Top Tech Tips for newbies?

[Zook (OP)]

(For da wiki) If you're new to the game, what are the most important techs to research in the beginning? Not a Top-100 list, just the stuff you need to get started, until you get the hang of it. My list would look something like this, in no particular order:

Higher construction rate
Power plants, to get better engine tech
Higher research rate
Higher mining rate
Engine Power +5/10/15% (faster engines, when fuel economy doesn't matter that much)
Missile reload rate (most important defense tech)
Small jump gate (the big ones require huge ships your shipyards probably couldn't handle)
Improved Command and Control (to build a Sector Command HQ)
Missile Engines, whenever you develop a new engine tech
EM Sensitivity (affects your Active Search Sensor range)

[ShadowLop]

Higher construction rate - Yes
Power plants, to get better engine tech - Yes, at least up to Ion asap
Higher research rate - Yes
Higher mining rate - Yes
Engine Power +5/10/15% - not really that important for newbies.
Missile reload rate - Yes
Small jump gate - Depends on if you find a nearby, safe system that you can connect you, that you need to exploit easily.
Improved Command and Control (to build a Sector Command HQ) - Yes
Missile Engines, whenever you develop a new engine tech - Yes
EM Sensitivity -Yes, but also grav strength, since Sensititivy increases it by a square root factor, while strength increases linearly (if I remember the equation correctly.
Also:
Shipyard construction rate
Fuel Efficiency tech
Jump engine efficiency
Missile warhead and manu tech if you're using missiles as primary armaments, otherwise you chosen beams + tracking speed, turret tech, reactor.
Armor and shield tech

As you can see, almost all tech is quite important, there isn't any real "top" tech. There is tech that will be useful no matter what though, which would be your mining/construction rates, anything improving engines, sensors and research rate. Everything else is useful but relatively situational.

[Redshirt]

Research rate. Absolutely mandatory. Think of it as investing in the future.

[Zook (OP)]

I was a assuming a peaceful start, with perhaps 30 years of little or no contact. You need as much exponential growth as you can get, and while I would research at least a few basic weapon techs during that time, developing and building a fully functional fleet is far too expensive IMO. It doesn't increase your safety much while sucking all the RP and BP out of your economy. You 'll end up scrapping most of the stuff by the time you have magneto engines, anyway.

[Erik L]

I was a assuming a peaceful start, with perhaps 30 years of little or no contact. You need as much exponential growth as you can get, and while I would research at least a few basic weapon techs during that time, developing and building a fully functional fleet is far too expensive IMO. It doesn't increase your safety much while sucking all the RP and BP out of your economy. You 'll end up scrapping most of the stuff by the time you have magneto engines, anyway.

How often do you get 30 years of peaceful start? If you are aggressively expanding and exploring, you will find NPRs. And most likely Precursors. Swarm is dicey on finding. And the Invaders, I turn them off.

It's much more satisfying to run the thin line of competent fleet, expansion, and economic growth.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

well, for one thing, having 'pre-knowledge' that you are relatively secure is kind of meta gamey. For another thing, it's not always correct. In my second game of Aurora I had an NPR on the other side of the first jump I went through, with 20000t ships and nuclear thermal engines. Heh.

And my current games usually feature more than one 'human' faction.  So constant military development is a must.

The thing to do for most essential tech is to identify your bottlenecks.  It's almost always wealth, construction rate, or mineral supply.  Assuming that minerals are actually available somewhere, that usually reduces it to being the first two... since you can always build more mines.  Wealth is the hardest to deal with since financial centers take a long term to provide return.

After that naturally it's engine tech. Engine tech is always core since it improves/make more efficient most everything that you do.

[Bouchart]

Research rate tech, engine tech, fuel efficiency tech, construction rate tech, mining tech and the tech for sector commands and a few miscellaneous Logistics techs are useful for the start.  You'll also need Economy+ tech to afford all the research you need to do.

Also I like the line of tech that reduces the costs of upgrading starports.  You'll want that before you expand them too much.

[Nathan_]

It depends on what you need, heres the RP per point of Engine power I did earlier though:

Code: [Select]

160  RP per P for NTE 1 -> 25 4000
533  RP per P for NPE 25 -> 40 8000
800  RP per P for ION 40 -> 60 16000
666.67 RP per P for ION+5 60 -> 63 2000
1333.33 RP per P for ION+10 63 -> 66 4000
1454.55 RP per P for MP+10 66 -> 88 32000
1500 RP per P for    MP+15 88 -> 92 6000
2500 RP per P for    MP+20 92 -> 96 10000
2666.67 RP per P for ICF+20 96 -> 120 64000
3000 RP per P for    ICF+25 120 -> 125 15000
4000 RP per P for    MCF+25 125 -> 156.25 125000
4000 RP per P for    MCF+30 156.25 -> 162.5 25000
4000 RP per P for    MCF+40 162.5 -> 175 50000
4898 RP per P for    NCF+40 175 -> 224 240000
6250 RP per P for    MCF+50 224 -> 232 100000
7058.82 RP per P for SCAM+50 232 -> 300 480000
13000 RP per P for GCAM+50 300 -> 375 975000
26666.67 RP per P for PCAM+50 375 -> 450 2000000
26666.67 RP per P for BCAM+50 450 -> 600 4000000
53333.33 RP per P for P+50 600 -> 750 8000000

Also its a good idea to only focus on one weaponsystem/firecontrol/sensor package early on. trying for more than one will leave you spread too thin researchwise.

