Is the AI better at war now?

[Hormagaunt]

Specifically, war at sea. My answer is No.

A while back I posted a thread "I love this game!". I posted it because I, as a casual player of Civ4, beat a Deity Duel game of Civ5 on my 4th try.

A couple of nights ago, I ran another one. Duel, Islands, Elizabeth. I pulled Ghandi again as my opponent. After a while in, he was handily outperforming me so I quit. Ran another one. Got Monty as the opponent.

I went after him with 2 triremes, 2 longbowmen, and 4 warriors. Hammered his city from outside his range (a couple of islands had me in range of his capital). Killed everything that sailed out from under the city's protection. Landed troops, lost 'em, killed the Jaguars that were exposed by their sacrifice. Landed more troops, took his capital.

So, as a casual player of 4, I've now chalked up my second Deity win in Civ5. Sure, it was a cheap win, optimal civ on optimal board, but I'm not an expert player; I shouldn't be able to do it. At Deity level the computer should always hand me my head. It doesn't.

Sooner or later I should try on a Pangea map.

 

[masonryan]

lol not at all ai still sucks at war and everything else.

 

[McRoos]

Not at all.
I still hardly loose whatever unit.

 

[Truthy]

I don't think so either. I will usually go through a war losing at most three units.

 

[masonryan]

I don't think so either. I will usually go through a war losing at most three units.

thats just sad a war should make you take more losses than that civ 5 is crap.

 

[Bob_]

Granted, the game is pretty easy compared to IV but if you dont like it you are free to massively increase the difficulty by adding other civilisations to the game.

 

[spfun]

Yep Unit AI is still a big joke, AI still move units all over the show with no next to no tactics even on emperor which i play. were a few changes for the good, but they did next to nothing. But they added in some terrible ones like 'luck' based combat. which i call 'bad luck' based combat.

Game is still easy, recently i played 3 One city challenge, small, Pangaea, standard, emperor & winning all 3 easily. 2 culture victories & 1 diplomatic. Stuff ICS... All you need is one city to beat this game.

 

[LegionSteve]

Combat AI is still generally poor, but I agree with the OP specifically about navy. I thought this was supposed to have been improved, but I haven't noticed much difference. Has anyone seen an AI build an effective navy and use it effectively?

 

[Tabarnak]

With right settings it's easy to beat deity in civ4 as well.

But i agree AI need improvements. It's weird when you think that programmers can do extreme calculations for missiles or spaceships, but no one in the game industry can make a decent AI in a simple game.

I'm not a programmer, but logically some guys on this planet can surely do something for us about AI! Maybe they don't pay them enough...I guess elite programmers have other things really more important to do.

We are going to die in 2012 after all...

Elite programmers will save us from the apocalypse!

 

[Sonereal]

Combat AI is still generally poor, but I agree with the OP specifically about navy. I thought this was supposed to have been improved, but I haven't noticed much difference. Has anyone seen an AI build an effective navy and use it effectively?

I've seen them actually use a navy which is a step-up.

 

[civfan99]

Granted, the game is pretty easy compared to IV but if you dont like it you are free to massively increase the difficulty by adding other civilisations to the game.

this still does not address the issue the op asked about, the ai is still bad at war its not as bad as when the game was first released but its not much better either. While the ai does not put siege, and archers in front most of the time anymore they still have no tactics at all.

 

[zomg]

Personally I noticed a huge improvement in that patch they released to address AI issues, but also I stay away from water maps and typically play pangea variants, so I dont make the AI use its navies much. If they get the tech advantage then they put up a decent fight and can take my cities, and if you get one AI that conquers a swath of the other AI's, which happens a fair amount. For the most part they dont seem to build enough military though, and when they have the advantage they dont push it.

 

[masonryan]

Personally I noticed a huge improvement in that patch they released to address AI issues, but also I stay away from water maps and typically play pangea variants, so I dont make the AI use its navies much. If they get the tech advantage then they put up a decent fight and can take my cities, and if you get one AI that conquers a swath of the other AI's, which happens a fair amount. For the most part they dont seem to build enough military though, and when they have the advantage they dont push it.

they also dont use the military they have correctly.

 

[civfan99]

they also dont use the military they have correctly.

this is one of the main problems I see while they dont lead with archers, seige anymore they still dont employ any tactics, and if they have to cross watter forget about the ai trys but is easly picked off. I just dont see why some games can make a half way competent ai and others just cant seem to pull it off.

 

[SpearMan153]

I find the combat ai on par with every other civ i've played - poor but fun enough

and yeah forget about ai naval invasions (like every other civ i've played). but at least some ais will build a navy

I think that the trouble is on the higher levels the ai cannot utilise their production bonus effectively because with 1upt they cannot deploy all their troops to the front at the same time.

I like the middle levels so this is not a problem for me

 

[Nares]

Granted, the game is pretty easy compared to IV but if you dont like it you are free to massively increase the difficulty by adding other civilisations to the game.

Adding more civs reduces difficulty by making any one civ less threatening, generally.

Especially with the recent changes to cities, which limit the chances of an AI snowballing early by conquering their neighbor(s).

If you want to increase difficulty, select more capable AI leaders. In particular avoid any of the AIs prone to self-OCC or outright DOA status, such as Darius, Elizabeth, or the often braindead Wu Zetian.

 

[civfan99]

I find the combat ai on par with every other civ i've played - poor but fun enough

and yeah forget about ai naval invasions (like every other civ i've played). but at least some ais will build a navy

I think that the trouble is on the higher levels the ai cannot utilise their production bonus effectively because with 1upt they cannot deploy all their troops to the front at the same time.

I like the middle levels so this is not a problem for me

did you play civ 4, with both expansions? I found the combat ai to be much better in bts.

 

[pickle]

The balance between war and research is terrible, if I set the difficulty to a point where the ai can build enough units to have any effect on my army come wartime the other bonuses they get mean that they completely destroy me in tech and without any way to come back from a tech deficit once you get too far behind there is little enjoyment to be had and almost no chance of winning

 

[mekane]

I think the warfare is more interesting the way it is in CiV, this is my favorite part of the game.

The game would definitely benefit from having a smarter AI, and not doing stupid stuff like they still do in naval combat (in my current game, I had a caravel picking off countless infantry in the sea while they could have easily killed me with their destroyers who were right there next to me).

IMO the programmers just aren't very good. If you think of what they can do for the chess AI in just analyzing the possible moves a few steps ahead, you would think they could do the same thing in CiV.

 

[lschnarch]

I think the warfare is more interesting the way it is in CiV, this is my favorite part of the game.

I really think this is the worst what can be said about a CIVILIZATION game.