Research Questions

[redrum68]

I'm relatively new to the game but have played a bit and read through the manual and some posts here. It seems like the best strategy on research is to invest as many chits as you can afford into just the most important techs as each chit provides an average of 5% increase in research each turn. This would seem to indicate there is no benefit to spreading out your chits vs concentrating them in fewer important techs? If this is the case, why not have the research system have diminishing returns for multiple chits in the same category to encourage nations to spread their research out more? This would seem to provide more strategic options for research.

[mdsmall]

When I first started playing this game, I drew the same conclusion that you have: that it was much better to concentrate your chits on a few key technologies. That is certainly true at the start for the two key combat technologies that you will need as soon as possible: Trench Warfare and Artillery Weapons (with Gas/Shell Production a close third priority). However, the longer I play this game, the more useful I find the more specialized technologies and the more I am tempted to distribute my research chits more widely and wait for results. The downside of having more than one chit in a tech is that it is an inefficient use of MPPs: once you reach the maximum for that tech, you can only buy back surplus chits at 50% of their original cost. Thus it is more cost-effective to invest only one chit per tech which will be consumed when you reach the maximum, than to invest extra chits which will get you there faster but can only be redeemed at 50% of what they cost. Plus the hard research caps mean that if you have invested extra chits in one tech, even if you have the MPPs to spend, you will often have to wait till you achieve 100% in that tech before you have the "head room" to start investing a new tech.

It all boils down to how patient or impatient you are for a given technology - or to put in another way, how much you value time versus money to get a specific combat benefit. You might decide that you need to increase your Gas/Shell production as quickly as possible, so you invest three chits in that, while you are quite content to get Long Range Aircraft eventually, so you just invest one chit there. And of course your investment strategies are likely to differ for each major, and over time, depending in part on what your opponent seems to be doing. Much of the fascination of this game lies in the different time horizons you have to apply in making choices on how to use your MPPs each turn - e.g. what capability do you need to have in the next three turns? in the next six turns? by the middle of next year?

[redrum68]

Yeah, I realize later game because of max tech levels that may encourage to not put too many chits into a single tech to avoid having to refund a bunch back once you hit the final level but this is more of an argument for a kind of soft cap than truly spreading your chits out. Even for specialized techs I'd rather say put 2 chits into 1 specialized tech then 1 chit into 2.

I think the part that seems kind of unfortunate is you almost always want to max research trenches then artillery then infantry rather than seeing more variety and spreading your chits out. Something like each additional chit in the same tech provides one less than the previous one or that you loose all chits when the next tech level is researched would make things more interesting IMO.

[Elessar2]

ORIGINAL: redrum68

I'm relatively new to the game but have played a bit and read through the manual and some posts here. It seems like the best strategy on research is to invest as many chits as you can afford into just the most important techs as each chit provides an average of 5% increase in research each turn. This would seem to indicate there is no benefit to spreading out your chits vs concentrating them in fewer important techs? If this is the case, why not have the research system have diminishing returns for multiple chits in the same category to encourage nations to spread their research out more? This would seem to provide more strategic options for research.

That is precisely what I am doing in my mods for those exact reasons, a max of 2 or 3 chits per tech vs. 1 or 2, 3%/6%/(9%) vs. 5%/(10%). Alas you cannot adjust the percentage per chit invested, only the percentage per current level for ALL chits. [Something, note, that I myself was confused on at one point] It also allows you to invest just one chit (@ the lower level of 3%) when you don't want to completely let a tech languish w/ zero progression. [As mdsmall indicated]

In earlier versions of SC you could indeed invest up to 5 chits per tech, giving you tons of flexibility-at some point that was changed. But as said that might mean a lot of wasted MPPs after the final level is reached. We need an editor toggle to wipe ALL chits off the board upon an advancement.

[Bavre]

ORIGINAL: redrum68

I'm relatively new to the game but have played a bit and read through the manual and some posts here. It seems like the best strategy on research is to invest as many chits as you can afford into just the most important techs as each chit provides an average of 5% increase in research each turn. This would seem to indicate there is no benefit to spreading out your chits vs concentrating them in fewer important techs? If this is the case, why not have the research system have diminishing returns for multiple chits in the same category to encourage nations to spread their research out more? This would seem to provide more strategic options for research.

Actually it's even way more biased towards concentrated research! Since each tech increase consumes 1 invested chit, each additionally invested chit gets more valuable:
Chit 1 gives 5% till tech 1. Chit 2 gives 5% all the way till tech 2, i. e. he gives bottom line DOUBLE the research than chit 1. Chit 3 gives triple, chit 4 quadruple etc.
Another way of looking at it:
Invest 4 chits, but one after the other after each tech has been achieved: 5% 5% 5% 5%
Immediately invest 4 chits: 20% 15% 10% 5%

Plus, as already mentioned by the others, some techs are vastly more powerful then others and you just need them asap. Having to refund a chit at 50% after your artillery research is done is imho a laughable nonissue compared to having the better cannons 10 turns earlier.

[redrum68]

Maybe the best current solution then if you can't adjust percentage per additional chit or wipe all chits upon completing a tech level is just increase costs of each level more. So that say each tech level costs 50% more (level 1 costs 100%, level 2 costs 150%, level 3 costs 200%, etc). This way you at least get more value for chits researching lower levels of each tech rather than just throwing them all at the most important techs.

[Elessar2]

No matter what some more research flexibility in the editor would be appreciated (hint hint)...[8D]