Okay some RP unless yo have a another fitting request.
Okay so now that Civ VI and more important things aren't distracting me I've had the time to hammer out the math on a potential research revamp. Here's the form I whacked it into. I'm opening it it up for a brief option poll. Feel free to comment and vote in favor or against. Numbers may not be 100% final.
While other special characters may give you RP as a secondary benefit, the main source of RP is the research hero. A research hero spend the majority of their time in a quarter working in a lab to research, develop and test new tech.
Research heroes come in four types:
Unique heroes are ones like Revy. They generate large amounts of RP and often have other powerful abilities or benefits. Getting them in hard and usually involves following a plot line to it's conclusion and/or taking some big risks. You may never see another one in game depending on how events play out.
Genius heroes are rare but far more common then unique heroes. Conrad and Modin are good examples. Getting these heroes will require some work, may pose a risk or generate a penalty in addition to the work needed to recruit a normal hero (see below). They average around 16RP or so.
Normal heroes can be found by having PI's sapient resources department look for them. However recruiting them will require some direct effort on Revy's part. The SR department may be directed to look for hero with certain specialties. Revy can also help the SR department look for research hero in her spare time and may thus bypass the need for other recruitment action on her part. Gaver Dor is a good example and like him most will generate around 10RP.
Minor heroes only generate a small amount of RP (around 2) but require no special effort to recruit other than having the SR department look for them. Hwan is a good example.
An additional source of heroes is creating them via AI. An AI hero could potentially be of any of the above ranks. AI heroes however take time to develop, especially if you want them to be sane/reasonable/able to get along with people, and thus may grow more able over time. Be aware that trying to spam AI will cause the GM to eye-roll and creatively say no in some manner. Also be aware of all of the potential issues with AI.
Heroes may give additional benefits or have other abilities. Typically each hero will come with additional techs to research.
On a meta level I will be targeting the players getting around 7 normal heroes by the time ME1 rolls around (or about one hero per 5 quarters). This is not absolute and I may use different balances of the above types but I will be targeting numbers around that. It's entirely possible for the players to fall short of that. In addition some heroes maybe temporary.
Of course no person is an island. Support from a team, access to resources and labs all help a research heroes generate more RP. The RP listed is for the hero having access to some general lab facilities (or which PI has loads), not having them may add an "in a cave penalty". Enhancing a heroes RP involves the following steps:
Lab Personalization (1 quarter, 20 million cr, 1 million cr upkeep): The hero over the quarter customizes their lab getting specialized equipment, modifying their space, and adapting to the resources and culture of PI. An x8 multiplier is applied to the hero's RP. (Multiplier enhanced by research VI, Improved Intelligence Algorithms and Optical Computing)
Support Team Recruitment (2 quarters, 100 million cr, 5 million upkeep): The hero begins to recruit a support team of talented people to help them research. The lab is also upgraded and expanded to adjust for the new personnel. The multiplier is increased to x15. (Multiplier enhanced by ANI and High Pay. May be further improved by 1 by Multi-species Teams)
Expanded Lab and Support Team (3 quarters, 500 million cr, 25 million upkeep): Over the next few quarter the hero's team and lab are expanded to maximize the hero's RP output. In the end the multiplier is increased to x23. (Multiplier enhanced by research VI, Improved Intelligence Algorithms, Optical Computing, ANI and High Pay)
The end result for the current turn would look something like:
Revy: 35 General RP and 15 RP for Non-Hero techs
Conrad: 10 General RP and 6 RP for Non-Hero techs
Mordin: 10 General RP and 6 Biotech RP
Gaver: 5 General RP and 5 Mass Effect/Dark Energy RP
Hwan: 2 RP for Developing/improving pre-existing Mass Effect setting techs
For the sake of simplicity I'll assume that all upgrade levels other then the final one on Elysium are finished (estimated to finish when the current Lab IIIs would have). Though you'll have to pay the upkeep on them. Research teams and theoretical research will be folded into the new labs.
This totals to 2146 RP per turn, 1380 of which is general and 766 of which is specialized in some manner.
So questions? Comments? And if you care give me a Yea or Nay. Do note that numbers are not 100% final should someone point out some critical error. Anyway I'm off to work on the update and stuff.
[ ] Yea
[ ] Nay
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