A.I. dosen't know when to call it a day

[holiday_hawk]

I have captured or razed half of their cities, beat them back the few times they tried to recapture there city, my empire is like 2.5 times his size so i can outproduce him with troops, and i way out tech him but he refuses any thing but a white peace. Is this just me doing something wrong or is the A.I. like this no matter what to there down to one city, i remember on Civ III they would just give you all their gold and cities for peace and now i have to hope to get a bit of there gold once my stack starts getting to small to continue conquest.

 

[Crowqueen]

Who are you fighting and on what difficulty are you playing? It makes a difference as different leaders respond in a different way.

It also looks like that is one of the "fixes" from Civ III. I haven't ever played it properly (two abortive games and I gave up because it was too different from what I was used to with Civ II) but there are some exploits that got toughened up in Civ IV.

 

[Roland Johansen]

I have captured or razed half of their cities, beat them back the few times they tried to recapture there city, my empire is like 2.5 times his size so i can outproduce him with troops, and i way out tech him but he refuses any thing but a white peace. Is this just me doing something wrong or is the A.I. like this no matter what to there down to one city, i remember on Civ III they would just give you all their gold and cities for peace and now i have to hope to get a bit of there gold once my stack starts getting to small to continue conquest.

So your idea of a good AI is one that gives you all of its gold and cities once your stacks are getting too small to continue conquest?

Nah, I'm just messing with you. But if one reads your post literally, then that's the logical conclusion. I can imagine that if you come from civ3, then you get the feeling that the AI in civ4 is a lot more stubborn. In civ3, you could capture or destroy half the AI's cities while losing most of your offensive abilities and then in the peace treaty the AI would give you anything you wanted. And you could directly break that peace treaty that same turn and kill that civilisation off. If you're used to that, then the AI in civ4 will seem impossibly stubborn.

In civ4, you can't immediately break a peace treaty anymore and the AI values cities a whole lot higher than in civ3. It knows that if it has to give you it's whole empire just for a peace treaty, then the value of continued existence is close to zero. You won't ever see a human player in a multiplayer game give you most of his cities just so that you grant him a peace treaty and 10 more turns of existence. It's just not a fair deal. And in civ4, a peace treaty must be somewhat acceptable for the AI to agree.

The AI will give you a few hundred up to maybe a few thousand in gold if you're really whipping his ass (losing almost no units and killing your opponent at will), but normally the AI doesn't have that much gold in reserve when it's fighting a war. On the other hand, technologies and big cities in the late game have a far higher value than a few thousand gold. So it might not have a lot to offer for peace. You can often get a smaller city or a lower value technology or an already partially researched higher value technology in return for peace. And you can often get some resources or gold per turn in return for peace.

With the expansion pack Warlords (or BTS), the AI is also willing to become your vassal when you're really whipping his ass. That's something like a complete surrender.

 

[BakingTheArt]

I'm not sure if this is what you're talking about, but I would conquer all but two of a civ's cities, and he'd have, like, two archers in each of them.

He'd offer me peace for three of MY most valuable techs, and 1000 gold. >_<

 

[holiday_hawk]

I'm not sure if this is what you're talking about, but I would conquer all but two of a civ's cities, and he'd have, like, two archers in each of them.

He'd offer me peace for three of MY most valuable techs, and 1000 gold. >_<

Thats happened to me a time or two they refuse to understand that there losing so they demand stuff from me

And you could directly break that peace treaty that same turn and kill that civilisation off.

Yeah i remember the good ol days lol, but i've never been much of a warmonger on civ IV yet, i usually go for space or cultural win this was one of the first times going for a conquest and reading your post i guess they've buff up the A.I.'s ability to just cave into demands i'm going to play another conquest oriented game and try to get a feel for the new A.I.'s reaction to war

 

[Roland Johansen]

I'm not sure if this is what you're talking about, but I would conquer all but two of a civ's cities, and he'd have, like, two archers in each of them.

He'd offer me peace for three of MY most valuable techs, and 1000 gold. >_<

Thats happened to me a time or two they refuse to understand that there losing so they demand stuff from me



Yeah i remember the good ol days lol, but i've never been much of a warmonger on civ IV yet, i usually go for space or cultural win this was one of the first times going for a conquest and reading your post i guess they've buff up the A.I.'s ability to just cave into demands i'm going to play another conquest oriented game and try to get a feel for the new A.I.'s reaction to war

I've never had the AI demanding stuff from me when they were clearly losing the war. I don't know exactly how it is programmed, but I do know that the AI looks at the power rating of its own civilisation and your civilisation (Power is not score, it's military power, see the F9 graph) when it is deciding to go to war. So I would expect the AI to also look at the power ratings when it is considering peace.

