Reasearch Idea

[Bruce70]

There was a recent thread about research being a little quick. I am only partway through my first full game and I am not sure myself whether or not this is so, but I had an idea to slow it down a little anyway.

If you have 5 points invested in a particular research area and you get an advance perhaps the number of points you have invested should reduce by 1. So if you only have 1 point invested then after you get the advance, research in that area would stop completely. This would mean that you would have to invest more in research but only when you actually get an advance. This could be thought of as simulating the cost of implementing the new tech.

Oviously this would have to be play tested to determine whether or not the cost of research points would need to be reduced or not so maybe its best left for SC2.

[Guest Mike]

Nah - it doesn't work - it's still possible to get 4 advances in 4 weeks(game time) and that's the main problem IMO.

[husky65]

Originally posted by Mike:

Nah - it doesn't work - it's still possible to get 4 advances in 4 weeks(game time) and that's the main problem IMO.

Possible, but extremely unlikely.

[Guest Mike]

25% x 20% x 15% x 10% under rhis proposal = 0.075%

But 5% chance of getting the first 2 on suvvessive turns, and even that is too much.

IMO there should be no chance of getting increases in subsequent turns!!

[Welshwill]

I think a limit should be placed on Tanks & Jets, maybe restricted by date. It seem crazy having L5 jets in 1941 and it also gives an unfair advantage. My suggestion for jets would be L1/2 between 39 & 41, L3/4 between 41 & 43 and L5 after 43. I think this would follow the historical trend.

Will

[USGrant]

I think this is mostly a problem when one is playing the Axis. Upon conquering the historical early-war losers, the best strategy is to put most or all of the plunder into research. The Germans then have between 5 and 10 research points and can sequentially place 5 points in industry, jets, and then tanks.

I ran some simple statistics to calculate the chances of getting a single advance over time (I didn't look at multiple advances, I would have to get out some old textbooks to remember how to do that). The chances of getting a single advance at 6, 13, and 26 turns (~1/2, one, and two years) are:

1 Research Points - 26.5%/48.7%/73.6%

2 Research Points - 46.9%/74.8%/93.5%

3 Research Points - 62.3%/87.9%/98.5%

4 Research Points - 73.8%/94.5%/99.7%

5 Research Points - 82.2%/97.6%/99.9%

So with 4 or 5 research points, one can be pretty confident of getting at least one advance every 6 months (with potential for more than one). Four points essentially guarantees a minimum of one advance per year, with pretty high odds for multiple advances.

As such, I have been suggesting limiting the maximum number of points in an area to three or four, instead of five. A 25% chance per turn is just over the top, in my opinion. Hubert could implement this simple fix with little effort and no fundamental changes to the playtested system. I think limiting points to 4 per category will slow some of the "unrealistic" German advances while still allowing the Allies to play catch-up later in the game.

In response to folks dislike the possibility of two advances in a row, I don't really have a problem with that. I think the jump from a Pzkw IV to a Tiger or Panther could easily be represented by 2 "levels" and the same for the improvement from a Thunderbolt to a Mustang or a BT-7 to T-34.

[ August 17, 2002, 01:38 PM: Message edited by: USGrant ]

[Welshwill]

I'm currently playing a PBEM in which my opponent has had maximum allocation in Ind Tech, for the Italians, we are now in late 1943 and he hasn't had one advancement! Not that I mind.

Will

[husky65]

Originally posted by Welshwill:

I think a limit should be placed on Tanks & Jets, maybe restricted by date. It seem crazy having L5 jets in 1941 and it also gives an unfair advantage. My suggestion for jets would be L1/2 between 39 & 41, L3/4 between 41 & 43 and L5 after 43. I think this would follow the historical trend.

Will

I lean the other way, have all research points be in a field be 'expended' when a level is gained, ie if I commit 1 point to researching tanks and I get an advance, I lose the point - if I commit 5 points to researching tanks and I get an advance, I lose all 5 of the points, it makes loading up a tech for fast research EXPENSIVE.

