I have one major design criticism in regards to the current format of the tech in this game. It is not all together clear as to "what" you are researching.



When I open up the tech tree I see roughly a hundred nodes and probably 3x that in spider like webbing.



As I hover over any given tech I am given a "witty" summary of the tech which gives me no idea as to the actual purpose of the tech. I have to zoom into the "tech" and read individually each tech to figure out what the heck I am getting in the tech.



and each time I am making a new tech choice I have to do the process all over again as I am trying to figure out the most valuable tech for me given my current situation.







What I would like to see under the witty "large scale" tech summary is green color text (to separate it out as important from the blue background) that says something like this.





+ Planet Improvement: dust

+ Planet type Colonization

+ Armor improvement

+ Diplomatic options



This would give in a very very brief way the benefits of that tech.



And then I can zoom into and see exactly its benefits like it is currently setup as after I figure out from the "high concept" if I want that tech.





What do you all think?

If I'm inclined to favor one area of research over another, I generally type a keyword, such as "dust" or "colonize", into the search box. That narrows it down nicely for me.

omg there is a search box???

Xervitus wrote:
omg there is a search box???

Bottom right of the research screen it says "search keyword" or something along those lines.

Duk wrote:
If I'm inclined to favor one area of research over another, I generally type a keyword, such as "dust" or "colonize", into the search box. That narrows it down nicely for me.

I get that, but that isn't exactly a streamlines process. What if, for example, I dont know what I want next? What do I then keyword search? and what if I misspell a word? Like Lazar instead of Laser?

Naisho wrote:
I get that, but that isn't exactly a streamlines process. What if, for example, I dont know what I want next? What do I then keyword search? and what if I misspell a word? Like Lazar instead of Laser?

Usually if something requires a certain tech or research first before it can be used/built. Hovering over it will tell you what it is. Then you know what it is called to search for it.

I actually just searched laser (per my example) and I was given 2 options both of which late game tech. It completely ignored the entire laser tech tree... I even had one I could research (in the laser tree) and it was completely ignored because it had a different name.



suffice it to say, the search engine is imprecise.

They've put a lot of work into good graphic tech icons, but there is still room for improvement in terms of graphical differentiation. I should be able to pick out certain type of techs without mousing over for a tooltip:



-System and planet improvements icons could be unqiue

-Combat card unlocks

-Approval improvements

-Ship modules in the Applied tree are hard to spot easily

This thread is the origin of discussions about making more clear what techs affect (FIDS, happiness, military etc.).

Other threads about this have been archived:

/#/endless-space/forum/29-archives/thread/13210-suggestion-polish-on-visabiliy-research-rewards

/#/endless-space/forum/29-archives/thread/13220-suggestion-secondary-tech-page



Feel free to post here about this topic here and inform yourself about the variations the threads listed above have already discussed, but don't open new suggestion threads for anything alike.

MT4K wrote:
Bottom right of the research screen it says "search keyword" or something along those lines.

I never even noticed that