AI Spamming... Scouts?

Yarnosh · Jan 31, 2009, 01:48 PM

I played a One City Challenge game as Sidar on a Duel map at Emperor difficulty against two teamed AIs just to see how many superspecialists one city could possibly have in a city. :-)

Anyway, I never really fought much early on with the AI before. BUt I noticed that the AI likes spamming scouts. He'll come up to my city with like 2 warriors and 4 scouts. A pretty pathetic stack. Basically just handing me the experience points as I pick off the whole stack. I might have had SOME trouble if it were 6 or more warriors, but all those scouts were just sitting ducks. This was Capria, BTW. The other AI was Varn Gosam. He was worse. His stacks consisted of Scouts and *Lightbringers.*. On top of all that, they were often caught using scouts for city defense. (this is before archery).

So why does the AI like scouts so much? Does it just do some hammers/power calculation and scouts come out cheaper? I understand having one scout in a stack just to see hidden units, but to create so many seems like a poor choice.

[to_xp]Gekko · Jan 31, 2009, 01:58 PM

yeah, they love doing that. hopefully it's not too hard to tell them that warrior are the way to go

Micky Onimusha · Jan 31, 2009, 05:52 PM

Aye, I'm seeing the same problem. In my last game I had the Sidar declare war on me and approach with what appeared to be a very odd strategy - 5 Scouts + 1 Warrior. As best I can tell, he was intending to weaken me with Scouts withdrawing (at 10%

) and then finish me off with one Warrior.

I didn't really give them a chance to actually try and do that so I don't know for sure if that was his goal, but my Warriors certainly enjoyed the free XP (and since he was striking a border city, I counter-attacked with Shock I Warriors freshly beefed up from Sidar Scout XP - Thank you very much Sandalphon). Oddly enough, I found his city seemed to have more Scouts than Warriors defending it too (maybe he was tricking me into promoting Shock I to catch me by surprise with his awesome Scouts...?

).

The AI really needs some tweaking to de-emphasise Scout production, especially when it comes to using Scouts offensively. I could understand if they used them as worker harassers, but they don't. They walk them along with their stack of Warriors and use them as though they were Warriors, not even taking advantage of the +1 movement. I'm wondering if this is a recent change as well, because I don't ever recall the AI trying to invade me with Scouts

It's not just the Sidar I've seen guilty of this, just the most recent example that comes to mind.

bonedog · Jan 31, 2009, 07:55 PM

I saw the same silly behavior by the AI in my recent game as the Sidar. The Lanun declared war on me and sent several stacks of scouts (with occasionally a few warriors tossed in for good measure) to my closest city. Then, instead of attacking when they got there, they just kind of walked around back and forth. I swatted them easily with some axemen, managing to get a few shades in the process, before the whole thing got boring and I sent my forces over to crush the Lanun.

Lone Wolf · Jan 31, 2009, 11:41 PM

Maybe the BetterAI team, who knows the way AI chooses units, can help us to understand what's happening here? Long ago, one of the previous versions of BetterAI had the problem of AI building too many Spearmen in stacks and neglecting Axemen and Swordsmen. Then it was understood, that AI noticing that spears had a +100% bonus in regards to some units, while axes had only 50%, was the problem. They fixed it by making the AI realize that Mounted units are not often used in the goal of defending cities, and, therefore, city-busting stacks should consist primarly of axes and swords.

Maybe something like that is happening here in regards to AI warriors scared of the existence of +40% bonus against melee promotion?

Or maybe things are simpler and Scouts need to have the UNITAI_ATTACK and maybe UNTIAI_CITY_DEFENCE tags taken away from them? I mean, does anybody here ever used scouts when attacking AI cities?

someone67 · Feb 01, 2009, 03:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lone Wolf

Or maybe things are simpler and Scouts need to have the UNITAI_ATTACK and maybe UNTIAI_CITY_DEFENCE tags taken away from them? I mean, does anybody here ever used scouts when attacking AI cities?

Yes, but only svartalfer scouts. For all over civs I agree that the UNITAI_ATTACK tag should be removed. And the UNTIAI_CITY_DEFENCE tag should generaly be removedfrom scouts.

Kyroshill · Feb 01, 2009, 10:10 AM

I don't know for sure about other civs.... but MANY times I have seen Calabim create superstacks of Rangers.

Maybe the AI likes that only one unit has any attack bonus against recon units.

Zechnophobe · Feb 01, 2009, 06:33 PM

AI tends to build fast units, but also combines them in stacks with slow ones, meaning they don't get the value of it.

That stack of scouts with 1 warrior moved at warrior speed. It wasn't even useful at marauding through an empire and killing workers.

