A hypothesis that needs testing

[SkyRattlers]

I was just wondering if anyone has done any studies on whether terrain has any impact on which of the AI civs will cause a player the most trouble. ie. the 1 or 2 AI's in each game that cause you the most difficulty....is it because they have the best terrains? Does this pattern hold true for all games?

 

[SirJethro]

Better terrain = better production/population = better peformance.

 

[WildFire]

Or it could be that yeah they had good starting position but also they found plenty of goody huts and they got tech instead of gold. So instead of being behind you, they might be equal or even ahead of you.
ex. My current game, the Iriqouis are about 2x as big as me and that is huge! They had plenty of land becuase they settled good enough that no one could get by them. Now they are researching steam power while i'm getting Democracy!

 

[Allemand]

Starting position is the most important factor in the early game, not only for your capital but also for your position versus the other civs. The AI doesn't do as well as the human at blocking and pushing back opponents.

The Iroquois is an expansionist civ, meaning they should expand a bit faster than normal, especially if they find one or two settlers in the huts. But if they are cut off by other civs, they will have problems.

 

[MSGT John Drew]

in one game I had, the Aztecs had the greatest land area of any civ (including me) but they were half an age behind. The jungle terrain they were put in really set them back.

 

[Theseus]

AI civ success derives from a combination of a number of factors:

* Starting terrain
* World age (especially 3B)
* Area per civ and distance between civs
* Civ traits
* Number of early neighbors
* Human interference / aggression
* RNG results (best seen in tournaments and group games)

VERY successful AI civs usually result from a self-reinforcing cycle of the above factors, whereby the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer.

Try playing a few games with the following set-up:

* 3B, wet, warm, continents, 60% water
* One less civ than allowed for a given map size
* Make sure that AI civs include France, Germany, Greece, Egypt, Persia, and Japan

Not ever time, but this will often result in some great AI civs.

 

[gugalpm]

Terrain is by far the most important matter in civ...
One game I had the luck of having an entire continent to myself... but I didn't colonized it all... one part was all of jungles... left that alone... and build acity in an isthmus that blocked my continent from interference of the later AI colonized part... conquering their cities with each war...

 

[Free Enterprise]

Originally posted by MSGT John Drew
The jungle terrain they were put in really set them back.

This is indeed very true. I have seen many a computer foe *TOTALLY* crippled from starting in the jungles, it is worse than if they had tried a desert wasteland. They often are stuck using spearmen until some other computer "friend" donates Nationalism....

 

[Pillager]

In each of my last few games, the strongest AI civ has started with 2 cattle in its first city radius. Obviously, as Theseus showed above, there are other factors that are important, having cattle can make the difference, particularly if you have two right from the start.