Overhauling the Research Tree

Disclaimer: At no point should anyone assume that I'm about to unilaterally run with the ideas posted and discussed in this or any other thread. I'm mostly just hashing some ideas out for the sake of discussion, so don't jump at the chance to say something around the lines of how this would kill Empires. I will just delete your post without a second thought.

Having comm'd and played and talked some in the past few weeks, I've been thinking about the real decisions I make when it comes to research and comming. One of the things I've noticed is that it's very common to get a certain research simply because it's close, which I believe to be drastically lowering the diversity of the game. ER is hands-down better than HE against buildings and has more base DPS than Plasma with less HPS than Rails. It has a fundamental problem with being deep in the Physics tree and not being near anything else good; in particular its associated engine and armor are considered to be low-tier, so it doesn't appear often. Buffing it is out of the question because it'd become too strong though. Composite is right in Mechanical and has a decent engine near it, so it often ends up researched with Gas Turbine, even if it's not necessarily the best armor in the game (Capacitive, Regen and Reflective are all potentially better and Reactive is much better early-game due to plate limits). I do realize that I'm only looking at a single factor here (A comm, for example, might decide to go Composite instead of Reactive because they intend to rush Mediums and/or Heavies ASAP), but I feel that it's an important one. If nothing else, then because players talking about "physics rush" or "electrical rush" because everything in a tree is at least decent, if not necessarily best-in-slot.

So, I feel like the only way to really ameliorate this issue is to overhaul the research tree in its entirety. The simplest way I'd imagine would be to split the base trees into chassis/armor/engine/weapons, weapons into missile/cannon/MG, and then possibly nest it further based off number of slots, adjusting research times so at the very least it wouldn't take any longer than now to get to a given item from the root. UGL would be in the root of the weapon tree.

The idea is that getting something like HE wouldn't make it any easier to get something like HEMG, which I know is a common combo right now because of its strong synergy combined with ease of access due to both being in Chemistry, and the benefit is that a weapon like Ranged wouldn't get burdened from being in the same tree as Fission and Reflective. I believe that diversity in research would potentially increase and it'd make it easier to balance weapons against each other instead of in relation to what's around them.

All at once, I know the first criticism I will get is that it'd remove any tactical choice in deciding to get a certain weapon because it'd faster and not necessarily stronger. Frankly, I fully acknowledge that argument and that it would certainly remove that element of choice. I believe the tradeoffs are worth it in this case.

I feel that it would simplify the research tree. Weapons would be sorted by type and tier; armors would be group together, as would chassis and engines. Turrets would most likely go into the root of the tree due to not having any other good place to be. It would be fairly clean and straightforward.

The possibility to further divide the engine and armor branches into sub-trees exists based off chassis, but I realize that further division into chassis-based research would mainly slow the game down above all else, and I feel that round times are already at a strong balance between early- mid- and late-game phases.

Again, this is a simple method that I figured entirely as a possibility and as an example of what a change could be. By no means am I saying that what I previous described will be put into the game, it is simply a starting point for discussion. I'm interested in other people's views on the matter and their ideas on how to solve the problem, or if they even believe there is a problem to be solved in the first place.

 

So everyone would go straight for compo gas/3phase? What is really the best does not even matter anymore. People will just get compo and ignore the other armors no matter what. Increasing research time is not such a good option to counter it imo.

This option would be good if you wanted to avoid balancing ze videogame.

To me it should be more like a Team Fortress 2 game. Perfectly same options for all teams, but research tree are deep and specialization is important. There numerous armors and weapons to counter the enemy's weapons. If they just go for the best with such ease, the other weapons would be fairly useless. :/ This is my main concern.

 

Didnt I suggest this a few months back.

 

I think maybe the Best of both worlds is to have types of chassis, and weapons as 1 research type and the current chemical/bio/physical/electrical as another.

So you would research say chemical, unlocking an armor and engine. Then research say 2 slot/lvl2 cannon to unlock He cannon, then maybe 21st/lvl2 MG to unlock HMG. If you later unlocked Bio you would then pickup Biocannon and Bio MG.

Would have to make some of those trees longer to unlock or research would be too fast but overall speeding up research diversity may be no bad thing right. Just make MK3 chassis take a good long time, then it is a decision as to whether to open another tree for a short term advantage or spend longer to get heavies

 

It sounds like this is being considered because Physics is never used.

Physics is the high skill tree. Fission is tough for people to use & pretty much universally hated. Reflective is tough to use to its fullest potential. ER Cannon requires much more skill than HE Cannon. Plasma & nukes are effectively useless vs tanks once again, so they are omitted from this kind of discussion.

This isn't an issue with the research time necessary to get some stuff in Physics. BioML is so ridiculously OP that people dive into that entire tree just to get BioML because it's that overpowered.

So if we want Physics to get used, there are a couple options. There's the "BioML" option where there's something in there that is really useful. Then there's the option of just bringing the total skill level down. I think both options are possible.

Plasma could intuitively be made into a bio knockoff (players already think that plasma "melts" infantry). If it's good enough, people would flock to the tree for it. Or fission's cooling while moving could be increased even further. People aren't baited by fission's unique "carrot" right now, so upgrading the carrot would probably do the trick.

Likewise, the entire tree's "skill" level could be lowered as the second option. Fission could be watered down. Reflective could be made lighter (and consequently weaker). ER could get more splash and less DPS. etc.

