A new first: AI builds carrier

[Mize]

I swear I did a double take when I saw it. First time in almost 24 years of playing. Save is officially put away too. When I have more time, I will investigate how Shaka decided on this. Would also be interesting to see if the AI manages to use it to carry planes. Damn. This game keeps surprising me.

 

[Posidonius]

I swear I did a double take when I saw it. First time in almost 24 years of playing. Save is officially put away too. When I have more time, I will investigate how Shaka decided on this. Would also be interesting to see if the AI manages to use it to carry planes. Damn. This game keeps surprising me.

Turn the tables on the AI! Load your Militia on a Trireme and lure the Carrier into attacking you. Everyone knows that Militia units are the achilles heel of expensive ships. They always wipe out my Battleships

 

[Mize]

Well, their carrier would not attack, it just followed my fleet around, like most ships with weak attack do. The AI did manage to land a fighter on it by accident, it was in the way of the city the fighter was attempting to go home to. I did a save then, and a test: the fighter did attack my bombers from the carrier, but after that it returned to a city again. It just might be possible to lure them both out to open sea and check if the AI knows how use the carrier as a landing base if no cities are near enough. I haven't tried that yet, though.

 

[Posidonius]

The AI did manage to land a fighter on it by accident, it was in the way of the city the fighter was attempting to go home to. I did a save then, and a test: the fighter did attack my bombers from the carrier.

That's fantastic, and you're in uncharted waters here. I have never (ever) seen anything like that.

 

[Civinator]

Since the release of Civ I, I was waiting for such a news!

 

[C1v1l1z@t10n]

Nice try, I'm not buying it, the screenshot doesn't look real. The map shows different from the minimap in the upper left corner, it shows black undiscovered land.
The computer would NEVER name a city only W so unless you built it and they took it from you... you are the Green player... and green player is Bulgaria which is you... who built the Carrier also. The screenshot says Battleship but not which screen, so you could have a Battleship in another screen, move to this and make it look like you are the Red Player.
I guess a photoshop would be easier LOL.

 

[C1v1l1z@t10n]

so much strange in that image, population is too small for green but too large for red... yeah a one city can be that size, but look the city is located with too much water spaces, even if there are 2 with fish you cannot build a huge city in that space...

 

[Mize]

Why don't you try photoshopping these here two saves, then?

 

[C1v1l1z@t10n]

Thanks Mize, sorry if I was a bit aggressive in my post, it is much possible it is true, I just played the game too much and never seen it, but maybe you got a special setup and due to your city is so far from the computers he actually build a carrier. thanks for the save file, I will check it out thanks!

 

[Mize]

No problem. It just baffled me that someone would think I'd fake it. I mean, what's in it for me?
Theoretically, it can be faked by hacking: by switching sides and building a carrier on behalf of the AI, but I did nothing of that sort.
I suspect they built it not so much due to my setup, but due to them having maxed out. Large AI civs will sometimes start building palaces all over the place when they can't figure out what to do. The Zulus were kind of in that stage and a carrier might have sneaked in their build list.

 

[C1v1l1z@t10n]

Used the save game, still some things that doesn't make up, the strangest is that you got ONE city the whole time... how come no one ever built an enemy city, surely Zulu must have sent boats and loaded off troops?
You break a lot or peace in the beginning which should make the computers to not trust you, when you met Zulu the first time 20AD and they had 10+ city and you just one... how could they accept peace?
3480 BC: Bulgarians declare war on Chinese
3060 BC: Bulgarians declare war on French
3040 BC: Bulgarians make peace with French
3040 BC: Bulgarians declare war on French
20 AD: Bulgarians make peace with Zulus
????

When I try to live in peace the computer even if in peace they always drop solders on my squares, demand more and more money/techs until I have nothing more and they declare war... you got one city and Zulu so many...

You build the right wonders, and republic early to get a lot of research early, but still one city on Emperor with Zulu huge.... how can you lead research with one city the whole time?
In your save game you got 2 NONE settler, nice... but you NEVER build a single city... how did you get them? you must build a city far away and then build a Settler to do this... how did you get two? and all the cities you conquer are destroyed so it cannot be them, you could have started with one extra settler but not 2 NONE extra Settlers
3060 BC: Bulgarians declare war on French
3060 BC: Orleans destroyed
3040 BC: Bulgarians declare war on French
3040 BC: Paris destroyed
3000 BC: Germans found the city of Berlin
3000 BC: Berlin destroyed
3000 BC: German civilization destroyed by Bulgarians
How come no one declared war on you? and even if they didn't at least they drop off troops on your land and block resources.

The map looks strange also, you have discovered land that isn't natural, an island and you see some water outside it that is not by boat or land unit, only flight.... which is possible you had a carrier and sent out a bomber to check the island... still looks strange, like switch nation and get their map too.

Did you modify and gave Bulgaria a lot of money? or any other tweaks?
Super strange with one city only, and not even a single river or alike, just plain and a lot of worthless water, the location of your only city isn't even good, and still you manage to beat off all on your island, research the good technology, keep peace with crazy Zulu and still lead the tech race... send a spaceship, build carries, bombers, Battleship... to me it sounds like a modification to add money so you can have 100% tech and still buy a unit or building each turn?

