Aeson
Posts: 784
Joined: 8/30/2013
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quote:
Why would I turn this off
Because you can make an incredible amount of money selling technologies to the computer factions, and some players feel that this is abusive to the point of making the game significantly less challenging and enjoyable. Combine that feeling of less challenging or less enjoyable with the lack of ability that some people have to prevent themselves from playing in an 'optimal' way despite said 'optimal' way being less fun for them, and you should understand why some recommend that you disable tech trading.
quote:
Should I have tech trading on or off
Do you like:
- Being able to help a computer faction out technologically?
- Being able to sell technology to supplement your current tax income or cover a temporary deficit?
- Being able to purchase technologies you do not have from a more advanced neighbor?
Do you feel that:
- Raking in millions of credits per game year by selling minor technologies to your competitors is abusive?
- Bankrupting your opponents by offering them 'deals' on technology is abusive?
- You will not be able to prevent yourself from abusing the above to replace taxation and other standard methods of income or attacks despite feeling this is less fun?
- The benefits of being able to trade for computer-held technologies does not offset the issues caused by the abuses?
Answer those questions, and you may find the answer to your question. I cannot answer them for you, and these are probably not the only questions you should ask, but it's a start for thinking about whether or not you want to include tech trading.
quote:
Am I also shutting this off for the AI?
Probably, though the computer only sells technologies to people that it thinks that it likes a lot (something like 30 or 50 in positive relations modifiers), and tends not to sell technology after technology after technology to the player. A human player might speak to each faction every few months trying to sell any technology they can for as much money as they can get; the computer will not do that, as far as I can tell.
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Does this handicap the AI, or is the AI not good at this, and so turning it off makes for a more even playing field?
What do you mean by 'more even playing field?' How are you using tech trades? Are you handling them in a manner similar to how the computer handles it, making occasional deals for several hundred thousand or a few million credits or trading your technologies for their technologies with a bit of money swapping hands to balance the deal, or are you a door-to-door tech broker, selling any technology you can get your hands on to as many computer factions as you can for as much of their money as possible? Are you using items of questionable value, like that abandoned space port you found in an asteroid field that now stands in the computer faction's territory and has a list price of ~1 million credits, to purchase their technologies and then turning around and selling those technologies for millions of real credits to all the other computer factions in the game that don't already have them? Are you spending millions of your credits to buy a technology and then making tens of millions selling that technology to the other computer factions? Or are you keeping things reasonable and trading your technologies for their technologies, occasionally buying their technologies with money and maybe selling a technology to a close friend if it'd help them or you need a bit of money to cover a short-term deficit? If you're doing this last, then you're not abusing technology sales (much), and probably aren't gaining any significant advantage over the computer factions (you might be, though, if you have lots of friends and therefore can trade techs with lots of people, and the few factions you don't like don't have anything like this kind of friend network). If you're doing the earlier things, then you're abusing the technology sales, and probably causing the computer factions a significant amount of economic trouble as they blow through their treasuries paying for the technologies you're offering them, potentially crippling their treasuries while boosting your own astronomically.
Tech trading is one of those things where it might be helpful to leave the advisor on, or even give the advisor control, just to keep you 'honest.' The computer isn't going to suggest that you sell techs to people that the computer thinks that your faction shouldn't like, and as importantly, it's not going to suggest that you sell lots of technologies to lots of factions at a rate that allows you to use technology sales to replace your regular income (for the most part, though one tech selling for a million credits or some such thing can be a considerable boost to the treasury even so) and it's not intentionally going to suggest that you sell technologies in a way that consistently bankrupts your opponents.
quote:
I understand the mechanics (I think), but what is the actuall impact on game play?
Tech trading in theory accelerates the overall technological progress of the galaxy and allows factions that are friendly with one another to further build up that relationship and aid one another in ways which are not necessarily directly related to the economy or the military. It theoretically keeps the technological levels of the various factions within the galaxy relatively close to one another. In practice, there is little control over how the human player can trade technologies, and as a result there is a lot of opportunity for the human player to break things while making millions off of selling technologies which are not directly militarily important - i.e. selling improved fuel cells or command centers or cargo bays to other factions while preserving your lead in torpedoes, and perhaps shrinking their lead in some other militarily-important technology. It's also not clear how much tech trading goes on between the computer factions, as this is not something that the player can easily observe, and so it's a bit difficult to tell if the theory holds in practice even when the human player isn't abusing the system.
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Tech trade or not to tech trade, another noob question. - 
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