Research

Research refers to the discovery of technological advancements in the Townforge network.

A predefined list of tech, difficulty, dependency tree and their specific effects exist upon launch. New tech is discovered by investing money, and the larger the invested amount of gold in comparison with the target the higher the change of discovery. This is a one time attempt, and if the random chance fails, the gold is lost. With a successful attempt, the player is given 10 copies of an exclusive patent to that discovered tech. Everybody with a copy of such a patent gains its corresponding tech's advantages. Patents can be sold on the player markets like any other items. After a fixed time period (in terms of a block count) the patents expire and the tech becomes globally available to all players.

Examples of tech advantages include:

- Increased amount of shared generated by a specific building type

- Increased yield for food in farming or hunting

- Decreased building decay or increased yield in redeemed building materials upon lot demolition

- Prevention against disasters (earthquake, vermin, ...)

- Access to increased Economical Power buildings

- Prerequirement techs that open access to other downstream technologies

Example of technology research;

Top: Some tech are locked (greyed), discovered by others (cyan), or possible to research (in white). A larger sum of gold in comparison with the target gold yields a higher change of discovering the tech after investing in it.

Middle: Upon investing money to researching tech, the consensus network determines whether the player is able to research it. Upon successful discovery, player obtains 10 patents and the tech's advantages.

Bottom: Players are free to trade patents from other players, as exemplified here by purchasing a single patent of certain techs from other players. The player does not benefit from having 10 patents - single one is enough - so the rest are a business opportunity for selling at the player-driven markets.