PON dev diary #10: Research system [INDENT] Inventions, Theories and Technologies
The research system in Pride of Nations has some peculiarities… We wanted it to emulate what happened in the real world of the Victorian era. This meant for us that most of the areas of research (almost all in fact) are not driven by the state, but either by individuals, prodigious inventors, master theorists or by a test and try approach, in the industrial world or in warfare.
So we designed from the ground up a system for that. We split research into two kinds, theoretical research and applied research. To progress in an area of applied research, the theory must be known. Nothing much new under the sun you might say. Indeed… except for how the progress is done. The system indicates what can make research progress, according to several dozens of parameters.
Much research will benefit spontaneously from ‘tech diffusion’ for example. This means that as a research area (theoretical or applied) is mastered, then other countries can also learn the basic principle, because there are always ‘leaks’. For a theory this can be because of books, publications on the subject, or even perhaps public university conferences. This automated spread can all be parameterized for each theory, i.e. it will spread a bit faster if there is a friendly country who has mastered the theory. For applied research, the conditions are even more important, because for example industrial or military technologies were jealously protected from the scrutiny of other countries. As such, your progress here will be tremendously slow if only an unfriendly country masters a technology (say a new way of making guns). On the contrary, if an ally possesses it, then progress will be faster.
But then, perhaps you believe there is a chicken and egg dilemma here. If nobody knows about a theory (or applied research) how can it progress if you never get a bonus from others countries, thanks to ‘tech spread’? This is where another aspect of the system kicks-in, and it is rather imaginative, compared to what can be found in other equivalent strategy games, while being at the same time very obvious to players: research will progress if your country has an adequate existing infrastructure in related areas. Two examples will shed some light. Most naval technologies will progress at a good pace, if you have big harbors and naval bases. Developing a new method to extract iron faster and from deeper veins will progress much faster if you have iron mines in existence. Because there is no better way than experience to make progress in a research, period. And thus, Great-Britain with her huge navy and facilities would indeed be a likely candidate as the country able to develop new Naval Doctrines or technologies.
For military technologies (or even doctrines), you can tremendously boost your research speed by owning the right units, or experimenting on the field of battle. The simple fact (yet not so easy to achieve) that your navy is made of battleships will help you develop new technologies around them. Even better, should you engage them in battle; the research system will record this fact and will give you another boost for any related technology!
But we know that players like to also have a direct impact on their country. The system works well to simulate how research was conducted historically, but Pride of Nations remains a game, so we have provided a tool for the player. It is possible, for each research area, to give a boost to the speed of progress by investing State Funds into it. The system is more plausible than historical grognards may imagine, because this happened historically, perhaps not to the extent we are allowing in PON, but still. Many private companies got contracts from the state to build guns, ships and others military devices. As such, this helped these companies to fund research and develop improved equipment.
In any case, the Research System in PON is not just about dumping massive amounts of money into a technology to get it. You’ll have to work uphill from that, in a very natural way. If you want to develop a more efficient railroad system, then you better have an existing rail network in place that will act as a testing ground for your ideas! [/INDENT]
. This seems to be The Game.
