DEVELOPMENT SNAPSHOT #74 — The Researcher Brings Proposals: Cards That Grow with Skill

The buttons that handed institution and technology research to the AI are gone from the research management window. Whether research is delegated now depends on whether a chief researcher is in office, and when a delegated research slot becomes free, the chief researcher brings proposals for the next research.

The proposals arrive as cards in the same form as the minister's budget proposals introduced two articles ago (#71). The more able the researcher, the more proposals there are to compare.

The event screen, captured for verification in a development debug build. The chief researcher (policy) proposes three options for the next research, with her portrait and a "View proposals" button. People and the country's state come from a verification setup and may change.

Delegation follows the chief researchers

Of the chief researcher offices (the national posts introduced in #68), a chief researcher (policy) in office takes the institution slot, and a chief researcher (technology) takes the technology slot. Delegation is on by default; a slot whose office is vacant is not delegated.

On the day a delegated slot becomes free, the researcher picks the next research the same way AI countries do (AI scores plus a bonus from the head of state's personality). Only research whose daily cost is within 20% of the country's daily income (budget revenue ÷ 365) and that needs no ancient-civilization materials is considered. The result arrives as an event notice, "A request from the researcher". If the notice comes first, the proposal window opens directly; if it is listed in the event screen, "View proposals" opens it.

Comparing proposal cards

The proposal window has the same layout as the budget proposals: the researcher's portrait, post, name and ability grade on the left, and three proposal cards on the right.

The "A request from the researcher" window in the same build. A researcher with Scholarship A brings three proposals: Police System (advised), Public Sanitation System and Poll Tax System. Each card lists field, duration, daily cost, total and level, a description, why it is proposed, the next-level effect, what it unlocks and what it leads to.

Each card shows:

• The same institution image as the research screen, and the research name. The first proposal carries an "Advised" tag.
• Field, duration and daily cost, plus the total (duration × daily cost) and level (current → next, maximum).
• A description (the institution's description for institutions, the discovery's description for technology).
• "Why this": the same view as the AI's scoring. Living standard and stability for institutions, rising resource prices for resources and facilities, armament for equipment, and the fields the head of state values. If none apply, the short duration and low cost are the reason.
• "Effect" (next level), "Unlocks" and "Leads to" (up to three research items that require it).

"Leave this to them" reserves that research. Like a player's reservation it is confirmed at the next midnight, and a delegated reservation can be cancelled at any time. To decide yourself, "Set manually" at the bottom opens that slot's research screen without reserving anything. Closing the window without answering keeps the notice, and no new request comes for that slot until it is answered.

The researcher's ability decides how many cards you see

The number of face-up cards depends on the researcher's ability grade (Scholarship for policy, Ingenuity for technology), with the same steps as the budget proposals: one card for E, two for D and C, three for B and above. The remaining slots become hatched "Hidden proposal" cards that show the grade needed to unlock them (D for the second, B for the third).

The same state with the researcher's Scholarship set to D. Two proposals are shown, and the third is hidden: "The researcher's scholarship is too low. Scholarship B+ unlocks this proposal."

So the choice of chief researcher now affects not only research speed (the Ingenuity-based shortening described in #68) but also how wide a choice you get. When there is not enough research available right now, a slot is hidden even if the researcher is able enough.

About the images

All images were captured from a development debug build using a verification setup. People, the country's state and numbers are still being tuned and may change. Unanswered requests in data saved before this change are shown as a single proposal card built from the requested research.

About the research screen: DEVELOPMENT SNAPSHOT #64 — A Research Tree You Can Read: Faster Opening, Visible Links, and Why You Can't Reserve

Budget proposals in the same card form: DEVELOPMENT SNAPSHOT #71 — The Minister Brings the Budget: Allocations, Bond Terms, Midyear Top-Ups

Previous article: DEVELOPMENT PLAN #73 — Banks Compete on Rates: Short- and Long-Term Prime Rates

See the files currently available and the development status on the download page