For me the GalCiv2 limitation was no mulitiplayer PBEM - easy to play and have time to plan. Nowadays the power of game is a real community to play together or develop the game together with mods. No multiplayer no strong community.
Technological victory off? Why? The tech tree for technology victory is really expensive - what happened if you are attacked by empire where all resources were push into military and its weapon is 50% stronger now than yours?
This idea of "infinite" tech tree may be used for all types of technology to improve: - engines power, - missile power, - construction durability, - food / energy production, - resources production (minning), The idea has sense because the player as an empire's leader decides what is more efficient: develop old technology (costs) or develop new technology (costs) or military aggression. There are some "points of no return" where costs of new/old technologies are too expensive for empire.
There are different technologies to research like: Particles -> Lasers -> Plasma -> Phasors -> Distruptors with several levels, but maybe a good option is creating a infinite levels of each of them? Each level is stronger than previous one (for example by 5% and require 5% more research)... What sense of this idea? 1) There no "ultimate" weapon and each race cannot focus at the war "when all technologies discovered". 2) Player decides what is more sense: develop old technology (
Yes, the simultaneous turns are way to go. I plan do not play this game without multiplayer system. Stars! was a extremely good example but have a few poor points. Mechanics of GalCiv may cure it: 1) All games are provided by central host which keep all game informations, 2) Turn are solved simultaneously, with initiative order (the fleets with higher initiative move first). If the initiative is equal, smaller fleet is first. If equals -