From a game design point of view, one of the major things that having technological advancement adds is another set of goals for the player. The best 4X games are always described as having "one more turn" addictiveness; that addictiveness comes from having so many overlapping goals that you're always on the cusp of achieving something, be it starting/ending a war, building a unit - or acquiring a technology.

So technological development, aside from being a staple of the 4X genre and the absence of which will make a lot of people feel like something is "missing", has a significant role in contributing to the overall pace/flow of the game. If one were to argue for taking it out altogether, I would want to be sure that something else was going to fill its role of helping to make each turn feel full of achievement, rather than empty and stagnant.

As far as the issue of technological development in other fantasy settings, I would point out two things:

1) This game is not set in those worlds. Stardock - and by Stardock, I presume I mean Brad - is crafting their own lore for this world. Until we know more about that lore, commenting on what or how much technological development is appropriate for it is nothing more than guesswork on our part.

2) I think there is plenty of range within the scope of "ancient civilizations" for a robust technology system without leaving the desired era. And there is already another thread around here somewhere with plenty of people on record as saying they wouldn't like to see flying units or gunpowder weapons in the game, so I don't think we need to worry that they will go too far with it.

- Ash

I personally am a fan of the industrial revolution fantasy.  Where there are hot air balloons and gimmicy flying machines.  They possibly even have early steam engines and bizzar mechanical contraptions.  I always related wizards to having bizzar non-sensical technology.

I am guessing that there will be "tech" trees both for magic systems as well as mundane weaponry, armor, assault engines, fortifications, etc.

The truly exciting (I think) will be seeing blending of tech trees such as having a certain level of ability with sword making, and a certain level of ability with fire magic being able to make a flaming sword, etc.

Steampunk Fantasy is god.
Regardless, EWoM isn't Steampunk (regrettably so!).

You're right. It's about who makes it, and then who steals it before it can be used!

I'm no great fan of sub-genre names like 'steampunk fantasy,' but I deliberately avoided mentioning Martha Wells' Il-Rien stuff in the 'best epic fantasy' thread because I was trying to respect the genre boundaries. Her The Death of the Necromancer is a fabulous example of mixing fantasy motifs with Victorian melodrama, and that includes talk about how new-fangled iron railways disrupt the much older power of the Fey. In the broadest sense, I see no fundamental conflict between a fantasy 4X TBS and a technological development system.

That said, *every single time* I've seen 'tech' or any word including it in talk about Elemental has made me pause with discomfort. The very word itself is wrong for the setting, IMO, even though I completely agree that forging metal, farming crops, and building stone structures without mortar are all serious techs from a Sid Meier/Will Wright sort of POV. At the moment, I hope to see Elemental stick to a particular 'age' in terms of metal use, chemical energy sources, etc.

And I think that's in no small part because I both want the game to be centered on magic and I still believe that Arthur C. Clarke gave us Great Wisdom when he mentioned that a sufficiently advanced technology will appear to be magic. A big part of all 4X games is basically how stuff gets done, but what gives any given game its unique flavor is a combination of the underlying mechanics and the language the UI uses to describe them.

Edit: It may seem silly to some of y'all, but I'd have an easier time with an art style I didn't love than I would with a word choice that seemed way out of context. So far, everything I've seen the devs describe that us moderns would call 'tech' is just as legitimately called a 'craft' in older writing (e.g. animal husbanrdy). Regardless of how many or how sophisticated the possible non-magical advances are, I really think it would work better without 'tech' words in the UI, at least given what I know of the back story so far.

I came with an idea : how about giving a "flag" to each research like "military, cultural, enhancement, etc.."

Then when you do some actions in game you earn "military" or cultural" or "etc" points that would speed the research of the same flag.

For instance : You're researching "bear cavalry" () each time you win a battle you earn some insight to how handle them. Then you earn some bonus point sin bear cavalary researcdh beacaus eit has the flag "military" and a battle won gives you "military" points.

It works well with long research times. So an aggressive player would speed up it's research.

And why not having several goals at the same time? And you can't really give a priority (meaning your researchers have some limited autonomy) .. unless with your actions. You're researching taming bear and improved roads? If you create a lot of caravans it will be easier to discover better roads.

About the cost of research : why not an exponential cost? The first research cost 10 research points. The second (whatever it may be) cost 20 then 30 then 50 etc... So you would really have to make hard choices : expertize or generalize? Diplomacy would become really interesting. Why researching a simple tech that would take forever if you have ally that has it?

Well, a greatly expanding tree (that possibly intertwines with other trees to create cross-element techs ) isn't too much.  You do need an 'end game' eventually though.  So, a seemingly ever expanding tree isn't TOO much, provided it eventually has an end.  I mean you could have a case-all end tech that upgrades everything civ4 style (they had 'future tech' that just improves all health and income or something like that.)  This could have a 'elemental mastery' or 'even better spell research' tech that makes channeling a particular element cost less or faster or something. 

