Seriously man, is it that hard to read? I am arguing that creating broad categories will lead to tactical diversity, but terrible or no strategic diversity. I argue for several different tech paths that have connecting benefits and flaws, rather than generic progression in areas like 'weapons' and 'engines'. Oh, and reactive is actually usually explosives that are electrically detonated to prevent enemy munitions from exploding properly. The ultimate for of ablative armor.
Reactive is really any type of armor that reactive to an incoming projectile. Both types are real and both are used. But the explosive plate version is more common
I fully support a tiered research system. I loved drag's scripts and actually did a fair amount of work on this but stopped due to limitations (128 research max, required coder for most infantry and building research, no ability to have "combo packs", problems with too many engines/chassis, afv handling like shit at high speeds, etc...) I would be rather happy if testing/refinement began where drags scripts left off. They were fun. Especially when the rpg's were broken and could 6 shot comms... Mmmmmmmove: The best thing I loved about it was the fact that when getting multiple weapons, you can add in "support" weapons along with the real ones.
You make valid points. I'm just making sure we don't try to make pure hard counters in Empires. So, maybe up to 40% of a battle is decided by tech, the rest by skill. There's still investment in good tech choices and diversifying your team, but if one team gets one tech and the other gets another one it isn't gg. Something else we need to watch out for. Perhaps the biggest problem with tech being so limited is the fact we don't have TIME to research stuff. Or, in other words, the first few engagements are so important that we barely have time to get armor+weapon+engine in time, let alone different two sets. This heralds back to the Slippery Slope thread. Since the equilibrium can be switched so quickly, those couple of first techs can quickly turn the tide, making each tech progression focused on a full set instead of diverse combinations of tech. Perhaps an interesting way around this would be to let tech be easier to get at the beginning. Reduce Radar cost and entry level tech prices. This will make the first couple of techs fairly inexpensive, allowing commanders to quickly get out of paper tank region. However, don't make the first tier very effective, promoting diverse choices, at least initially. This is similar to how Fall From Heaven 2, a Civ4 mod, does its tech. The foundational techs are pretty easy to get and all pretty useful, but if you devote yourself to one major tech path you can reap huge rewards but at the cost of not being able to get the benefits of another path of tech. Perhaps we could implement versions of tech. 3Phase MKI, MKII, etc. That way beginning tech has its perks, but an upgraded version will be more pronouncedly useful in its area of expertise.
I like Beerdude's research tree idea but I also like RoboTek's research tree idea. So I guess devs have only the difficulty of picking something they like from the wide variety.
