According to Brad's podcast from a while back, Elemental is going to have two tech trees: one for magic, and one for "conventional" technology like forges, siege engines, mining, etc. The question is, what technology should be on the conventional tree: at what period in technological development should the tree start, and at what peroid should it stop? I for one do NOT want to have my empire building power grids and racing with the Fallen to split the atom, but then again, I don't want to have one of the end-game techs be "The Wheel" either.
A good tech tree scope for me would be starting somewhat before the Dark Ages, developing animal husbandry, agriculture, and stonework (this ignores the Romans' advances, of course), then later getting to metallurgy, catepults, medicine, and basic machines like the crossbow. The tech tree should then stop at some point shortly before the Industrial Revolution, probably right when more potent agriculture was developed. May want to skip the heliocentric view of the solar system, hoewever.
Thoughts?
I see. I was referring to Darkodimplus. Thanks anyway...
I was thinking just water. If you throw in steam you'd almost be pushed into the more advanced tech and I doubt a good excuse could be made to stop there. Although, the Romans did develop a steam engine but they never used it. I forget way that was though I want to say it kept exploding.
I think their problem was that they didn't know what to do with the steam. In any event, water power does seem like a good stopping place for machinery. Medicine, on the other hand..... as I said before, I don't want evolution or germ theory, but maybe hederity and selective breeding/seeding, and some basic herbalism. Or should that go on the magic tree?
My understanding of the tech divide was that essence powers are on one list, and actual technology is on the other. Not that the tech list would be a mundane list, and everything magic related would be on the other. A divide between spells and tech, not magic and mundane tech.
In either case, more advanced tech is easily modded in, so I don't really care where they stop as long as it's before modern warfare. I probably wouldn't even mind muskets and cannons in an exceptionally long game. They really weren't much of an improvement early on.
I'm pretty confident that Brad has stated somewhere on these forums (many months ago) that he is strongly opposed to gunpowder in Elemental, so I don't think we'll be seeing any of that (yay!). But I would like to see some steampunk aspects, and I only remember him stating his opposition to gun-powder specifically. Airships and steam-power could be nice additions.
And also, the evolution of science and technology in our history should only ever be a rough guide. If God went back 4000 years and started over with a new random seed, technology may have progressed totally differently. Hell, it's even possible such an alternate world could end up at a similar level of technology but based on radically different ideas. Note that this is not directed towards you Luckmann.
I think Brad has, again a long time ago, said that every faction will have a slightly modified version of the racial tech tree but that they will be largely the same. It may have been as simple as each faction has its own unique tech or two on top of the base racial tree. This may have even been in a dev journal somewhere along the line...
Again, note that this is not what I think or demand will be in Elemental, but just theoretical wishful thinking. That is all.
Steampunk Fantasy isn't just magic + some technology.
World of Warcraft, for example, technically has both dwarven steam tanks and flintlock weaponry. But it's no in any way, shape or form remotely steampunk. So I still dare anyone to mention a steampunk game, which Nights Edge mentioned had been done so much.
Or somesuch. My point is that Steampunk rarely makes sense. Especially not fantasy steampunk. Steam engine armors, steam-propelled jetpacks, enchanted revolvers, archimedes rifles - it's all on the same level of realistic as 'a wizard did it'. But with steam, gears, and propellers.
Eugenics have been around since the first civilized societies, so if that'd be in the game, it'd be great. I'm not sure how I could see that worked into the game, though.
It doesn't really need to be revolver and rifle steampunk either, I'd be happy with a steam-powered crossbow. man, this steampunk talk makes me want to play Thief 2. (where the hell is my thief 4 trailer. Wasn't E3 this week? why don't I have a trailer? what was square enix/eidos doing not giving me news?) Thief is totally steampunk, but thief 1 and 3 have pretty mellow steampunk tones. Like it is totally steam punk (especially on the thief 1 menu screen) but there really arn't many things like super steam-suits or jet packs or anything like that (the 2nd one most of that, but that isn't the point)
I think they're called the Fallen. Magic-assisted eugenics is pretty much the background for the Fallen, so I could definately see at least one faction of them conducting mundane and/or magical research along the same lines. Especially if their magical tech tree is the evil Life list.
Maybe off topic but I would like a fantasy setting not from medieval stuff but more of spartan/athens nature. And form that point, upwards.
And we won't get a tech tree. It'll be called "Development lines".
My two cents: I wouldn't mind a few elements of steampunk here or there.
For example, I'd have no problem with a kind of steam engine. My idea of it would be:
Lots of research to get, expensive to build. It's a large structure able to be built only in the largest of cities. One of the very late-game intentionally debalancing things, it essentially allows you to equip armies and build/forge things very, very fast and a bit cheaper.
Beyond that, though, I'd say most of the rest just doesn't fit well enough. (I'd love to see some mods for stuff like that!)
I'd also like to see a few 'mini-techs'. Nothing complicated or powerful, but more like adding 'barbed arrows for +1 damage/-1 heal rate' or 'greased axles for +1 caravan speed'. Fast and cheap to research.
Will it just be a tech tree by another name, or will we actually have numerous "lines" of techs?