 

[Mize]

No modifications or hacks used, only the occasional save/reload. Having only one city and winning the space race is the main point of the one city challenge.
IIRC, in that game I got 2 settlers at the start and got my capital out of a hut. Sea squares are most certainly not useless, especially in a one city challenge, they get you the most trade. Thus, city location in this game was obviously good, after all it gave me a tech lead and a win in the end.

Eliminating early rivals without declaring war probably means I didn't talk to them before I attacked, or that they just had a defenseless capital city. I don't care about the AI not trusting me, as long as it's dead. Also, I believe the 'trust' mechanic you mention is very rudimentary in civ I - the AI here only cares about you as a potential threat and it doesn't really give a damn if you break peace with other civs or not.

Keeping peace early in an OCC is actually quite easy. Just spend all your money on buildings and the Zulus or whoever is going for you can't ask for much. Give them scraps of cash or ancient technology and they'll leave you alone until you can build up. Later, when all AI civs turn more aggressive, you have to fight them, but with a tech lead that becomes easy. A battleship on your coast and a couple of armor units can defend against almost any invasion. If you're at peace you can either bribe units that land on your territory or prevent them from landing at all by blocking your shores with units.

You are correct about my carrier and the scouting of land with flying units. Carriers are VERY useful in OCC for many reasons. For starters, you can grind down rivals anywhere you want. Even if you don't destroy their cities, you can use bombers to pillage mines and reduce their production. Secondly, carriers give you about as much bang for their buck as possible - you pay 1 shield per turn for a unit that is basically undefeatable and can move anywhere. Throw in a couple of bombers and you can project power anywhere.

 

[C1v1l1z@t10n]

Yeah your story checks in and sounds possible even if extreme, I still find it very strange but strange things can happen.

Huge thanks for the save file and explanation, it is really cool that computer AI can build and by mistake use Carriers with flight, I hope I get to see that one day also, I play a bit too much command and conquer than 1 city and let computer be huge, so it could be my play style that makes this probably not happen for me.

 

[Mize]

Which C&C do you play and do you know about the CnCNet project? I only play the first C&C from '95, but the server also supports Red Alert 1 and 2, Tiberian Sun, Dune 2000 and an assortment of mods.

 

[C1v1l1z@t10n]

C&C ah, sorry meant in Civilization just build chariots and take over but I have played old Command and Conquer game in the old days, loved it... and Red Alert but it was 15+ years since last time. Next vacation I will look into that

 

[Mize]

Haha. Well, since I basically only play these two games and maybe occasionally one or two more very old ones, it's easy to make that mistake for me.

 

[tupi]

I hope Darkpanda someday will help us to understand this Carrier case. Well, Zulu Empire is very far and W... does not have access to the sea, so this is not very typical situation. Nobody knows what behavior routine for civ 1 AI looks like and what AI theoretically can do in some if-else branches but practically never does. One city challenge is not quite a normal game, so maybe it helped. But after all it can be that AI never builds Carriers and this was only a glitch, some wrong memory reading for 'what to build' or something.

Today I decided to try OCC on King (never win OCC higher than on Prince before) and I saw Barbarian Chariots for the first time (I think) after about 2000 or so games. Maybe it's not so rare for you, but it was definetelly bizarre for me to see it. I knew as the rule of nature that Barbarians always are Cavalry, Legions, Diplomats, Knights, Musketeers, Cannons, Sails and Frigates. I skip message too fast, but maybe it was an analogue to guerilla message (musketeers, cannons, diplomat). 880 AD. Maybe my usual playstyle's just not so conductive for such game behavior.

Also I guess I never saw some dialog options from king.txt: HELPME and CRUSADE. But about these maybe AI use them but virtually only on easy diffs, I vaguelly remember them from my childhood. After all, AI never offers me all techs and money either (or even a single tech, not money), but I perfectly remember that and I know AI can do it on lower levels. But about HELPME and CRUSADE it can be nothing but false memories, like ones about AI Democracy. Or maybe AI world empire with peaceful leader CAN switch to Democracy sometimes?.. Who knows (except Darkpanda, anyway).

 

[Mize]

Quick update. In my latest game the Mongols built a carrier (they built two, actually, but one got either killed or disbanded at some point). After my spaceship landed, I decided to monitor the carrier (using the 'shift+5,6 cheat' hack for version 05 by tupi). A bomber landed on it, but only by chance. On the previous turn the bomber flew out of a city, on the next one the carrier moved first and got closer to the bomber than the city was, the bomber's pathfinding then landed it on the carrier (I suspect the AI uses the 'home' command to land bombers). Next turn: carrier moves first, bomber flies out far away. Next turn: carrier moves further away, bomber crashes because it has nowhere to land. So maybe that's why the AI is technically forbidden from building carriers, because it doesn't have a clue how to use them properly.

 

[tupi]

Wow, only today thank to your post I first used H command as "goto to closest city/carrier" for air units. I knew for a long time that AI uses H command this way (darkpanda posted long listing for AI units, and this H command was here) but I still did not try to use this command myself. It is not in 'orders' menu, and I never knew about it!

And yes, there is no proper AI for carriers so they are prohibited. Probably their programming would be too much work. This reminds me demolition squads from Warcraft II.

AI nuclears, caravans and diplomats are kinda cheaty in their behaviour, but at least they exist. But carriers were cut entirely.

 

[Theov]