Now that im nearly 2 months into playing the game, I finally realized that all the AI's in all the custom games I've faced now have NEVER declared war on one another, except ME! I've started being a little nicer to the AI though by giving them tribute, accepting almost all their trades, giving them gifts randomly that I don't think will be gamebreaking, and even convincing them to convert to my religion. But even if I get a couple of civs to like me alot, they sometimes still declare war on me, probably only because im not putting much emphasis on military. But still, why does the AI always favor war with the human player over other computer opponents? Is checking on "AI favors war over Diplomacy" the only way to fix this? I've never played with it before. But still, I wish the AI civs would hate each other a little more every now and then instead of LOVE each other all the time, because it really puts alot of pressure on me to declare war on someone when I could potentially make everyone else an enemy. Anyone have some advice?
AI never fights each other
- Thread starter Manick
- Start date
Lone Wolf
Deity
- Joined
- Dec 4, 2006
- Messages
- 9,908
Taken from the linked thread:
What of read of even deity suggests that, at their best, the human can roughly match the diplomatic "skills" of the AI. It's not the difficulty setting that I'm looking at here; it's the skills of the players attempting that difficulty setting.
Only the human can be weak at diplomacy.
One of my favorite random events is the faux pas event occurring between two "enemy" AI. Outside of that and religion, I just don't feel there's enough "hatred" between AIs to sow the seeds of centuries of warfare. Even once those seeds are sown, and war has taken place, it's still ridiculously easy to rebuild relations and overcome the various warfare associated -ves.
And this doesn't include the phony wars.
I think that's hits the problem right there. The AI is effective enough at military build up that only extreme diplomatic relations foment into war.
What of read of even deity suggests that, at their best, the human can roughly match the diplomatic "skills" of the AI. It's not the difficulty setting that I'm looking at here; it's the skills of the players attempting that difficulty setting.
Only the human can be weak at diplomacy.
One of my favorite random events is the faux pas event occurring between two "enemy" AI. Outside of that and religion, I just don't feel there's enough "hatred" between AIs to sow the seeds of centuries of warfare. Even once those seeds are sown, and war has taken place, it's still ridiculously easy to rebuild relations and overcome the various warfare associated -ves.
And this doesn't include the phony wars.
How do the developers balance the AI so that it will fully pursue other AIs without crushing the player?
That is to say, more gamers would be upset if they were routinely challenged to the point of defeat by AI SoDs than are upset by the inability of the AI to fight wars (at all).
Popcornlord
Steampunk Mechanic
- Joined
- Oct 18, 2007
- Messages
- 787
I've never really encountered this problem. Of course, most of the time I try to get the computer on my side long enough to suprise attack them. 
Edit: Woops, just realized this is for warlords, which I don't have.
Edit: Woops, just realized this is for warlords, which I don't have.
Thain Esh Kelch
Chieftain
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2003
- Messages
- 76
While I definately have to admit that the AI favors war against me, I've seen loads of AI vs. AI wars.
I always play custom games with the checkbox set for "Aggressive AI". While that will increase the AI's willingness to attack the human player as well, it's about the only way I've seen to get the AI to each other in any significant way.
Also, as you play higher difficulty levels, there's an added bias that makes the AI treat the player worse. It's not an overt modifier, but the definition of "Cautious" and "Annoyed" changes a little. This can really add up eventually. Open Borders is usually one of the quickest and easiest ways to get diplomacy moving in the right direction, but if you can't even start that, you end up mired at a low level that the AI's won't have with each other.
Also, as you play higher difficulty levels, there's an added bias that makes the AI treat the player worse. It's not an overt modifier, but the definition of "Cautious" and "Annoyed" changes a little. This can really add up eventually. Open Borders is usually one of the quickest and easiest ways to get diplomacy moving in the right direction, but if you can't even start that, you end up mired at a low level that the AI's won't have with each other.
ChicagoCubs
Prince
- Joined
- Mar 6, 2006
- Messages
- 361
Also, the AI isn't that interested in war as long as there is space to expand. Increase the number of civs on the given map size, and you'll see more AI vs. AI war.
MonRiverMonarch
Oar Master
The barbarians are the ones who will walk right past one of your weaker opponents and attack you...or build 2 or 3 cities surrounding you. But, I'm only an average player so maybe they recognize a weakness!
dagriggstar
King
surely there is a mod where AI's are more likely to declare war on each other...
(guess who's too lazy to find it)
(guess who's too lazy to find it)
The Fishman
Resident Megalomaniac
When they do go to war its usually a bit pathetic. They almost never make real territorial changes, and either give up or vassalise the other civ. There are some exceptions, I recently saw all the Muslims and some of the opposing Christians (choose religions was on) go after Confucian Egypt, and they completely butchered it! But it took hundreds of years to do it, and as enough Chinese stack 'o' dooms to conquer half the planet had marched across my territory, it begs the question 'why did they stink so badly?'.
Civfan333
full metal alchemist
this may seem REALLY obvious, but what difficulty are you playing on?
