Check Enslaved to the Past trait and AdMech faction.
You can increase the cost of all researches at once per faction.

so for adeptus they do have a unique faction trait that makes all research 110% normal, and I see how I could add and alter it for other races. Thanks for the info, if I want to scalar it further I can try there... it turns out not many features/buildings give research points or %s, so ive also already dropped them all down and am trying the slower progression out atm.

Originally posted by brainless:

. it turns out not many features/buildings give research points or %s, so ive also already dropped them all down and am trying the slower progression out atm.

I wouldn't alter buildings/outposts. It's not maintainable, and it alters balance between buildings (e.g an Aedanthropum at 2 research is very much less interesting than a Brood Nest at 4 biomass) as well as impact on some flat bonus research (e.g +2 research on outposts from AdMech).

Possibly, though I was looking at it as adding value to research buildings. So for instance every race has an HQ giving 6 to research, per city, which for extreme testing now ive simply nuked to +1; cant just spam cities for research this way. Tangentially, if every building gave the same value before and now just give the same fraction it isnt so much of an imbalance than it is being a scalar like "pace" for research only (for odd buildings that gave minor research e.g., +2 on a war factory etc, those were lessened too).

I looked into the adeptus trait more, its not a flat rate exactly, its an additional 10% cost for each new research, which on one hand is great at increasing costs thereby delaying techs, although it can also further incentivize tech rushing because +10% of higher tech is more than +10% of lower tech. For instance, 10% of tier 1 is like 3.6 (if 36) whereas 10% of tier 10 is significantly greater. So with adeptus trait it would be inefficient to get numerous lower techs because later techs would then cost many 100s (perhaps 1000s) more than if they were just researched first. Even so, a small % might influence choices between being well rounded over rushing for something end tech.

all that is to say that the adeptus trait is a good thing to manipulate but it cannot be used in the way that nerfing research income was via features and buildings, probably because loyalty excessively exacerbates incomes. At 6 default, 2 cities is 24ish, whereas for my current game only 4ish. At the same time, 1 city with a research builidng for me now gives more research than 2 cities without research buildings. Technically it is a balance change, but I am seeing it positively as adding value to distinctions in choices: wide/tall, research investment over unit production etc. Derivatively, certain factions absolutely get new cities earlier than others, and with hqs being as they are, it unfairly benefits their research gain.

As it is default game mode, I dont see the point in ever building research, even setting myself at -15 I was getting new techs faster than I could make a single unit from the new buildings e.g., 10 turns left building a commissar and tech for tank commander is already done.

Originally posted by brainless:

its an additional 10% cost for each new research,

Fairly sure you're wrong.
You're sure you're not confused with the increase to research cost common to all factions?

No, go pump up the pace to see the numbers being added and compare it to what is added to adeptus (at the same pace). What I am saying is that the adeptus trait affects the new amount added to research per research completed (that happens for every race). So, at a low percent (like default 10%) it does not seem so bad, but increasing that trait very high starts to make research costs explode in higher techs, and again equal % gains in tech tiers per new research makes sense to rush later techs because the same % gain for every new tech learned means later techs can cost 1000s more if many early techs are researched first whereas coming back to early research after rushing end techs is significantly cheaper. <---- this is already a problem in default game, using adeptus trait amplifies it, noticeably.

You could make the tech tree more interesting by adding more requirements. (So no baneblade if you never discovered extra vehicle armor for example or no leman russ if you didn't figured out how to build a chimera)

You have to add a couple of new/extra techs but then suddenly it becomes all a lot more interesting (if you do it right). Well may be not for the fast PVP play on the internet but I'm not after playing on the internet so there is logic in it.

At least that’s how I do it. But on the other hand it's quite strange why the xml doesn't contain a cost per tech. And so get a little control over the tech pace. But modding for Gladius means almost alway's you can skip plan A. B is good enough. C too otherwise you end up with nothing.

that is an interesting idea for helping to make the other condition I was trying for: say 3 instead of 2 to go to next tier. Ill have to try that later when I have a better understanding of every factions tech/play/balance.

What i notice from techs that require multiple prior techs is that it is just listed as any of those techs, NOT as all techs (you could look at how Dozer-Blade is setup for instance). So, unless there is a way for the game to check an AND condition instead of ANY (or), there is a limitation on the amount of prereq pathways that can be made

on the other hand, you could do an infantry chain and a vehicle chain as you mention though, for example, which is probably good enough. to fit your example, the way its presented it seems as though you could do: baneblade needs extra vehicle armor, extra vehicle armor needs leman etc.

but, yeah, too many tech prereqs would sort of undermine the point of have choices in research tiers (and remove game-to-game variation), so only adding a few extra prereqs would be for the best, probably.

Sorry for necro'ing this thread, but did you ever find a way to cleanly increase the number of techs required to access the next research tier? That is exactly what I'm looking for