Editor: build often/build never does ... what?

[bluebox]

In the editor, civs can get (and do get) different AI presets in terms of what to build often (or what to never build). Any guides/tests available on this issue? c3c/ptw/vanilla alike.

thanks for your tips!

[bluebox]

uhhh ... no ideas to this question? did I explain it badly?
In the editor, you can define some presets for AI behaviour with each civ - buildoften/build never offense defense, commerce, a pretty long list. I want to know what the single items relateto, e.g. what does 'happiness' mean? markets do provide happiness, but also commerce, catherals also culture. are markets preferred by the AI when 'commerce' is selected or when 'happiness' is selected, or both? I searched the forums a while, but didn't find anything helpful.
If there isn't any knowledge about that, would it be worthwhile trying to do some testing by myself?

[kevincompton]

I second this! I am really curious about this function as well.

I did however notice that in some of the conquests (AOD for example) firaxis has different build often presets for the exploration civs like Spain, England, Netherlands all set to build settlers and naval units often. So i did it to mine and it seemed to make a difference! They colonized much quicker.

[El Justo]

Originally Posted by bluebox

In the editor, civs can get (and do get) different AI presets in terms of what to build often (or what to never build). Any guides/tests available on this issue? c3c/ptw/vanilla alike.

thanks for your tips!

the 'build often' flag is used so that when modding, we can dictate which units the AI primarily builds and which ones they won't build at all (never build).

for example, say you flag the germans w/ the 'build often' flag for artillery and offense. as such, the AI (and presumably the default build que for the human player as germany) will make these units (artillery&offense) a priority.

now, keep in mind that the 'AI strategy' flags such as 'offense', 'defense', 'explore', 'artillery', etc play a HUMONGOUS role. if you fail to check one of these boxes for any new units you put in, the AI will completely ignore them.

in other words, these 2 flags (build often/never & AI flags) go hand in hand. it took me quite a while to figure out how important (to the AI at least) they are and how they work in concert w/ each other.

hope this helps.

best,
El Justo

[kevincompton]

Very helpful! Thank you.

[bluebox]

thank you, kevin + el justo!

what we found out so far:

the build priorities influence the internal default building queues.

changes to the build priorities make a noticable difference to AI behaviour.

the build priorities for offense, defense, artillery, and presumably sea and air units as well as settlers, workers and the 'explore' flag, too, refer to the units' AI strategy flags of the units.

any ideas for the buildings? there isn't any similar categorization except the 'other charateristics' flags categorized by civ traits. will they work the same way? then some improvements would be left out, that means they could never be priorized.

[El Justo]

Originally Posted by bluebox

any ideas for the buildings? there isn't any similar categorization except the 'other charateristics' flags categorized by civ traits. will they work the same way? then some improvements would be left out, that means they could never be priorized.

i think the 'flavor' flags work well w/ buildings.

it won't keep every civ from building a certain improvement/wonder but it will set a sort of priority order for them; ie, if you have a set of buildings/improvements for, say, a communist 'flavor', each civ w/ this flag will build all impr/wonders w/ the 'commie' tag first, then after they're all built, the 'commie' civ will start building the other imp/wonders.

another good way to have only certain civs build certain impr/wonders is to specify a certain govt. this works pretty well.

the best way to have certain civs build specific imp/wonders is to make those imp/wonders require a certain tech that isn't able to be researched. for example, you could give a certain civ, say the 'gunpowder' tech for free, while the other civs can't research it. if the said imp/wonder requires the 'gunpowder' tech, only the civs that were given it for free can build it. this method is FOOL PROOF.

hope this helps.