Let's put in a few corrections shall we?
agsard more powerful defence
(constant bonus) more powerful defence weapons (economic/efficiency bonus) and hologram upgrade
(racial technology)
tuari more powerful attack
(constant bonus) more powerful attack weapons (economic/efficiency bonus) and quick withdraw upgrade (takes no damage whilst attacking)
(racial technology)
replicators have a covert upgrade
(constant bonus) , and also get cheaper covert lvls
(economic/efficiency bonus) and a Unit Regeneration unique racial technology (racial technology) .
g'aould have an incoem bonus
constant bonus) , and also bank naq for free
(economic/efficiency bonus) and a Unit Conversion racial technology (racial technology).
That's better. Now, as you can see each race has a constant bonus that defines their race, a specific economic/efficiency bonus that further enhances that race if the player invests Naquadah in it and finally a unique racial technology that (uniquely) may or may not have anything to do with the defining feature of the race. It is these unique racial technologies that are the source of the imbalance complaints. Let's look at them shall we?
Yes, we shall.
Asgard Holographic Technology - Whenever the p,layer is attacked there is a %-age chance that the attack will hit a hologram and do nothing, except damage the weapons of the attacking player.
Tau'ri Rapid Evacuation Technology - Whenever the player attacks there is a %-age chance that his units will suffer no damage, but will still inflict/steal as per usual.
Replicator Unit Regeneration SubRoutine Technology - Whenever the player suffers casualties there is a %-age chance that a small %-age of them will regenerate and not be dead anymore.
Goa'uld Host Processing Facility Technology - Whenever the player causes casualties a %-age of the casualties causes are converted to Untrained Units/Untrained Mercs (depending on the type of casualty) under the Goa'uld player's control.
A few observations.
1) The Asgard and Tau'ri technologies further enhance the areas of the game that these races specialise in. Therefore, the racial technology bonnuses stack with the other bonuses enjoyed by the race in question and are made more powerful because of this. For example, with the Asgard technology, not only do you have to worry about hitting a hologram and getting nothing from the attack except a list of expenses involved in attacking said hologram, but should you hit home then you have to worry about the high defence power of the Asgard and the increased casualties they will cause etc.
2) The Asgard technology is the most reliable by a significant %-age. I don't have the figures myself, but is the total not around 45%? A little below this is the Tau'ri technology, which if memory serves triggers around 25% of the time. A long way behind are the Replicator and Goa'uld racial technologies, which either work so infrequently that players actually forget they have them (Replicator), or are pretty much worthless if they do (Goa'uld).
3) The Replicator and Goa'uld racial technologies are totally seperate from their race specialisation. This is not a bad thing - it adds no end of character. However it should be noted that they do not therefore benefit from the stacking effect with racial specialisation. Again this is not really a bad thing, as it gives the player a bit of power in another, perhaps totally unique field of the game.
Draw your own conclusions from all that, but my own ending thoughts are that the Asgard technology really is fine as it is, and it is the other technologies that need to be brought into line with the Asgard power level.
Afterall, there is balance between the constant bonus of each race, as is there between the economic/efficiency bonus to each race. So why not the unique racial technologies?
The overall impact on the game would be neither staggering nor game-breaking, but it would silence a lot of the moaning around this subject and make the non-Asgard technologies a bit more worthy of their cost (Forum deemed them worthy of the game afterall - they might as well get some evaluation now that they've been around for a while).
There we go - I've tried to be as objective as possible with all that. Anyone got any comments? Glaring holes in my reasoning? Wondering what that llama is doing in the corner?
Too much of an advantage don't you think??
