I had that idea a few years back. Check out this old post about tech trade; WWW Link . It has a lot of great ideas for new tech trade options. I'd like to see some in the new expansion.

A No Technology Brokering option would definitely be my favorite option.

That sounds like a fantastic compromise, and it would certainly make me more inclined to trade techs... I wouldn't have to worry about the technology making its rounds and finding itself in the hands of my enemies.

I'm no programmer, but that sounds like a horrid nightmare to program. Even worse to play with - why should I have to keep track of whether I personally researched a tech or traded for it? Perhaps putting a time limit or something - you can't trade a tech you traded for until after a 10 turn delay or something. Maybe also include that you must have all prereqs for a tech before it becomes tradeable.

My suggestion for racial techs was probably more feasable - a race should not be allowed to trade a tech they can't research. I can buy anyone's tech, but I can only sell those techs appearing on my race's tech tree.

This would be great IMO. I believe the majority of my games would go from no tech trading to no brokering.

I can't see that it would be hard at all. When you research a tech, the game can put it in a list. When you go to trade techs, it consults the list and only those techs can show up in the trade screen.

Definitely! Correct me if I'm wrong, Stardock, but I envision a system like this, that is easy:

We already know that SD can dub techs 'not-tradeable', as in many racial techs. But... could there not just be another variable... researched or not--that can toggle 'non-tradeable' on or off?

Then again, I'm not sure how the game knows what you research. It may just classify techs as 'have' and 'don't have'.

So please correct me if I am wrong, SD.

It's been a long time since I programmed anything (and I was never that great at it anyway) but when you finsih researching a tech the game has to trigger several events such as marking that tech as researched, displaying the tech description, enabling whatever new abilities the tech unlocks, etc. Adding the tech to a list of those you've researched yourself wouldn't be hard, and since the game already has the ability to mark techs as tradeable or not, it would seem that the basic framework for the No Tech Brokering Option would be in place already.

In fact, if I were designing it I'd probably have not tradeable as the default state in a no tech-brokering game, then it would be quite simple to determine tradeable techs by looking at each race's list of self-researched techs. A simple check would keep non-tradeable race-specific techs off the list.

TA could indeed benefit from such a "limited" span in tradeable techs (or even more items, yup... Cash may come to mind, too!).

One might also figure that IF the complexity in coding the gizmo outweighs the overall perception players get from examining all the new differences and starting to juggle with the creepy feeling that any true value(s) (estimates, btw) isn't nearly only in the tech-tag-name but certainly in the "importance" AIs give to it.
The brokering effect prevents a wide-spread leveling of research edges while maintaining uniqueness - for a reason; the advantages remain effective.

There's another aspect, players should consider about each gameplay technology race to the wire. Which consequences create too much unbalancing conditions and more importantly, for how long... at near victory status or for the entire game from first discovery made by anybody?

It always boggled me that most of my strengths don't exactly last enough to really exploit. With Brokering at least i'd have some kind of control on the essentials i decide to focus on. As does anyone else which makes it even more interesting. Now, comes better spying options - outch, counteracting the purpose.

One more thing -- Linear actually ASK for a steady path and rapid growth; with brokering you'd alter this "impression" to some degree. Just imagine too, the micman of general knowledge involved. Experienced players won't bulged at that power but i fear new gamers might get stuck in numerous tech-nodes while being outpaced by the lucky givers of un_brokered key-alternates to others. Though, the street has two lanes. The trick would then be to NOT fall behind active traders since you have the choice to go straight North never looking back. Check the back-mirror, buddy. Someone out there is still releasing science (that you locked, uselessly!) like candies for more speed, weaponry & top-notch buildings.
See, where the new sort-of trap is.

I'd test the function just for kicks. Optional if i hate it.

- Zyxpsilon.

You wouldn't have to keep track of anything, Willy.

Techs you haven't researched yourself simply shouldn't show up in your Tradeble Tech List.


Well, if you use "No Tech Brokering", you automatically get "No trading other race's special techs" as well.
Since you can't research other races' Special Techs, you can't trade them away either - should you get knowledge of one.

Glad to see I'm not the only one who would like to have this option.
Personally, and from the CIV4 experience I have with this option, I'd say it would give Galciv2's play a tremendous boost.
Gone would be the days where you sell 1 Race a Tech, only to find out that next turn, everybody in the galaxy has the Tech you just sold ....

So, is there any chance Stardock
A- notices this request
B- gives it some thought
C- implements it ?

Of course I would have to keep track of it - like everyone else, I use tech trading as an intelligence tool to see how far other civs have advanced. If this option is on, it would be harder to tell if the AIs haven't researched something yet, or if I stole it (I almost never buy tech) and just can't trade it to them.

I haven't had the same problem with techs getting passed around that much, mainly due to my trading pattern. If I trade a tech, I sell it to EVERYONE I have contact with. Sure, maybe a minor or two I haven't found yet will buy it from someone else, but me selling it to as many people as possible all at the same time prevents others from brokering my tech. Since I talk to everyone on the same turn, the diplomacy timer runs out for everyone on the same turn, and I repeat the process with whatever I've researched between sessions.

For the last part:

A: Almost certainly someone will see this.

B: Almost certainly they will kick it around the office some (assuming they haven't already)

C: Certainly not in the first TA release. TA is feature-frozen at this point, so that Stardock can refine and finalize the features currently in the betas or already slated for following ones (AI upgrades, editors, etc). There is a pretty good possibility of something like this being in a later TA upgrade or, more likely, in version 2.0.

Well then, don't check the option.

As previously stated, tech brokering is not really a huge concern of mine. The only time I notice it is when I'm doing it   

Lately, I've been playing with tech trading off. Again, brokering isn't an issue.

The point is, if this option is included I will eventually try playing with it, and so would like to see it implemented the best way possible. Very likely I am wrong in my opinions about how it should work, and I'm fine with that. I just want to make sure all angles are examined, all ideas explored, and the ones that seem worthwhile are torn apart bit by bit to make sure they don't have hidden pitfalls.

The only part I'm really interested in is controlling tech brokering for race-specific techs. If I'm playing as the Arceans, I may want to sell weather control tech to my allies, but I wouldn't want them selling it to someone else afterward.