Tiered tech/combat system

[Kalistra]

As the game progresses the tech tree has just been added to and is now desperately in need of streamlining. Currently it is very intimidating to the new player who feels like it will take weeks to find techs they want and work their way to them. I propose the fog of war be removed and we group techs by relevancy. A player can only start with the beginer tech and must complete this page before moving to the wider tree. All basic tcs and several lv1 upgrades needed for the fledgling player to be ready for most maps beyond beginer will be here. A player can come to the tree, see exactly where to start and look forward with an eye towards planning without being intimidated or overwhelmed by too many options. 1 page for eastern units, 1 page for monestary, then primitives and so on. This way as the game grows with time, like techs can stay together and not be just randomly assigned an empty space in the scrapbook, lol.

Secondly I propose a 3 tier system in multiplayer based solely on a players progress through the tech tree. Obviously I feel miserable having researched the whole tree and having a new player join my game, no matter how easy and helpful I try to be, they have virtually no chance and so the fun is spoiled for us both.

Ive tried to think with an eye towards the new player because they are coming in all the time, and I want them to enjoy this game as much as I do. Imo it simply has no peers when it comes to strategy games.