Maybe it has a lot to do with relative losses. Maybe if you're winning a war, but sustaining a high amount of casualties, then the AI thinks it is doing well in the war. It wouldn't be a weird way to program the AI but of course sometimes the victorious civilisation is sustaining higher losses. I'm never in the situation where I'm winning the war but sustaining high losses, so I can't evaluate that situation.

 

[Iranon]

I think it also looks a little on how power values change; if I am secure in winning a war and building up infrastructure while my opponent is churning out units they can continue losing for a long time before they start taking your offense seriously.

When you're churning out troops yourself and your power rating shoots up while theirs goes down, they sometimes offer way more than they should for peace... even if all those troops are on the other side of your empire fending off a backstabber.

 

[deanej]

It goes exclusively by troop losses when deciding if it's winning. Firaxis really needs to make the AI understand that it can win the battle but lose the war.

 

[ignacz]

The AI in that regard definitely needs to be better.

Also, Civ II had the best perception as far as real life treaties go. I remember being able to fairly easily get a city through negotiation.

During one game of Civ IV, Spain, with whom I thought I was having very good relations joined a surprise war against me, and seized a fairly important city for me early on. Since I shared the border with Spain, I concentrated my efforts on them. Since the other Civ (I believe Greeks) had great distances to fight me, I made them do all the work.

As the war went on, I reduced Spain to their capital, and one connected city, and the city that had seized from me--a good distance and disconnected from their main territory, which I wasn't ever able to recapture. I ended the war, but no matter what I threw in the hopper (including tens of thousands in gold or even hundreds per turn), no dice on the city.

I could've easily destroyed their entire Civ with a few more turns, but I wanted to move away from defense production. I figured I would surround the city with culture.

While Spain struggled to maintain the city and civil disorder constantly plagued the city reducing it's size to less than 5 for hundreds of years the city never turned, nor would Spain ever negotiate for it. Even all the resources for the city were in my territory.

I have had the same frustrations on "new worlds" where I'll have basically the entire landmass save for one small city that constantly has the same problems as the city above.

Civ II this was much more negotiable. Now the only way to take is a city is to draw blood.

 

[Roland Johansen]

As the war went on, I reduced Spain to their capital, and one connected city, and the city that had seized from me--a good distance and disconnected from their main territory, which I wasn't ever able to recapture. I ended the war, but no matter what I threw in the hopper (including tens of thousands in gold or even hundreds per turn), no dice on the city.

You're making this up. The game doesn't even allow GPT deals versus one shot deals like a city. You can't even offer such a deal. Never, not in a peace treaty and not in a normal deal during peace time.
And in a peace treaty, it is also not allowed to have both parties offer something for the peace. It isn't allowed by the game, so you can't have offered it. The game just doesn't accept such deals.

 

[ignacz]

I realize that the treaties can only be one-sided in terms of conditions.

The deals involving gold were post-war negotiations. Perhaps I didn't make that clear.

And I guess I probably didn't do the GPT offering since that's not an option. (I'm not that observant on all the intricacies of the game.)

The rest is true. And it should be a more flexible aspect of the AI.

 

[I_Scorpio]

It goes exclusively by troop losses when deciding if it's winning. Firaxis really needs to make the AI understand that it can win the battle but lose the war.

I think if the AI is losing relatively less troops, i.e. the attacker is sustaining significantly higher casualties then it's perfectly reasonable to refuse a humiliating peace treaty. Isn't that what a human player would do, too? I think the AI in this regard made a good decision, as the OP mentioned he could not sustain the invasion any longer. In its calculations, the AI is making a perfectly reasonable offer of a white peace.

 

[Pitman]

The AI is screwed up when it comes to surrender. It doesn't know how to buy its way into survival. I have lost count of the number of times that I have completely crushed an AI opponent, and am willing to let it survive for some goodies, but even though it is otherwise doomed, it won't deal. So guess what? It gets eliminated.

What the game needs is a sliding scale of peace. The AI gives you more (cities, tech, whatever) but in turn gets more than simply 10 turns of guaranteed peace, it gets 20 or 30 or whatever. That way, it survives, you get your loot, everybody's happy.