[blue emu]

One point to keep in mind is that the Fuel Efficiency tech-line is much more vital in games where you are using Missiles as your primary ship-killer, since it extends their range (per liter of fuel).

[Theokrat]

Besides the big four: research rate, production rate, mining rate and engine power, I also have another early priority: The first one or two armour technologies, especially in a conventional start.

Armour is a component to all ships, and even civilian ships need to cover a large surface with armour (even if not very thickly). Conventional armour is terribly inefficient, to the degree that the single layer of conventional armour on civilian ships can add substantial weight, which slows down the entire design and necessitates more engines.

But in the end, as most respondents have already pointed out, tech decisions will be circumstantial. It depends on what scientists you have and what constraints you are facing. E.g. I often find myself short of Corundium, which is required to build mines. Since the very lack of this resource means I cant expand mining operations quickly through more mines, the mining tech becomes a priority.

So maybe it can be a bit easier to point out techs that can be safely ignored by newbies for a few years. Here are technologies I don’t bother with early on:

• Most non-missile weapons. Beam weapons have such a short range that they only really make sense when you can get close to the enemy for which you need to be faster than him. This is unlikely to occur against spoilers, and in a conventional start also against early NPRs. The two exceptions are jump-point defence ships which basically camp on the friendly side, and PD weapons. So early on its railguns and carronades, but nothing more.
• Cloaking & Shields. Yeah it’s fancy, but it takes quite a while to become worthwhile to actually employ in a ship. Better return to that when you generate enough RP so that the expense wont matter that much.
• All Biology Techs & Terraforming rate &Colonization Cost Reduction. Again nice tech lines, but hardly ones that are likely to make an early impact. Even if one starts terraforming early, a 20% increase in the terraforming rate is not that much, unless you already have a good number of installations running.
• And of course all techs of dubious value overall. E.g. laser size reduction, improved cargo handling, damage control, laser warheads, radiation warheads

[ShadowLop]

With my initial 120k RP, I always get research speed up to 400 RP per, plus get Ion engine tech, then get as much as possible for surveyor ships, freighter, miner, passenger, basic jump capability. Usually run out of starting RP by then.
With limited corundum, I prefer mining ships over mines. Each module costs less overall and though I pay for the ship and it takes longer, I spend less corundum per mining point.

[madmarcus]

How often do you get 30 years of peaceful start? If you are aggressively expanding and exploring, you will find NPRs.  And most likely Precursors.  Swarm is dicey on finding.  And the Invaders, I turn them off. 

It's much more satisfying to run the thin line of competent fleet, expansion, and economic growth.

I basically always get 30 years of peaceful start.  TN start with no Fast OOB.  Sometimes I'll allow myself a few big freighters but normally I force myself to build the shipyards first if I didn't start with them.  If Mars has reasonable minerals we have to expand there before leaving the system.  Otherwise we make a lot of automining colonies and generally don't leave Sol until everything that I want is being exploited.   

In my current game I'm at 11 systems visited after 60 years.  3 colonies outside of Sol (all now at zero colony cost) plus one colony being built.  No aliens seen although I have seen two alien jump gates which has inspired the creation of a small, rather pitiful military force.

More on topic - I would rank research, engines up to ion, and mining tech as the three big ones.  Construction is reasonably high also but since I do a slow start its not such a big deal if it takes a little longer to build something.  Because I hate the fiddly management of racial techs and refiting ships I generally rush to at least EM and Thermal sensors 11 and Active Grav Sensor 21 just so that when I make my first military its not going to be instantly outdated.

[madmarcus]

I'd also ignore any ground combat tech. There are some useful logistics tech but the rest of that path is fine to leave for much later.

[Erik L]

And of course all techs of dubious value overall. E.g. laser size reduction, improved cargo handling, damage control, laser warheads, radiation warheads

Actually Improved Cargo Handling is useful. Reduces the load/unload times for your freighters, cargo ships and troop transports. Damage control is also very useful for in-combat repairs, or repairs post-battle to get to a repair base. Laser size reduction, I'd only use this on fighters or maybe a PD design. Laser warheads are broke if I recall, and I've never built an increased rad warhead.

[jseah]

My standard TN start is something like this:

Research rate until I cannot afford it less 1TL (you can estimate as each level is 2x more expensive than the previous, more or less; so buy until you think the next level will be higher than remaining starting RP)
Construction rate until the same. 
Everything else into the engines line (shouldn't be more than 1 or 2 TLs)

Anything left over goes to sensors or misc. stuff. 

I also do not start with jumppoint theory unless I do not have a colonizable planet in the same system.