Sporkbomb · Feb 03, 2009, 11:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Micky Onimusha

Aye, I'm seeing the same problem. In my last game I had the Sidar declare war on me and approach with what appeared to be a very odd strategy - 5 Scouts + 1 Warrior. As best I can tell, he was intending to weaken me with Scouts withdrawing (at 10%

) and then finish me off with one Warrior.

I didn't really give them a chance to actually try and do that so I don't know for sure if that was his goal, but my Warriors certainly enjoyed the free XP (and since he was striking a border city, I counter-attacked with Shock I Warriors freshly beefed up from Sidar Scout XP - Thank you very much Sandalphon). Oddly enough, I found his city seemed to have more Scouts than Warriors defending it too (maybe he was tricking me into promoting Shock I to catch me by surprise with his awesome Scouts...?

).

The AI really needs some tweaking to de-emphasise Scout production, especially when it comes to using Scouts offensively. I could understand if they used them as worker harassers, but they don't. They walk them along with their stack of Warriors and use them as though they were Warriors, not even taking advantage of the +1 movement. I'm wondering if this is a recent change as well, because I don't ever recall the AI trying to invade me with Scouts

It's not just the Sidar I've seen guilty of this, just the most recent example that comes to mind.

I have seen this twice from the Amurites, and no, they don't use them as suicude artillery, either, which would make sense. The stack that came after me was four scouts and two warriors, and the morons attacked with the warriors first. (I let them get to my city just to see what they would do.) Needless to say, they lost.

Seven05 · Feb 03, 2009, 11:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lone Wolf

Or maybe things are simpler and Scouts need to have the UNITAI_ATTACK and maybe UNTIAI_CITY_DEFENCE tags taken away from them? I mean, does anybody here ever used scouts when attacking AI cities?

Reduce their <iPower> value, add UNITAI_CITY_DEFENSE, UNITAI_ATTACK_CITY and UNITAI_RESERVE to their list of NotUNITAIs and change their UnitAIs list to only include UNITAI_EXPLORE.

Reducing the iPower value will help the AI understand that they are not powerful when they have 100 scouts. The NotUnitAIs will prevent the AI from building AND using them for those purposes. By only having one UNITAI defined the AI will prefer them for that use but they will still be able to use them for other functions not excluded by the NoUnitAI list. For example, if you remove UNITAI_CITY_DEFENSE from warriors and add it as a NotUnitAI for scouts early in the game the AI will defend with warriors because they can't defend with anything else but once they can build archers they would defend with them and use their warriors for attacking. The AI build descisions for units are heavily influenced by the UNITAI values so fixing these first will greatly improve the AI without any changes to the code.

There are a lot of units that could use similar attention to help the AI understand how to use them better. Also, if Kael feels so inclinded, adding the ability for promotions to modify the UnitAIs and NotUnitAIs for individual units would be a big help, another boost would come from allowing promotions to modify the iPower value of the unit. This would get the AI to understand that highly promoted units are potent adversaries and you could get the AI to use units based on the promotions it has given them in addition to what the base unit was designed for. Imagine if the City Raider promotion also gave the unit UNITAI_ATTACK_CITY, you'd see an improvement in the AIs use of existing units with more experience.

[to_xp]Gekko · Feb 03, 2009, 12:56 PM

now that's talking. great post.

notque · Feb 22, 2009, 01:08 AM

My answer to this problem was to not allow scouts to be built by the AI.

It still allows hunters for recon line civs, but stops the whole scout over and over thing.

The AI Immediately improved a ton. It was quite shocking to me the level of improvement. AIs stopped dying early.

lordrune · Feb 22, 2009, 05:20 AM

The AI cheats anyway when it comes to revealed/not revealed map doesn't it? So aside from the initial 'goody grab' the AI is really wasting its time building scouts after that point, even if it loses its initial scout.

JonathanStrange · Feb 22, 2009, 06:59 AM

I've seen these scout stack attacks too; although not very often. The AI civ (it's not a habit of just one civ, in my experience) in the early game declares war and a scout/warrior rush follows. And follows. And follows. I was thinking not that the AI values scouts/warriors so much as it sees an opportunity to knock me out and isn't waiting to build stronger units - generally I don't have anything but warriors/scouts either but I have to build them (well, the warriors) for defense.

Sometimes two or three civs join in attacking me early and for many turns there are scouts/warrior stacks all over the place. It's as if they're on a loop and it'll be awhile before better units appear.

Just another odd AI thing, I thought. 'Cause other times, I'll see AI with ten-twenty-thirty champions, longbowmen, chariots in an enemy city, a stack that could crush me, and yet they're just apparently being used as a garrison.

Diamondeye · Feb 22, 2009, 10:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lone Wolf

Then it was understood, that AI noticing that spears had a +100% bonus in regards to some units, while axes had only 50%, was the problem.

Scouts have +50% against animal units, could that be it? That would certainly be ridiculous, but one never knows...

