FreeOrion

How about a special mechanism that helps with balancing. This mechanism could allow points for techs, as a test. If the tech consumes more points then are available to it, the game throws an error. The same could be true for species design.

How deep the tech is in the tech tree and the amount of prerequisites could determine the amount of points available to techs to spend.

Techs could spend points on:

• Components;
• Effects;
• Buildings;
• Hulls;
• Each tech unlocked.

For components, effects, buildings and hulls there could be a formula to calculate the cost for the item based on various properties.

This makes the game detect anomalies in the tech tree quickly and could warn for imbalances. Little manual work required. This could also be done by a specialized tool that scans the tech tree and species for imbalances.