For those who might want an example of Steampunk, this is an excellent example:
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/03/16/jasper-morello-stunn.html
I think that was the joke. Changing or not changing names means a lot, even when it is effectivly the same as something else. Sometimes you want the same thing, but by a different name so it seems 'new and fresh' or other times you want something that is different, but should be called by its old name for nogistalia reasons (like having a mother brain rip-off in metroid prime 3 is stupid and they should not have done it. They should have just had it be the mother brain, because then nobody would have asked 'why' or anything and all plot holes would be filled by "because its the mother brain")
landisaurus wins.
Quite a while ago, I got a bit roughed-up for wanting people to stop using the phone "tech" when they talked about this game on account of my conviction that names are a big part of style/feel. I yield to the pragmatic side of the objection--it is just simpler to use modern language while brainstorming on a forum. But I still really do hope that the game UI never uses the string "tech."
On a related note, I wish I could find the post for a link, but I could just about swear that early on, the dev plan was to have "tech" be radically simpler than the magic side of the game. I still hope this is so, but, like Luckmann, I also hope to see plenty of interactions between magical knowledge and mundane knowledge.
For example, I don't want to see a multi-node branch for Roads. Maybe two basic road types, paved and unpaved, but no more. Road enhancements after paving should be via magic, not "technology." For me, much of this is about timescale as it relates to the core fantasy genre. A basic fantasy epic, even if it spans generations, does not emphasize mundane knowlede advances.
Perhaps more importantly, I think that 'keeping it simple' for the base game will build a strong foundation that could lead to a much stronger 'steampunk fantasy' component via an expansion pack. Stardock game devs have been doing mundane tech trees for a very long time. Magic is new schtick for them, so they should be allowed to put most of their attention on it, at least until the first expansion pack.
I think that when they say that there are two tech trees, I don't think they mean that the Magic Tree will have actual techs. I think that they just mean that spells will be researched seperately. Which makes total sense, now that I've thought of it.
My point is that you won't be seeing the "Construct Magic Forge" tech in the Magic Tech Tree. You'll be seeing it in the Mundane Tech Tree. I think the Magic Tech Tree will be confined to Fireball, Ice Age, Imbue Steamtank, Luckmann's Greater Bearomorph and such.
Pure speculation on my part. Just wanted to make that clear.
I so wish that game had more of an RPG in it.
Also, I absolutely love the idea of a steam-powered crossbow. What does it do? Does it shoot faster? Does the steampower retract the bow automaticly? Is it auto-fire? Does it propel the bolts with steam? I have no idea. I just want a crossbow with a steam engine on it!
I mean, if they were, the game would be completely unbalanced.
Hey, another Metroid fan! Do you happen to have GC2:TA? I'm in the process of making a Metroid mod for it...... and yeah, the Auroura Unit screwed up a lot of the backstory (and most of the "fronstory", too) that I had created for the mod and some other projects set in that universe.
I really don't see how the Aurora units messed up the plot personally. I took it as the Federation decided to make their own biological brain type entity to counter the Space Pirates' Mother Brain. What screwed MP3 up for me was Dark Samus had survived, you had to kill all the other cool Hunters they introduced, and they made the Space Pirates a bunch of push overs. Still a pretty good game though I would give it an 8.3 of 10.
Back on topic as I said earlier I would like technology to progress as stages of civilization where you start at Nomad and work your way up to basic Industrialization.
They didn't mess with the plot of the GAME so much as the fact that (according to the backstory) the Mother Brain was actually built by the Chozo, but then the Federation is not only able to duplicate their design but apparently make them both cheaper and better. That's why I personally always use the excuse that the Chozo versoin had atrophied over the years, and that the Federation got the tech from Samus' scans of the original brain.
In fact, the Chozo of Prime and Corruption look and act waaaay different fromk the Chozo of the other games. Soooooo much filling in the blanks on that......... I've actually done quite a lot of story-writing in the Metroid universe: can post if you atre interested.
Wow. I've derailed my own thread!
Hmm, I never recall reading that Mother Brain was created by the Chozo or that the Space Pirates stole her from the Chozo. Actually, according to Wiki's time line the series goes Metroid/Zero mission / Metroid Prime / Metroid Prime Hunters / Metroid Prime 2 Echos / Metroid Prime 3 Corruption / Metroid 2 / Super Metroid / Metroid Fusion. (edit) I must have lost my mind. My original analysis of the situation stands. Aurora units should be based off of the Federations encounter with Mother Brain on Zebes.
Back on topic: Yes regular technology vs magic research is very interesting........
Mother Brain existed in the original Metroid: Samus disabled it, then much later the Pirates were able to repair it (or maybe it repaired itself), and it reappeared in Super Metroid. The Aroura units appeared before it was "reborn", but not before it was first encountered by the Federation. I say it was created by the Chozo for two(or three, depending on how you look at it) reasons:
As for the tech tree: I also wonder if the technology and magic portions will be sepoerate "lines" within the tree, or if they will be intermeshed?
I agree with you 100%.
Karma for reading me mind.
Sammual
I don't want them building Aroura units, either!!
Hmm, you know I have to admit some type of magical equivalent to splitting the atom would be very interesting or perhaps refining some type of rare and unique metal. By this I don't mean the magical equivalent to a nuke but just the tension created by the cold war with the East vs West arms race. It would be cool if there was some technology that could be used as a deterrent against world war type situations and that other smaller less advanced countries would try to obtain so they could compete with the largest nations.
Yeah, I like the idea of power struggles to develop super-advanced spells. One thing that springs immediately to mind would be an instant city-razing spell....... or even long-range channeler kill spells.
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