Alignment, Technology, and Trading
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Stardock Forums
Stardock Forums
This is in response to a post regarding the use of anathema technology in the "GalCiv: Altarian Prophecy NEW SHIPS" thread.
I don't see a problem with Neutral civilizations using material technologies of extreme alignment, especially since they aren't given a countervailing technology. Not wanting to use social technologies of extreme alignment is perfectly understandable. That is, non-evil civs should condemn and reject others' use of death furnaces to power factories, but condemning and rejecting superior material technology due to its moral origns is cold comfort to your armed forces. If an Evil tech uses life force (a la B5's Shadow ships) and is therefore rejected by non-evil civs, the current design philosophy means that only a Good civilization can counter with their own technology.
Perhaps enforcing trading limitations might solve the problem. Allow Good civs to trade for Good or Neutral techs, allow Evil civs to trade for Evil or Neutral techs, allow Neutral civs to trade for any tech. What's the reward for trading for techs you can't use? Add ships and techs that have both Good and Evil pre-requisites. That is, a Neutral civ that acquires "Evil Ship Tech A" and "Good Ship Tech A" automatically gains the ability to build "Neutral Ship A", a ship that pulls the Neutral civ even with others in the galactic arms race. A Neutral civ that acquires "Evil Soldiering Tech A" and "Good Soldiering Tech A" can now research "Neutral Soldiering Tech A".
This may make trade decisions tougher for Neutral civs, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
RSVP :notsure:
~SDC~
I don't see a problem with Neutral civilizations using material technologies of extreme alignment, especially since they aren't given a countervailing technology. Not wanting to use social technologies of extreme alignment is perfectly understandable. That is, non-evil civs should condemn and reject others' use of death furnaces to power factories, but condemning and rejecting superior material technology due to its moral origns is cold comfort to your armed forces. If an Evil tech uses life force (a la B5's Shadow ships) and is therefore rejected by non-evil civs, the current design philosophy means that only a Good civilization can counter with their own technology.
Perhaps enforcing trading limitations might solve the problem. Allow Good civs to trade for Good or Neutral techs, allow Evil civs to trade for Evil or Neutral techs, allow Neutral civs to trade for any tech. What's the reward for trading for techs you can't use? Add ships and techs that have both Good and Evil pre-requisites. That is, a Neutral civ that acquires "Evil Ship Tech A" and "Good Ship Tech A" automatically gains the ability to build "Neutral Ship A", a ship that pulls the Neutral civ even with others in the galactic arms race. A Neutral civ that acquires "Evil Soldiering Tech A" and "Good Soldiering Tech A" can now research "Neutral Soldiering Tech A".
This may make trade decisions tougher for Neutral civs, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
RSVP :notsure:
~SDC~