Mod with the best non-racially driven tech tree?

[Wenin]

I'm having a hard time deciding how to design the tech tree in the mod I'm helping create. We are looking for a realistic feel, but don't want it to granual. We don't have any racially specific tech. So I was wondering what people thought of the various tech trees that are built in other mods.

What's your favorite and why?

[Fyron]

I like Adamant's (if you pretend there is only the Physical paradigm, its more or less non-racial ) due to the increased number of theoretical requirements, either in the form of more levels or more tech areas entirely. More of a tree feel, I think. Although, I think some of the other paradigms might do more crossovers, like the Magic paradigm.

[Urendi Maleldil]

I re-designed the tech tree in the Pointer Mod. My ultimate goal was to make every tech researchable by everybody. Different racial traits would then be defined by the path a race researched through the tech tree.

Unfortunately, it was way too ambitious. I re-designed the tech tree from the ground up and it just proved too much work for one person to re-design all the AI research and ship design files as well.

But if you want to learn from my efforts, you can get a copy of the Pointer Mod here. The discussion thread is here.

[Ed Kolis]

/me jumps in with the shameless plugging of personal mods to plug the Low Tech Mod
http://kolis.dyndns.org/ed/se/se4/mo...Tech%20Mod.zip

[Wenin]

I get a "The page cannot be displayed" error when trying to download that.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

Well, maybe you should add techs that only give other techs, or redundant techs, which may go on for quite a while (but not too long); there's always the research path that leads to no results at all. Those might be nice, especially for games where the objective is to reach all tech levels; you need to get through research that actually doesn't yield any results in order to win.

Or crossover techs; so that when you have Torpedo Weapons lvl 6 and Computers lvl 4, for example, you get AI-controlled Smart Torpedoes, or when you have Military Technology lvl 2 and Political Studies lvl 3, you get Government Training Academies and all that, and so on.

Also, racial crossover techs; to take an existing example from a mod I don't remember, a race with Crystallurgy and Organic Manipulation can build Biocrystal Armor, that channels damage to the shields and repairs itself. This is just an example; there's loads more potential racial crossovers out there, so I'm sure you'll find some to your liking.

Maybe different techs that lead to (essentially) the same result? So that you have two Destroyer hulls, for instance, exactly the same except for the fact that one requires Ship Construction lvl 6 and the other Warship Construction lvl 2. Or "upgradable" hulls; say, you research Warship Construction lvl 2, and you get to build Destroyers; but, as soon as you research EW Ships lvl 3, you get a Destroyer hull which is slightly more expensive but has built-in combat modifiers. Or you research Deep Space Warship Deployment lvl 2, and you get a Destroyer with built-in supply storage. When you have all three, you get a Destroyer with combat bonuses (though not as much as the dedicated hull) and supply storage (though not as much as the dedicated hull)..... but that's straying into the realm of crossover techs, so let's not go into that any further.

Grid techs; i.e. you have an Ion Engine I, and you can research different types of upgrades; Miniaturization lvl 1 gives you an Ion Engine I which takes up 28kT instead of 30kT (trust me, you'll notice the difference once your Mini tech - or your hull size - increases), or you can research Efficient Engines, which gives you an Ion Engine I with 95 supply consumption per move, instead of 100. If you have both these techs, you have an Ion Engine I which is 28kT in size and uses 95 supplies; add in, say, Fuel-Injection Systems, and it can store more supplies; and so on. Grid Techs are somewhat reminiscent of crossover techs, but are more involved. If you want to try Grid Techs, I'd say try SJ's Tech Gridder. I've never used it myself, but I've heard that it's good.

I'm rambling again. Good luck trying to make sense of this jumbled mess.

[Ed Kolis]

Sorry Wenin... the mod is also available from the PBW mods library. My brother keeps shutting off my web server

[dogscoff]

Also, racial crossover techs; to take an existing example from a mod I don't remember, a race with Crystallurgy and Organic Manipulation can build Biocrystal Armor

It wasn't the only mod to use racial crossovers by any means (although I thikn it may have been the first) but I think you're probably thinking of Pirates & Nomads.

[Urendi Maleldil]

I believe the Devnull Mod also has racial crossover techs.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

dogscoff said:

It wasn't the only mod to use racial crossovers by any means (although I thikn it may have been the first) but I think you're probably thinking of Pirates & Nomads.

Probably. I never claimed it was the only one; it was just the first to spring to mind. I know there are more mods that use racial crossovers out there, but I've only browsed so many, and like I said I couldn't even remember that I was talking about P&N.