Alternativly it could open the ability to research upgrades on a per-spell basis to get better version.  Researching firebolt again to get a new version that costs less and is stronger, for example.  So once you complete your tech tree, you start back at the begining again researching the tree over with improved versions, and that could go on endlessly until all spells cost 1 mana crystal and do like a million damage and/or effect every tile on the map.

It has been noted by a Dev already that at some point, the Channelers will have Populous size destructive capabilities. That has to mean that at least the Channelers Trees will have power growth potential, whereas other trees may provide City building growth potentials because as also noted, large Armies, 10K + do not get produced from Farm based economies, but in order to have a 10K + military, it requires a vast and productive Farm based economy be up and running in order to feed, mount and provide animals for caravan services.

And that doesn't include the obvious requirement for Military Production needs as well... it sounds like there could be alot of Trees and perhaps Focus based on 50% of them will provide the best fit to whatever strategy is selected. Whereas, trying to do all things well at he same time could be quasi counter productive.

Which brings up the idea of a De-Construction function, in which resources out layed earlier for some function is now not in such demand, so that said resources could be reduced in order to channel the now liquid finances be channeled in to other more pressing areas.

Ex. I had 30 Farms to support my 10K army. After a bloody battle I now only have 3K soldiers left but upkeep on those same 30 Farms is holding up my immediate need to build more troops, for which I have suddenly have surplus food stuffs, which sadly won't last. do to rotting etc., until my 7K in army losses are replaced. So what I need to do is quickly to reduce my Farm count to 15, and then funnel that new liquid income into producing fresh green troops, ready for arming and Trainging and then slowly bring my Farm requirements back up to speed as required. Like I would have done from the start of the campaign...

Carzy, silly, even understandable?

The tech development system works well as a mechanism to shift resources into, just like how you can shift resources into scouting by building more scouts, military by building more units, etc. but just done differently.  But like you, I agree it'd be sweet to see an improvement over the same old.

I don't know if it's exactly what you meant by 'ever expanding', but I don't like limitlessness in tech trees (a la 'future tech 1, 2, 3, n'). Unless you have some really clever procedural generation stuff going on, which is unlikely because that stuff is hard and often flops, it's going to be dull.

I expect (hope, assume?) the tech tree is going to be one of those community moddable bits, so expect some to be neat, clever, well-balanced distillations of strategic choice and some to be so ludicrously bloated you could never play through them. Depending on what sort of game you feel like playing at the time.

"Could you better define what you mean by 'ever expanding tech tree'?  I'm thinking that no matter how hard you research, there's always another tech higher up, but I've been mistaken before."

what i mean is a tech tree that never ends, the techs could have no limit to how far could go if you make the techs just cycle through and improve old technology. like a mount training upgrade which allows you to train better mounts. well, if their is enough content for new, better mounts, then their could be a never ending "next level" of mount technology to research. this could apply to any principle, and thus require players to contantly research throughout the entirety of the game and never get to an "end game" level of technology where everyone steamrolls.

I like the idea of mundane tech but very very limited.

I don't want steampunk, but certainly making better armors and weapons I would like to see improvements. Making magic weapons and armor should require the ability to make decent weapons and armor before they are made magical. (more hybridization between different tech trees = great imo)

I couldn't disagree more. Fantasy is not all about magic. For example, magic doesn't directly play a huge role in most of Lord of the Rings. The solutions to their problems are hardly ever magical, and when magic is used it's mostly subtle. Likewise, George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series hardly involves magic at all, but nonetheless it belongs more in the fantasy genre than in historical fiction. As long as the technologies (or crafts, or whatever you want to call them) are suitable to a fantasy world then I think it'll only add to the fantasy feel. It also makes sense in the context of the backstory - Elemental is a world whose civilizations were utterly destroyed, and only now are the survivors starting to rebuild.

I also don't see how it undermines the importance of the channeler or of spellcasting, unless it's implemented really badly. Spellcasting and tech trees will serve different purposes, although I suspect that they will coincide at times, too. Moreover, we know that by the end of a game we will have access to massive world-altering, game debalancing spells. I don't think any technology will be on the same scope as magic. Likewise, many important actions will require the channeler, even settling new cities. It also looks like magical creatures will be more powerful than most/any of your mundane, technology-equipped soldiers. For example, we've already been told that individual dragons and powerful channelers will be able to wipe out thousands of soldiers all by themselves.

Copper swords pretty much shatter when wielded against an iron or bronze sword, for example. Likewise a poorly constructed iron sword (either because of the shape or quality of the metal) will hold up terribly against a good one. My staple units of the beginning of the game should pretty much stink compared to my staple units towards the end of the game. Even to the point where their only practical use might be in maintaining order inside my cities. Or to overwhelm stronger units with vast numbers of crappy ones.