Science thresholds

Does anyone have (or know where I can find) a list of the points needed in Science where their acquisition actually produces a reduction in research time? I remember once when I was somewhere in the 30s that it took about 5 more levels before my completion time altered. If I knew where the trigger points were it would save me (and others) from wasting money on expanding Science.

I think that more than trigger points is a thing of “Proportions”

So if with Science 1 you’d get the tech completed in an hour, with Science 2 you’d have it in half, with 3 in 20 min and all the way to Science 30 where you’d have it done in 2 min. So in terms of increase, from 1 to 2 would be 100%, from 2 to 3 would be 50%, from 3 to 4 33%, then 25, 20, 16.5, and on and on and on. Until eventually the speed increase in percentages is minimal and very close to 0.

The thing is that there’s a “Minimum percentage” that the game can measure. Considering that you didn’t see an increase from 30 until 35, it means the smallest possible % increase it can measure is around… 16%

But in the end all this is my theory, wouldn’t be able to be sure until Jay clears out whether this is how it actually works or if it’s a bug.

It is completely situational. There isn’t a magic number at all.

You can calculate that yourself based on your current situation. The game provides you with several data points: Number of Science per hour, number of hours to complete current research, current number of points in tech and required number for next level.

A very simplified example:
Say my next level needs 144 points. I have 5 points in that field, and am earning 10 points per hour. Currently, I would need 14 hours to complete. (144-5)/10=13.9hrs Adding 1 point of Science will drop it to 12.6hrs, 2 points to 11.6, etc.

Later in the game, where the numbers are much bigger, you can simply take the whole hour amount, multiply it by your science points, and subtract that from the remaining amount.

Example: 3600 needed for next level, 133 current in field, 275 per hour
(3600-133)/275=12.6, so the game reports you need 13 hours to finish.
3600-133=3467 3467-(12hrs*275)=167 meaning you will be short 167 points for that last hour. 167/12 full hours=13.9 points per hour needed. Therefore, you would have to add 14 Science at that point to finish an hour earlier.

Thanks for that!
Maybe I’ll write myself a little calculator for it…

Are you just looking for the number of science levels you have to purchase to increase the daily rate of production? If so, that’s actually simple. Each additional level of a technology costs 144 points. So as an example, if you are currently producing one level per 24 hours, to maintain that 1/day production you must purchase 144/24 = 6 levels of science per day. To increase the rate of production buy more than 6 levels.

That scales like this:
1/day: 6 science
2/day: 6 + 2x6 = 18
3/day: 6 + 2x6 + 3x6 = 36
4/day: 6 + 2x6 + 3x6 + 4x6 = 60
etc

Another hint:
Say you have 183 Science and you are researching a level 20, 2880 RP research, which would take 16 hours to complete (15.7 precisely), but you want it to finish 1 hour earlier. Just calculate 2880 / 15 = 192 which tells you how much Science you need (9 additional Science).

If you are in middle of researching banking and you just realised you won’t finish it before production, you can buy more science.
Banking 13 = 1872 RP, already researched 768 of 1872.
You have 65 Science and the ETA is 17 hours, but you want it in 15 hours.

(1872 - 768) / 15 = 1104 / 15 = 73,6 = 74

You would need 74 Science to finish the Banking before production.

A little built in science calculator where you added science stations one by one e.g. < 3 > that gave you the completion time [ 1d 3h ] would be a cool aid and not out of place as we already have a battle calculator.

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