So it’s a more flexible and subtle tech tree. Your military units and civilian technologies benefit from advancements, but you don’t get whole new classes (like steamship / train) until you support research in that direction.

Also, I figured it could lead to the possibility of space missions with only rocket tech (and no radio/television), since you could launch dangerous space missions in that manner with a higher change of failure.

Or just skip chemical rockets completely, and launch a nuclear rocket!

Of course, as your technology base develops, radio and similar technologies become much cheaper to develop anyway, so it becomes sort of redundant. But I suppose that the order of discoveries, and your research priority, could still matter.

One problem is that Civ military units needs to be more flexible. Instead of a machine gunner equalling 2/6/1, maybe you could have general infantry units that gain defensive bonuses once machine guns are developed.

I tracked back to your site from the comment you left on the G&M.

I’m an undergraduate history student at UWO, but I never knew you or your class existed! I really wish I had had the chance to take your class before I graduate in June. I would have really enjoyed redoing the Civ tech-tree.

Playing Civilization 1, asking questions like “what’s that unit? what’s that city? whats that civilization?” and then researching the answers is what got me hooked on history in the first place.

Keep up the good work!