Why does tech never get smaller? Every tech I can think of at some point has gotten better and smaller, just not here?

Guns - 100 years ago a machine gun had to be hauled by a team of horses. Now you can hide one that is 10x as powerful in your backpack

Engines - 100 years ago an engine the size of my garage produced less horsepower and torque than a standard pick up truck does now. 50 years ago it took a rocket the size of a skyscraper to put a satellite into space. Now a rocket a quarter that size does the job

Hull - 60 years ago battleships had armor that was 6-8 inches thick. Today a modern tank's armor is less than half that and twice as strong. A submarines skin is thinner and withstands pressures greater than though possible 40 years ago

Defense - 50 years ago a jet fighter had to have 4 computers the size of suitcases and a backseat driver to fly. Today they can almost fly by themselves with a computer the size of a toaster

Scanners - 20 years ago my friends dad had a police scanner that took up half his kitchen table, today you can buy one at Radio Shack that runs off AA batteries and fits in your pocket. Satellites are smaller and take better pictures, scan more of the energy in the universe too.

Cloak - The original spy planes had special paint and materials an inch thick but it barely worked. Modern cloak materials are made on the molecular level now and make things almsot invisible.

Jammers - 20 years ago they would outfit an entire airliner or a medium sized ship to act as a jammer. Now more effective technology is packed into a drone plane the size of a motorcyle.


I am not saying that tech should always get smaller with every research level. Just that it is ridiculous the tech here has NEVER gotten smaller with ANY research level.

I actually never thought about that. wow

That's a great idea for research. Miniaturization/upgrade research tree. Of course it would require a mission chain to unlock first (to give lower ranked player incentive to keep playing and a reward for higher ranked for the time and effort they've put in.) and then a difficult but not impossible boss battle (so when you do finish the mission chain the mission goes that it was too close of a battle and your ship needs to be upgraded to better prepare for future encounters [which could lead to a new race chain etc.]). From there each level of miniaturization would make a corresponding tree smaller (yet make the upkeep and initial buy a bit more expensive as newer technologies do come at a price).

level 1 (newer processes/materials make them smaller/thinner while keeping them as strong)
1.1 armor
1.2 weapons
1.3 defense
1.4 planetary structures (this one is for the higher lvled buildings to make them even more cost effective but only limited to the "basic" resource gathering structures)

level 2 (more efficient energy consumption/generation to squeeze out every last drop)
1.1 shields
1.2 sensors
1.3 stealth systems
1.4 advanced power systems

etc...(every odd level would focus on the "physical" type trees while the even levels would focus on "energy" type trees)
Another idea would be after finishing each level it would unlock a booster modules to increase the effectiveness of a particular part on the ship (this could bring out injector modules some players have been asking about).

honestly i think the way you can do this is when you research a new tech, it should take the max amount of decks it would normally take to equip it. For example:

Light Gun- 4 decks
Gun- 3 decks
Heavy Gun- 2 decks

that way the more 'advanced' it would get the less decks it would take up

How about we implement a shrink ray, everyone stand back while I test this on Kaos while he is inside his ship....


WooOOOOoooOOOoooOOoooOOOoooOOOoooOOOoo.........OMG I think it worked....


OH NO THE SPACE CATS ARE TAKING ADVANTAGE!!!!

I always thought of it as everything got smaller you packed more together. you might get a phaser the size of a pistol but a heavy phaser cannon will put a lot of kick!

The real answer to this question if anything is balance.

I'm fine with miniaturization, but the install cost and upkeep cost need to be proportionally higher.

Thats hilarous!

a midification to this could be:

* First you need to research an expensive tree, maybe start out at 1.000.000 RP for first level
* That unlocks an mission where you have to use some RP per click (lets say 100 rp per click and some 20e), around 20 clicks.
* each completion drops en minituration device that is used to enhance one item you select from it, costs 25% of module price AND (1000rp*miniaturize level). and can only be used once.

Research tree has 5 levels to max, and RP cost doubles each level so:
1, 2, 4, 8, 16 million RP to max it (31 million RP to max that tree)

Miniturazion device works as:
newDeckReq = (0.98^miniaturize level)
(I.E. 2% deck reduction per mini-level)

Wouldn't it be easier coding just to make a mission that gives more deck space? You could still describe it as miniaturization, just that you are fitting more in your ship.

I think it does make sense tech gets smaller, but not when you get a new better version. I.E, you can get an insane machine gun, but you switch to lasers, and suddenly they're 10 times more powerful, but 10 times bigger. So, while a more advanced tech device is smaller, the next version up is a lot larger. I think that makes sense.

The problem with things getting bigger is you need bigger ships. The bigger your ship the more the attack calculations are biased against you.

For example...

I research a gun that is 30% more powerful
I have to increase my decks by 40 to fit a few.
Because I increased my ship size, the game penalizes me when I am fighting smaller ships and ignores part of my attack power

In the end my 30% more powerful guns only count for 15%

Thats just an example but hopefully you guys can imagine how size would penalize you as you got bigger. Researching tech and having to get big to use it could actually hurt you in the long run.

I looked at your title and thought you'd hit on an idea I'd had a while back, I don't want smaller new techs, I want smaller OLD techs! I get that my new stuff should be bigger, but what if I'm just filling in space?

I want to be able to fit better small stuff into the space I have.

It'd require re-coding the items, but maybe change it so that your tech level increases your maximum Decks and the return each deck gives you. So I could sit with my 50 deck scanners, and they'll keep growing stronger, or I could upgrade to the 60 deck scanners that are 1.2x better, instead of the geometric growth we see now.


Sorry if this idea doesn't make any sense, it's 3:35 and it's kind of a hard concept to explain.

Absolutrly a good idea...fits the idea where tech gets smaller and more powrful as it advances. The only other thing I would add is higher tech is obviously more expensive...

+1

The "new" techs are giving you more of the bonus per deck than the old one's were, so technically they are getting smaller.

When I see them take up more space I also am in the mind to think that you are getting more then one. Yes the weapon itself is better and smaller, but that one image is just one of a battery of cannons you get.

But that is just me.

Heh. Dunno. A frigate was big for its time.. Vs Battleship was big for modern time "WW2 era" then now Carriers are big (bigger than battleships) for our current time.. Tech got better but ships had gotten bigger too.. We got missiles that are much bigger than frigate cannon. Tech is better but also got bigger.. We got battleship guns but much bigger than frigate guns..

It makes sense that planetary structure size needs to stay fixed or grows very very slowly due to finite size of the planet while ship size has no limit and it'll grow forever with no hard cap so it makes sense to force better tech with bigger size for the sake of game balance. Besides, we have NO way to reduce decksize anyway if the approach of better tech = smaller size gets implemented..

To be honest, I am perfectly satisfied with ship tech system but I wasn't satisfied with planetary tech system but Dan fixed that so I'm happy now..

Jon you have a very good point here that I've been thinking about for a long time but never posted it.
You're right , the further we go in tech the more efficient that tech gets so it gets condensed by microchips in turn would make our space used smaller.
I'd like to see this implemented in the near future.
Another common sense idea.