Civ 5 AI: Habits/Shortcomings & Improvements

Hey guys, just started playing Civ 5 (finally jumped ship from Civ 4), and I hear quite a bit about how stupid the AI tends to be (only witnessed a few instances of such myself however, due to limited time actually played).

My intention is to get a better grasp of what general logical (or illogical) decision trees/patterns the AI tends to make (cannot analyze all possible outcomes just by looking at the SDK files, too many lines of code), and mod/tweak some code blocks/values to make them a little less idiotic.

Off the top of my head:

- Ranged units unable to move + shoot on same turn
- Irrational (or more accurately, I should say "shallow", as they can be too easily influenced/bribed by other AIs) diplomacy.
- Somewhat poor economic strategy (although that may be attributed to bad starts w/ few luxuries and whatnots as opposed to just poor planning).
- Victory conditions/goals other than spaceship may be shaky (in its current form, the AI will not have much chance going to war vs. humans, so domination/conquest not really viable for an AI "win").

What bad habits do you guys encounter the most? What game mechanics (i.e. 1upt) does the AI fumble around with? The AI does seem to have a primitive "Grand Strategy" planning implemented..... does the AI execute its strategies well (if at all)?

In your opinions, are the leaders flavourful enough? (i.e. do they all act the same? or are they a bland homogeneous bunch of monkeys facerolling the keyboard)? I've only noticed some AIs seem overeager to have DoFs, but not much else (but then again, likely due to my lack of play-time).

How overbearing or effective are the AI bonuses on Emperor to Deity? (Note: not asking if the "numbers are right - these are easily tweaked", but does playing "catch-up" feel realistic? Are there enough levers aside from raw bonuses? There is an attitude change for handicap, but is this noticeable? Do more parameters feel like they need to be implemented?)

If you know of any mods that have fixed/improved such behaviours [BNW compatible], I'd appreciate if you can link them here as well


Note: this is NOT a rant thread (strictly speaking, at least )!

In my opinion, the most stupid action from AI is when their units embark into water in the middle of a battle and most of the times within ranged and/or naval units' range!

Here's some of the biggest weaknesses:

1) AI lacks a lot of flexibility in its strategy for victory. It's all driven from flavors calculated at the start of the game. For example, Shaka will always, always be an expansionist warmonger. Even if he's behind in the military game or would have to attack into your heavily-fortified border, he will never reconsider his strategy and is incapable of doing so.

2) Army movement is... strange. Like mentioned above, it's not afraid to embark into your face and lose everything while it's vulnerable. Sometimes it will just choose to move instead of attacking to crush a few units (I think it's trying for a better surround on your whole army rather than a kill), and then takes heavy losses from giving you 1-2 rounds of free ranged fire.

3) Really bad policy choices. AI loves Piety and Honor as opening trees - Piety is abysmal and Honor is noticeably weaker for the long game.

Many improvements for things on the list are in the community mod.

It would be really difficult to rip out the flavor driven AI logic to replace with something more rational though.

I'm not aware of an official mod that does this, but simply making Piety & Honor both require Classical era to open would largely fix the AI opening with a poor opener.

AI worker move into a tile where he can the enemy but fails to withdraw even if there's a movement point left.

Prophet and missionary wars where more than one AI try to convert a city back and forth.

Missionaries stuck in your territory and die off attrition.

Not pillaging tiles when they could.

Leaving great generals unprotected.


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brasaelal said:

In my opinion, the most stupid action from AI is when their units embark into water in the middle of a battle and most of the times within ranged and/or naval units' range!

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For me, this!
Someone in another thread once neatly summed up: "We're under attack - quick, get the catapults in the water!"

joncnunn said:

It would be really difficult to rip out the flavor driven AI logic to replace with something more rational though.

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Could have the AIs transition from one flavor set to another - for example, a Civ with early warmonger capabilities could have a trigger to use another set flavors when it advances an era beyond its units. This might lead to an aggressive Huns or Mongols choosing to consolidate their gains and do something else, rather than forcing ahead in the war game while getting progressively more behind and hated by the world.

Alternately, an AI that was going for a science victory could react to being beaten to the Manhattan project (by a good margin) by suddenly going military production to try and kneecap the competitor. Stuff like that.

GoStu said:

Could have the AIs transition from one flavor set to another - for example, a Civ with early warmonger capabilities could have a trigger to use another set flavors when it advances an era beyond its units. This might lead to an aggressive Huns or Mongols choosing to consolidate their gains and do something else, rather than forcing ahead in the war game while getting progressively more behind and hated by the world.

