Also, if another race is going for a tech victory and it is obvious that they are going to beat you, you will need to take military action to take down their research ability. In a recent game, the Thalians got to within 10 weeks of tech victory so I had to change a war with the Altarians into a "holding action" while I raced across the galaxy to capture "bug" planets heavy in research. Of course, while I was at it, I went ahead and conquered their whole empire.   

Well, I was having a discussion with my friend the other day and he says he doesn't like trying for technology victories because "They're too easy, and [he likes] trying for the hardest one". I'm not sure which he says is the 'hardest one' but I think he likes military victories. But back to the point- do you think technology victories (to use his words) "do not require as much strategy"? IMO, Tech victories require as much strategies as the others- you need as much strategy as you would normally to stay alive, and if another race is going for the tech victory, it's basically a race- you need population and morale for good economic revenue, you need enough military to fend off the Drengin for example, and everything else you would normally need to 'stay alive'. please note that my friend plays GalCiv1, where (i think) a tech victory is even harder because you can't see the tech tree and it's more complex. so what are your opinions?

Your kidding right? So what is the secret to an easy tech victory? I am finding that the hardest way to win so far.

I feel it's the easiest way to win and not many points in it, disabled it after winning a few that way.

remember, he plays GalCiv1, so any fancy AI stuff in GC2 doesn't apply.

I say: it's easy if you're good at that kind of organisation. If you're good at building a navy, then military would be the way to go. I say a win is a win, it would count the same in the metaverse (I think- ?). I've found, a lot of times, it takes an incredibly long time to get a tech victory. Especially finding your way through the complex GalCiv1 tech tree. Of course it also depends on the size of the universe- it would be nearly impossible to get a tech victory in a tiny universe before you win some other way, like influence.

I leave tech victory on just as an out, incase I either get bored or in trouble. I usually find it quite a smooth and quiet victory as the ai never has declared war on me during researching it. May be due to the fact by that point in the game my military keeps them shaking in their boots.  

I agree, if you have a sufficiently high military rating, you can go for a tech victory without the AI attempting to stop you, or if they do make an attempt it is too little too late. It might depend on difficulty level, I don't know.

I would like to see the AI become a little more aggressive, consistently, when a player reaches a certain point on the tech victory tree. Even if they can't destroy you outright militarily, it would make more sense for them to attack out of desperation to stop you from winning or at least slow you down.

Although- just as an aside- it's dull as hell.

Tech victory is cheese to go for from the outset, but it does make a nice out when the random events bone you.

I had a game where Alliance was right out, because two races otherwise ethical in alignment underwent a reversal of alignment (Drath and Torians). You can scratch conquest victory there too, because you simply cannot win a battle on five fronts, even with a tech edge, unless the few remaining ethical races are powerhouses, you're asking for a major setback.

The toughest win for me, so far, to try and pull off is Influence. I've got the highest influence by leaps and bounds at the moment, but projecting it beyond my borders has been nightmarishly difficult. Even with starbases, trying to push enough me-ness onto alien colonies has been a headache.

I think I get Tech victories because of the way I build my war machine after the colony rush. I prefer a few large, tech edged warships over the Mongol swarm effect. This means I'm already building a powerful research machine parallel to my production industry, and its nothing for me to build a reasonably powerful fleet, resolve whatever wars I'm in, then dial down the military construction and go 0/10/90 on the spending priorities.

That route is definitely less an eyebleeder than the Influence win I pulled off over the weekend. Gigantic Galaxy, Rare habitables, abundant stars and planets against nine Intelligent AIs.

I think it took 80 starbases by the time it was over, the VAST bulk of them were influence bases, sometimes needing two or three stacked to push a cluster of planets into rebellion.

It wasn't overly difficult, this weekend's game represented my first time where I had the economy so well oiled I had nearly 50% tax rates, 100% spending, 100% approval, and was still raking in over 200 bc a turn from the excess, it was the sheer mind numbing boredom of making 50+ planets crank out enough constructors to unload the starbase pain. I was pushing so many out at a turn, I had to leave fleets of constructors stuck in orbit while my economy replenished the construction funds. I was up to about 5400 bc to build the last starbase that pushed me over the top.

As a player of ethical races, it was a nice feather in the cap to pull the influence win, especially being my first step up into the Tough level, but good God it was painful...