, the spokesperson from the Department of Trade has this comment:

"We have concluded the session with very good results. In the next couple of days we will sign trade agreements with several of the other representatives.
Given the cultural differences, we have decided to establish a set of very loose rules to govern the exchange of goods between us and them.
The spirit of cooperation and good faith has lead us to reach these argeements with less problems than anticipated by the War Party and other political figures."

Effect: When using the Generous attitude in negotiating trade agreements, you have a higher chance to make the agreement. However this means that you will get 10% less from the agreement than normally.
If the other part of the agreement breaks it for no good reason, it will cost them in their Prestige.

Tech: Generous

After the conclusion of the session of the Sentient Races Commitee this afternoon, the spokesperson from the Department of Trade has this comment:

"We have concluded the session with very good results. In the next couple of days we will sign trade agreements with a few of the other representatives.
Given the cultural differences, we have decided to establish a set of very strict rules to govern the exchange of goods between us and them.
The negotiations have been long underway, due to the formulating for these rules. However we are convinced this will ensure that commerce between all of us will be conducted according to precisely defined procedures."

Effect: When using the Strict attitude in negotiating trade agreements, you have a lower chance to make the agreement. However this means that you will get 10% more from the agreement than normally.
If you break the agreement for no good reason, you will lose Prestige.

The tech above is supposed to be Strict...

I wonder if Brad will implement this

we also need to have the ability to block off a tech from research if you choose another path. like choosing nice blocks the option to reseach mean. this could have very cool effects on how a race develops. so in addition to the "requirements" for a tech, we need "restrictions"

Just so you guys understand things, we're a very strange company. If you guys produce something better than us, we'll use it if we have your permission.

The original GalCiv techs weren't done by us. They were done by the beta testers.

I'll try to work on the tech stuff more shortly.

Let me dig up the tech tree we have here. It's in PDQLIte format.

Getting the original tech tree would be cool for inspiration.

What I would like to see in it are tech's that makes sense - in the sense that we're building on tech that can be reasoned to exist at game start - not having to reinvent the wheel..

Btw.: Brad, can you either place the tech tree in a location where we may retrieve it as a text-file - or post it as such?
See, I don't have PDQLite

all you need is notepad to open the .tech file in the data directory

Well, that one doesnt have descriptions...Brad's file has that.

I like the idea of one tech excluding others. It would be great to have a handful of these as it would mean that games would vary.

A further suggestion would be to limit some tech advances depending on the government type currently in ascendance. For example some of the more powerful battleships should only be available if the war party has at least 25% of the senate. Some of the pure research techs could only be researched if the technologists have at least 25% of the senate. This could make the senate very interesting.

Paul.