The Fishman
Resident Megalomaniac
I play noble. But if, as the original poster was saying, the AI declares war on the human quite a lot the difficulty is not going to be something like settler where nothing bad ever happens and you can get people angry all you want without them fighting back.
Civfan333
full metal alchemist
yeah, if he told us what difficulty he's playing on, it'd be a LOT easier too find out what's wrong...and then we could give him some tips..
JimTheGreat
Chieftain
- Joined
- Dec 2, 2005
- Messages
- 15
I haven't played CivIV since before the 2.13 patch came out. I quit playing because the AI were too friendly. I always enabled the aggressive AI, and played small-medium maps crammed with lots of AI in it hoping to have wars early on to fight for territory. Only once did I ever see an AI civ wipe out another one.
The last game I remember playing, just as an experiment I purposely did not build many military units. I only had the conquest, cultural and domination victories enabled. I only kept one defensive unit in each city that bordered another civ's territory. I had massive cultural influence and lots of happy citizens, but I was the weakest in terms of military strength.
I made it all the way into the modern era before an AI civ declared war on me. The AI did have a few small wars with each other, but nothing major, each only lasted a few turns, and from what I could tell all they did was cross the other's border and destroy a few tile improvements. They would try to get me to help, and I would refuse, which is probably the reason I was eventually attacked.
As soon as the AI declared war on me, I switched all cities to producing military units. I was somewhat impressed by the AI's tactics, he had his military units staged outside of my borders in the "fog," and he declared war on me and marched his army across my border and took out three cities in one turn. The AI was able to take over about of my territory before I built up a strong enough military to defend what I had left. As soon as I won a couple of battles, he came begging for peace.
I remember the AI being a lot more aggressive in Civ III. I remember one game where I was on a continent with two civ's on each side of me. They declared to war with each other. I stayed neutral, but did not have open borders with either one. If you never played Civ III, in Civ III you could cross the borders without declaring war, but you could contact them and tell them to leave and they had one turn to leave before their units were booted back to their territory. My territory completely separated them, so they either had to go through me or transport around me in the water. This was still fairly early in the game right around the start of the medieval period, so ships were still primitive. I kept forcing their units out of my territory, until they started offering me things for open borders. I ended up giving open borders to the highest offer.
It was fun watching that war while. Later on after they settled their differences, the civ that I refused to let through my territory declared war on me. That was actually the largest civ on the continent, but I was able to defend myself, and after a while he gave up.
The other continent had 4 civs on it, and they were constantly having battles, even wiping one civ out.
The last game I remember playing, just as an experiment I purposely did not build many military units. I only had the conquest, cultural and domination victories enabled. I only kept one defensive unit in each city that bordered another civ's territory. I had massive cultural influence and lots of happy citizens, but I was the weakest in terms of military strength.
I made it all the way into the modern era before an AI civ declared war on me. The AI did have a few small wars with each other, but nothing major, each only lasted a few turns, and from what I could tell all they did was cross the other's border and destroy a few tile improvements. They would try to get me to help, and I would refuse, which is probably the reason I was eventually attacked.
As soon as the AI declared war on me, I switched all cities to producing military units. I was somewhat impressed by the AI's tactics, he had his military units staged outside of my borders in the "fog," and he declared war on me and marched his army across my border and took out three cities in one turn. The AI was able to take over about of my territory before I built up a strong enough military to defend what I had left. As soon as I won a couple of battles, he came begging for peace.
I remember the AI being a lot more aggressive in Civ III. I remember one game where I was on a continent with two civ's on each side of me. They declared to war with each other. I stayed neutral, but did not have open borders with either one. If you never played Civ III, in Civ III you could cross the borders without declaring war, but you could contact them and tell them to leave and they had one turn to leave before their units were booted back to their territory. My territory completely separated them, so they either had to go through me or transport around me in the water. This was still fairly early in the game right around the start of the medieval period, so ships were still primitive. I kept forcing their units out of my territory, until they started offering me things for open borders. I ended up giving open borders to the highest offer.
It was fun watching that war while. Later on after they settled their differences, the civ that I refused to let through my territory declared war on me. That was actually the largest civ on the continent, but I was able to defend myself, and after a while he gave up.The other continent had 4 civs on it, and they were constantly having battles, even wiping one civ out.
Civfan333
full metal alchemist
you can just tweak some code to make them MORE aggressive...
You kind of have to force them to have war with one another - It's complicated, messy, and often difficult, especially at higher difficulties.
But if you do, they either won't fight at all, leaving you save as well, OR they'll fight and tear into each other, and you can take over. Then again, in the latter case, it tends to be one sided. It is something they can improve on immensly, though.
At the same time, I think it's meant to sway down the difficulty a bit. If you end up a country who conquered everyone else, you're bound to lose.
But if you do, they either won't fight at all, leaving you save as well, OR they'll fight and tear into each other, and you can take over. Then again, in the latter case, it tends to be one sided. It is something they can improve on immensly, though.
At the same time, I think it's meant to sway down the difficulty a bit. If you end up a country who conquered everyone else, you're bound to lose.
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