What is the deal? EB's direction...

[khelvan]

It should be noted that the changes to the recruitment system were not isolated to recruitment. The entire building system had to change to accomodate it.

Imagine this as a war-era tank. The goal of the next tank upgrade is to defeat the currently superior enemy armor in the field, and it is determined that upgrading the weapon is the best and most effective way to do this, along with, secondarily, improved armor. Tank MkIII has a 75mm short-barrelled cannon, and the designers state that MkIV will have an 88mm high-velocity cannon. So the new cannon is designed and built, with other improvements to optics, chassis shape, armor strength and slope, tread mechanics, engine efficiency, and so on to go with it and support the new design.

However, as the first prototypes are rolling off the line, field tests show that the system mechanics have previously undetected design flaws and fail at a rate close to 80%. The suspension can't handle the weight, and the engine just doesn't have enough horsepower to push the beast around. The tank will spend the majority of its "fighting" time under repair. So the designers have to design an entire new chassis & suspension complete with a brand new engine to handle the weapon and armor upgrades.

So now during these ensuing months, the designers of the other teams continue to improve on the other areas. The ammo is improved, the designers come up with an even more efficient armor scheme based on the new chassis & power specifications, a better tread design, a better interior layout, far superior optics, and so on.

The new prototype rolls of the line. The MkIV is a beauty of a tank, far superior in every way. The goal has been met, a better killing machine, able to defeat the existing enemies in spectacular fashion. Yes, the first design failed and had to be completely redone, but this did not mean that work stopped in the other areas. Nor did the upgrade to those other areas affect the core components. Compared to the engine and weapon systems the rest is just window dressing.

Our tank crashed and burned. Our prototypes never made it off the line before they broke down. The hard limits of the engine became readily apparent and we had to go back to the drawing board. The goal of our new weapon never left our sight, but the way we got there had to change dramatically. Sure, you'll see new treads, better quality armor, a more efficient exhaust system, even an experimental close-defense anti-infantry weapon that doubles as a smoke launcher for those really hairy armor battles, but none of that affected our engine design, and in fact happened in parallel.

As we stalled in one area, we improved in another.