Hello,

Returning to the game for the expansion, I noticed that the Scientist cultures must research extra tech to get their stars. This flows well in the early ages, it gave me an incentive to get ahead in tech as the Greek and then transition into a different affinity. Then I decided to pick the French (Industrial Scientist culture) to refresh my tech bonuses, and ran into a wall.

I began the age with 45 techs, I needed 55 techs for bronze star and 65 for silver star. I've reached Contemporary tech before the silver star, and if the pattern holds at 75 for gold (edit: it's 74), it looks like I will have to research ~15 Contemporary techs to get gold. 

Here is a quick calculation: I've boosted research to the point that I'm at 2 turns/tech. Even going at this rate from the start of the era, that's 60 turns to get gold, which is one *fifth* of the turn limit.

What apparently happens is that Contemporary era has a lot of techs, so the same proportion of techs over two eras is much more difficult to get than in previous era. Unfortunaltely, these techs also are much more expensive than their predecessors. I think I will actually get the gold builder star from building research quarters before I get the gold scientist star - that's with science infrastructure.

Although I'm not a good player, I'm pretty sure this is too much. I would have completed Industrial tech (and thus the gold star) long ago as a non-science culture.