MasterofDisasta · Feb 22, 2009, 01:55 PM

I've seen the scout thing too. Last game I fought off a turn 35 attack by a Hippus scout army. All the experience gave me a shock 2 warrior that proceeded to level thier entire civilization before turn 100.

How about garrisoning cities with horse archers? In my most recent level the Ammurites built hordes of horse archers, promoted them with city garrison, and then used them to guard all thier cities. The worst part was that they had the techs to build archers and axemen, but they didn't build a single one.

Maybe they didn't have those buildings? Nope. I checked no AI building requirements. Seriously, the AI needs help understanding its troops when it guards its cities with horse archers and attacks my cities with rangers.

notque · Feb 22, 2009, 08:41 PM

I'd be interested if you tried my mod and what you thought of it with the ai not building scouts.

It's in modmods, MinorLeadersMod

Korias · Feb 25, 2009, 10:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diamondeye

Scouts have +50% against animal units, could that be it? That would certainly be ridiculous, but one never knows...

That just adds insult to injury, the AI Civs think we humans are animals

But yeah, Scout Warrior stacks were a problem. BetterAI and MinorLeaders have fixed it though, using two effective strategies.

scutarii · Feb 25, 2009, 11:39 PM

dp. delete plz

scutarii · Feb 25, 2009, 11:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by notque

I'd be interested if you tried my mod and what you thought of it with the ai not building scouts.

It's in modmods, MinorLeadersMod

playin' it. works like a charm. No more defendings scouts in cities and early offensive forces consist (bronze)warriors/axemen.

Playin' in monarch. lot of fun.

Btw, when choosing a trait instead of minor, does it mean that is all I get? Or is there a chance to get some more?

Jan 31, 2009, 01:48 PM	#1
Yarnosh Chieftain Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 70	AI Spamming... Scouts? I played a One City Challenge game as Sidar on a Duel map at Emperor difficulty against two teamed AIs just to see how many superspecialists one city could possibly have in a city. :-) Anyway, I never really fought much early on with the AI before. BUt I noticed that the AI likes spamming scouts. He'll come up to my city with like 2 warriors and 4 scouts. A pretty pathetic stack. Basically just handing me the experience points as I pick off the whole stack. I might have had SOME trouble if it were 6 or more warriors, but all those scouts were just sitting ducks. This was Capria, BTW. The other AI was Varn Gosam. He was worse. His stacks consisted of Scouts and Lightbringers.. On top of all that, they were often caught using scouts for city defense. (this is before archery). So why does the AI like scouts so much? Does it just do some hammers/power calculation and scouts come out cheaper? I understand having one scout in a stack just to see hidden units, but to create so many seems like a poor choice.

Jan 31, 2009, 01:58 PM	#2
[to_xp]Gekko WM junkie Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Seyda Neen, Vvardenfell Posts: 7,102	yeah, they love doing that. hopefully it's not too hard to tell them that warrior are the way to go __________________ " Sheelba does what Charadon't " - Senethro

Jan 31, 2009, 05:52 PM	#3
Micky Onimusha Prince Join Date: Apr 2004 Posts: 344	Aye, I'm seeing the same problem. In my last game I had the Sidar declare war on me and approach with what appeared to be a very odd strategy - 5 Scouts + 1 Warrior. As best I can tell, he was intending to weaken me with Scouts withdrawing (at 10% ) and then finish me off with one Warrior. I didn't really give them a chance to actually try and do that so I don't know for sure if that was his goal, but my Warriors certainly enjoyed the free XP (and since he was striking a border city, I counter-attacked with Shock I Warriors freshly beefed up from Sidar Scout XP - Thank you very much Sandalphon). Oddly enough, I found his city seemed to have more Scouts than Warriors defending it too (maybe he was tricking me into promoting Shock I to catch me by surprise with his awesome Scouts...? ). The AI really needs some tweaking to de-emphasise Scout production, especially when it comes to using Scouts offensively. I could understand if they used them as worker harassers, but they don't. They walk them along with their stack of Warriors and use them as though they were Warriors, not even taking advantage of the +1 movement. I'm wondering if this is a recent change as well, because I don't ever recall the AI trying to invade me with Scouts It's not just the Sidar I've seen guilty of this, just the most recent example that comes to mind. Last edited by Micky Onimusha; Jan 31, 2009 at 05:56 PM.