Completely redoing a very old & established research tree just to fix this minor & very fixable problem with Physics seems like overkill. We're using the nuclear option on something that doesn't need it.

 

Yea I pretty much agree with destroyer. I'm not getting high skill or less intuitive weapons in a pub. My team won't understand.

 

Yeah, that's a succulent way to phrase it.

The current research is chosen because it's idiot-proof. If I get my pick of any cannon, I'll still pick HE because it's braindead-simple to use and just so ridiculously versatile. If I get my pick of armor, I'd still go compo all the way because it's simple, versatile and still overpowered.

 

It's not a high skill tree, it's just a shit tree.

 

Yeah, I think it needs a missile somewhere and plasma needs to be relevant.

 

I liked that one idea I read a while back about replacing the research tree with a research web.

 

You know the funny thing is that it used to be balanced around time, cost with usability being the lesser of the factors. We actually had some pretty impressive strategical choices on that scale before things were messed with, by people who didn't really grasp that.

Sure things weren't really balanced and we used to have a choice more centred around a short term jab or a long term heavy punch (mediums vs heavies), but that coupled with basic-tier gameplay actually gave a lot to play with. Mid and late game were borked, but early game was actually very strategic, and to some degree still is.

But I don't think it's still supported by research.

/
We used to have a fast tree with decent armour, a useful engine and a hit very good support MG. The trade off of course was there was no longevity, you had to go into another tree for weapons. No question about it.

We had our strong tree with a reliable engine, great weapon combo and as compensation, a poor armour and only moderate MG. This was mitigated by additional support weapons (grenades) and the fact that you almost certainly would have a pick between the most expensive and least expensive armours at end game. It was often overpowered though.

Electrical always felt like a doomsday tree to me. A lack of support weapons for Tier 1 vehicles and a heavy armour meant that your money was firmly going on late game and most of your play until then would be defensive. However, 3-phase meant you could create a lot of havoc in the meantime which would help you get there, and add to map control.

Physics was actually the moderate tree for a very long time. People seemed to not really realise it, except to appreciate ranged cannon and sometimes DU (when it was working). But it had a decent armour that was cheap, an engine that used to be reliable and fast, support weapons as well as access to a great cannon and nukes for end game slug-fests.
/

All this people should already know, but the problem is that research had its costs removed and its times lengthened to compensate (at least in some cases). While the gap between heavies and mediums was narrowed into much more manageable terms and the game ending weapons were nerfed down, at the same time that more lengthy early game strategy seemed to flatten out. Most of the options now seem to be about what you want to have when you get real tanks, rather than there being two different plays you might choose, there's quite often just one now.

A singular choice.

Which is pretty interesting since we even had versions recently where you would research everything in the tree and the game would still be going on. With all that ability to research, there are a lot less choices to be made. Not in the research tree, but relevant to the game itself.

So before (I'm talking way back btw) you could research bio if you needed to counter your team losing ground fast, and they could push back with vehicles and regain ground. You had a choice that helped counter early game enemy infantry being effective.

If you needed to hold a position and be defensive you might pick electrical, although turrets - I suppose the equivalent of anti-vehicle MG's - were never very time efficient you'd have them throughout the match.

If you were pretty confident about your team you would research chemistry and then head straight into tanks. If you had an underdog team I can honestly say physics was insanely useful, giving boosts to all areas of a weaker team.

Right now the weapons, armours and engines are different. I think it's probably cool (though I still don't know too much about the current balance) but the one particular thing I think is that the research tree lacks relevance to strategic situations on the field. It has relevance against enemy tanks, but less to situations on the ground. You can't really go "wait a minute, I'll research this and we'll fast counter them", or "I'll research this and we hold", or even "let's fast rush with this". It's simply what's best and easiest to use for the team once they get tanks.

tl;dr version: Research has been geared towards countering enemy tanks, not on situational value in the field. If we can bring that back into the tree, while preserving the better balance between tier 1, med and heavy tanks that we have now, we would have a much more enjoyable game.

 

it promotes variation because you can set up counters much easier. right now you would have to open up a new tree and waste 6 minutes of your game getting the armor that is better for the weapon the enemy is using. that usually doesnt happen, since its "better" to just get heavies
more would get researched because everything is closer.

i am for making things easier for new commanders in regards to research. its not like its a fun thing to do, like mass targets were. too many games where comms go "what do i research? where is that?", both new and old.

but he cannon has good weapons around it. ranged does not. thus, its deep in physics.

 

Yeah time should not matter so much. I actually find that people totally ignore light vehicle combat and just go for meds and heavies and nukes with compo shits. I find the light vehicle battles are the most exciting and interesting because infantry are more involved.

 

ok your right. i dont look at the research times. it just seems long to me when i have to get a new armor/engine.

i dont really think we open up every tree in this version... not unless its a game that goes on forever and all the research is exhaustd.
the difference between it is: both teams have to open up the trees and right now, opening a third tree is optional and could waste time (getting a new weapon/armor/engine)

 

Ill be honest, i can't be arsed to read everything in detail, but one thing that kinda caught my eye is people saying that "youll get x if you are in y situation".

This really doesnt seem to be the case most of the time since quite a bit. You got your share of vf first coms back in the day, but now unless its mvalley or youre a cunt, youll probably see a radar first, meaning you will get to choose what youll stick with before most of the early-midgame development happens.