Before I move on to the other diplomatic moves, would like to comment further on part 2a and also the issue of my gameplay suggestions.
On the Flagship Drengin Ascension.
“Lord Kona, we have received a transmission from the Humans. They would like to sell us two techs for cash. They are offering to sell the first tech, Stellar Cartography, for 50bcs…”
“Excellent. What is the value of the tech, Chief Advisor?”
“Lord Kona, we already know the locations of all yellow stars.”
“What is the VALUE of the tech, Senior Advisor?”
“100bcs, my Lord.”
“That’s a great deal. Accept it. What’s the second tech?”
“Galactic Domination Philosophy at 1,000bcs over 50 turns, my Lord.”
“What is the value of the tech?”
“My lord, that tech is useless.”
“Just TELL ME the VALUE of the tech, Junior Advisor!”
“It’s worth 100,000bcs, my Lord.”
“Wonderful. We do not have the funds now but I’m sure the Inter-Galactic Bank would be willing to give us a loan.”
“I will arrange the loan immediately, O great and wise one.”
This scenario illustrates an issue with a system where the AIs do not gauge the true utility of the trade received. Similarly, AIs fighting for their very lives would hardly be interested in High Density Metal at that moment. Obviously, it would be great if AIs could decide on the relative value of techs purchased based on how the techs would aid in their overall strategy rather than how good a deal they are getting based on the tech’s value. However, I’m not sure how this issue can be resolved without a revamp of the current diplomatic model.
Over the course of two Galciv blog articles, I have mentioned several suggestions that we can make to the gameplay. Thought I should clarify that I would like to see, if possible, for these suggestions to be made in varying weightage from Normal difficulty to Maso difficulty. If this gradual implementation over difficulties is not feasible, I would suggest that these be implemented at the Crippling and Maso levels, which I term as the Challenge levels.