Jan 31, 2009, 11:41 PM	#5
Lone Wolf Wolfie Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 8,861 Images: 1	Maybe the BetterAI team, who knows the way AI chooses units, can help us to understand what's happening here? Long ago, one of the previous versions of BetterAI had the problem of AI building too many Spearmen in stacks and neglecting Axemen and Swordsmen. Then it was understood, that AI noticing that spears had a +100% bonus in regards to some units, while axes had only 50%, was the problem. They fixed it by making the AI realize that Mounted units are not often used in the goal of defending cities, and, therefore, city-busting stacks should consist primarly of axes and swords. Maybe something like that is happening here in regards to AI warriors scared of the existence of +40% bonus against melee promotion? Or maybe things are simpler and Scouts need to have the UNITAI_ATTACK and maybe UNTIAI_CITY_DEFENCE tags taken away from them? I mean, does anybody here ever used scouts when attacking AI cities? __________________ My AARs, mostly of Civ4 RFC and FFH reports: Byzantium, Turkey, France, Mughals, Calabim, Doviello, Ljosalfar, Kuriorates, Svartalfar, Eu3 Marathas, Civ3 WH Indics. My FFH modmod Last edited by Lone Wolf; Feb 01, 2009 at 04:24 AM.

Feb 01, 2009, 06:33 PM	#8
Zechnophobe Strategy Lich Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Goleta, California Posts: 1,866	AI tends to build fast units, but also combines them in stacks with slow ones, meaning they don't get the value of it. That stack of scouts with 1 warrior moved at warrior speed. It wasn't even useful at marauding through an empire and killing workers. __________________ Everyone who plays Civ: "I play on [Preferred Difficulty] Because it is the most fun. It is challenging but doesn't require the ridiculous micromanagement needed to play on [Preferred Difficulty +1] but is more competitive than [Preferred Difficulty -1]"

Jan 31, 2009, 07:55 PM	#4
bonedog Chieftain Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 43	I saw the same silly behavior by the AI in my recent game as the Sidar. The Lanun declared war on me and sent several stacks of scouts (with occasionally a few warriors tossed in for good measure) to my closest city. Then, instead of attacking when they got there, they just kind of walked around back and forth. I swatted them easily with some axemen, managing to get a few shades in the process, before the whole thing got boring and I sent my forces over to crush the Lanun.

Feb 01, 2009, 10:10 AM	#7
Kyroshill Huh? Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 642	I don't know for sure about other civs.... but MANY times I have seen Calabim create superstacks of Rangers. Maybe the AI likes that only one unit has any attack bonus against recon units.

Feb 03, 2009, 12:56 PM	#11
[to_xp]Gekko WM junkie Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Seyda Neen, Vvardenfell Posts: 7,102	now that's talking. great post. __________________ " Sheelba does what Charadon't " - Senethro

Feb 22, 2009, 01:08 AM	#12
notque Artificially Intelligent Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 774	My answer to this problem was to not allow scouts to be built by the AI. It still allows hunters for recon line civs, but stops the whole scout over and over thing. The AI Immediately improved a ton. It was quite shocking to me the level of improvement. AIs stopped dying early.

Feb 22, 2009, 05:20 AM	#13
lordrune Prince Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 431	The AI cheats anyway when it comes to revealed/not revealed map doesn't it? So aside from the initial 'goody grab' the AI is really wasting its time building scouts after that point, even if it loses its initial scout.

Feb 22, 2009, 06:59 AM	#14
JonathanStrange PrinceWithA1000Enemies Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: TThe Dreaming Posts: 1,306	I've seen these scout stack attacks too; although not very often. The AI civ (it's not a habit of just one civ, in my experience) in the early game declares war and a scout/warrior rush follows. And follows. And follows. I was thinking not that the AI values scouts/warriors so much as it sees an opportunity to knock me out and isn't waiting to build stronger units - generally I don't have anything but warriors/scouts either but I have to build them (well, the warriors) for defense. Sometimes two or three civs join in attacking me early and for many turns there are scouts/warrior stacks all over the place. It's as if they're on a loop and it'll be awhile before better units appear. Just another odd AI thing, I thought. 'Cause other times, I'll see AI with ten-twenty-thirty champions, longbowmen, chariots in an enemy city, a stack that could crush me, and yet they're just apparently being used as a garrison.

Feb 22, 2009, 01:55 PM	#16
MasterofDisasta Prince Join Date: Apr 2008 Posts: 336	I've seen the scout thing too. Last game I fought off a turn 35 attack by a Hippus scout army. All the experience gave me a shock 2 warrior that proceeded to level thier entire civilization before turn 100. How about garrisoning cities with horse archers? In my most recent level the Ammurites built hordes of horse archers, promoted them with city garrison, and then used them to guard all thier cities. The worst part was that they had the techs to build archers and axemen, but they didn't build a single one. Maybe they didn't have those buildings? Nope. I checked no AI building requirements. Seriously, the AI needs help understanding its troops when it guards its cities with horse archers and attacks my cities with rangers.

Feb 22, 2009, 08:41 PM	#17
notque Artificially Intelligent Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 774	I'd be interested if you tried my mod and what you thought of it with the ai not building scouts. It's in modmods, MinorLeadersMod

Feb 25, 2009, 11:39 PM	#19
scutarii Prince Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 552	dp. delete plz

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