[Bruce70]

Originally posted by USGrant:

I think this is mostly a problem when one is playing the Axis.

I do not agree. I recently invested 1 point in Jets as the Brits early in the war. I got 2 advances in successive turns and had level 5 by the end of 41. Sure I got lucky, but should it even have been possible. With the system I suggested above it would not have happened.

I tend to agree with Mike that it simply shouldn't be possible to get an advance in 1 turn. IRL even if an advance came quickly there would still be time required to implement that advance. But I don't think we can or should expect more than a quick fix for SC1 and I can live with it as is.

For SC2 I would like to see research tied to experience. So that if you are using lots of tanks (for example) then tank research will come more quickly.

[husky65]

Originally posted by Bruce70:

[QB] I recently invested 1 point in Jets as the Brits early in the war. I got 2 advances in successive turns and had level 5 by the end of 41. Sure I got lucky, but should it even have been possible. With the system I suggested above it would not have happened.

I tend to agree with Mike that it simply shouldn't be possible to get an advance in 1 turn. IRL even if an advance came quickly there would still be time required to implement that advance. But I don't think we can or should expect more than a quick fix for SC1 and I can live with it as is.

[QB]

This gives me an idea, why not upgrade units every second advance.

Get Tank tech 1 and my units do not improve, when I get Tank tech 2 my units upgrade and can go up to strength point 11, Tank tech 3 nothing, Tank tech 4 they can go up to 12 strength points.

In this example you could look at Tech 1 (all odd numbers) as being the theoretical/design work and Tech 2 (all even numbers) as being the implementation, production and getting the kit into the troops hands.

If there is a fundemental programming reason why the research is hard to change from being a 5 step research ladder, then it should be just a matter of changing the 'payoff' of research into a 0.5 increment rather than a 1.0.

Opinions?

[DevilDog]

I think you are all beating a dead horse. The current system works fine as is.

[John DiFool]

If there was some >simple< way to put a brake on

tech growth {so that we aren't seeing jets by

1941}, I'd be in favor of it.

That aside, say you have 5 points. Do you then

put them all into one area, or scatter them

among several {or 5 different ones}? This is a

purely theoretical question {i.e. we all would put

them into Ind. Tech early on}...

John DiFool

[USGrant]

Originally posted by John DiFool:

If there was some >simple< way to put a brake on

tech growth {so that we aren't seeing jets by

1941}, I'd be in favor of it.

John DiFool

I agree, that's why I suggested simply lowering the limit per category to 4 or 3 instead of 5.

[Bruce70]

Originally posted by John DiFool:

That aside, say you have 5 points. Do you then

put them all into one area, or scatter them

among several {or 5 different ones}? This is a

purely theoretical question {i.e. we all would put

them into Ind. Tech early on}...

John DiFool

If you invest 5 pts in one research area then there is a 25% chance of getting an advance each turn. If you split them up over 5 areas then there is a 77.4% chance of getting NO advances, a 20.4% chance of getting 1 advance, a 2% chance of getting 2.1% advances, 0.1% chance of getting 3 advances and a very minimal chance of getting more.

So the overall return for the split strategy is 20.4x1 + 2.1x2 + 0.1x3 = 24.9%. I'm guessing if you added the chances for 4 or 5 advances it would come out to exactly 25%.

My strategy is to invest in several areas early on and when I get an advance in one area I then shift most of my research to that and change my strategy to suit that tech.

[ August 18, 2002, 08:53 PM: Message edited by: Bruce70 ]

[Guest Mike]

Originally posted by DevilDog:

The current system works fine as is.

Yes it works - so does tossing a coin to see who wins.

It's not about it working, it's about trying to make things a little more "historical".

Hence discussions about whether there should be a port at Istanbul, or a Russian black sea fleet (bletch!!), etc.

This fits into the same category.