Alternately, an AI that was going for a science victory could react to being beaten to the Manhattan project (by a good margin) by suddenly going military production to try and kneecap the competitor. Stuff like that.

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Sorry, but the programmer in me just had a really bad reaction just reading this. With access to the entire source code and not just what Firaxis exposed, adding a layer to reliably determine what flavors it ought to be using would actually be harder than ripping out the AI flavor settings and directly giving the orders to build the units / buildings.

joncnunn said:

Sorry, but the programmer in me just had a really bad reaction just reading this. With access to the entire source code and not just what Firaxis exposed

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Is there an additional layer of code (not counting art/graphics) in addition to the C++ code?

ThorHammerz said:

Is there an additional layer of code (not counting art/graphics) in addition to the C++ code?

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1. The engine itself (probably in C++ but source NOT included)

2. What I've seen of the C++ source code to the DLL implies an additional layer of either C or C++ not included that calls these methods, which might or might not be in the same module as the engine.

i really have problems with the ai and player units movement. its so frustrating to see any unit which all it has to do is move for two turns up a coast between mountains and the sea suddenly waste 2 more turns by embarking, travelling on the sea and then disembarking, thus taking twice as long to get to the place you sent it. this leads to me micromanaging movement one tile at a time unless there is a road there which the unit will PROBABLY use...

i have lost count of the units i lost to a sea melee unit due to non necessary embarkation, or lost because a supporting unit took too long to get there because it was desperate to show off; 'look i can float too!'

workers dont build roads/rail where i would either. i would build straight out in the plains from one city to the next, with the turn toward the city only happen once you get a tile away. using the build road to tile option results in a worker building a diagonal road into a hill tile, then another then going straight on the plain to the destination city. and by the way, avoiding building the road inside my own territory and building in the wild where my city area hasnt expanded to yet. that seem almost the preferred choice - build a road between your cities almost anywhere EXCEPT inside your own land unless there is no way to avoid that...

^^I play on Prince and King, and I know that barbs can be a royal pain. It's not uncommon for them to be attacking your capital while your scout and warrior are out exploring. I'm in a game right now where I had to buy two archers just to keep the barbs away. I had three camps spawn near my capital. And I can't get any tiles improved because they keep coming around.

I believe that on Chieftain level, barbs won't even enter your lands until turn 60. Higher levels they can enter right away.

But barbs can also be stupid. The barb archers will just trade shots with your archer. Or if they're attacking a CS, they will give up their attack and attack your warrior instead. But it's not uncommon for a couple of them to chase your scout all over God's creation.

scouts. i am surrounded by fog. i make a scout. it goes always east. scout 2, no matter where i move it to for its first move, turns around and follows scout 1 but not precisely. same with scout 3.

WHY???

scouts should pick a direction NOBODY has explored and go there. thats their JOB dammit. not to explore that bit just away from and same direction as the guy whose gone before

Please don't automate scouts. The AI's scouting is bad enough, so why would you choose to let the game emulate their poor scouting on your behalf?

Explore automations are comfortable but city states also find your explore automations annoying. Scouting manually won't annoy anyone.

andreafin said:

scouts. i am surrounded by fog. i make a scout. it goes always east. scout 2, no matter where i move it to for its first move, turns around and follows scout 1 but not precisely. same with scout 3.

WHY???

scouts should pick a direction NOBODY has explored and go there. thats their JOB dammit. not to explore that bit just away from and same direction as the guy whose gone before

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I don't understand this. You complain about the scout not going where you want it to. Well you put it on automate, don't expect the AI to read your mind. This is like my friends who complain about their automated workers movements. I tell them to take control of them and they won't have that problem. Of course they say they don't want to. SMH

^^Calm down. Maybe he's a new player and doesn't know about the reasons not to automate.

He's not.

I didn't realise automation was in the game till I had played a few games. I then turned it on, saw them do stupid stuff and though "Never again!" But I must confess that I have now starting automating some units boats late in the game just to clear up the unexplored ocean tiles.

@andreafinn
Personally I would always build roads on hills! it means you have more tactical options when invaded,. Being able to move and fire on hills is great. Also the multiple turn movement is generally pretty good and does use the least amount of moves. From your description it seems like both would use the same number of moves.