 

[deanej]

Agreed. It should also be possible to make deals of both sides for peace, as this has happened numerous times in real life. You won't see anything like the Congress of Vienna in civ, because it's not allowed. It would also fix the inability to get cities out of a treaty with Alexander even if they aren't redded out.

I think if the AI is losing relatively less troops, i.e. the attacker is sustaining significantly higher casualties then it's perfectly reasonable to refuse a humiliating peace treaty. Isn't that what a human player would do, too? I think the AI in this regard made a good decision, as the OP mentioned he could not sustain the invasion any longer. In its calculations, the AI is making a perfectly reasonable offer of a white peace.

If I can produce units to replace those lost it isn't such a good call on the part of the AI, is it? And what if I have many more units? If I lose 5 units for every 1 of his, but am able to take city after city and am still as powerful or more powerful as the AI, does that mean the AI is winning the war?

 

[Roland Johansen]

I realize that the treaties can only be one-sided in terms of conditions.

The deals involving gold were post-war negotiations. Perhaps I didn't make that clear.

And I guess I probably didn't do the GPT offering since that's not an option. (I'm not that observant on all the intricacies of the game.)

The rest is true. And it should be a more flexible aspect of the AI.

Ah, you were trying to buy a city during peace. Yes, that doesn't work. The AI just doesn't sell their cities during peace time.

Cities are the building blocks of your civilisation and as such are extremely valuable. I've never considered selling one of my own cities during peace time.

If the AI would be programmed to be able to sell cities in diplomacy, then you can essentially buy their empire because how can you let them sell city A and not city B? In civ2, you could maximize your gold output and completely buy an empire city by city with spies. The worst element of this option was that it was extremely efficient compared to normal war efforts. I personally found this one of the worst elements of the game and I'm not alone in this opinion. Spies were considered overpowered by many in civilisation 2. There was almost nothing you could do to stop spies from buying cities.

But I guess, you don't mean buying cities with spies, but just during diplomacy. But there is still the very hard element to learn the AI which cities should be available for sale and which cities shouldn't be available. The position of a city could change as cultural borders can shift and thus you can try to expand the borders of a city under pressure and maybe the city can become valuable again later and maybe it shouldn't be available for sale.

 

[holiday_hawk]

I think if the AI is losing relatively less troops, i.e. the attacker is sustaining significantly higher casualties then it's perfectly reasonable to refuse a humiliating peace treaty. Isn't that what a human player would do, too? I think the AI in this regard made a good decision, as the OP mentioned he could not sustain the invasion any longer. In its calculations, the AI is making a perfectly reasonable offer of a white peace.

I may have lost more men than him but i captured 4 of his 12 cities, and i know that i would want out of a war if i was losing cities left and right even if my opponent was losing lots of troops

Well, i have another tale of the A.I. unreasonable demands in war, i was playing 1000 A.D. (the game i asked if it was winnable or not) and i captured 3 of the Arabians cities losing only one troop. As i was capturing North Africa and whatever city is on southern Italy the Byzantines were annoying me so i decided to finish them off now and I didn't want any odd galleys bringing troops or the Arabs to attack North Africa while i was focusing on Greece so i brought up Saladin thinking i was going to be able to get gold or some techs seeing how i just captured 3 of his cities and lost one macemen and guess what? HE wants me to give HIM some tech, at the time i just wanted out of the war and to focus on the Byzantines so i accepted it and went on with life but i don't see how the A.I. thinks

 

[Tibur753]

Saladin starts out in a very powerful position with a ton of cities and units. This seems to be proof that they take power into consideration too. Also, three cities isn't mush to the Arabs in 1000 AD.

 

[Roland Johansen]

Well, i have another tale of the A.I. unreasonable demands in war, i was playing 1000 A.D. (the game i asked if it was winnable or not) and i captured 3 of the Arabians cities losing only one troop. As i was capturing North Africa and whatever city is on southern Italy the Byzantines were annoying me so i decided to finish them off now and I didn't want any odd galleys bringing troops or the Arabs to attack North Africa while i was focusing on Greece so i brought up Saladin thinking i was going to be able to get gold or some techs seeing how i just captured 3 of his cities and lost one macemen and guess what? HE wants me to give HIM some tech, at the time i just wanted out of the war and to focus on the Byzantines so i accepted it and went on with life but i don't see how the A.I. thinks

Hmm, that's weird. I rarely have trouble getting out of a war like the one you described without any payments from me and with some minor payments from my enemy.

In what order did you do these deals? Did you first declare war on the Greeks and then tried to get peace with the Arabs or the other way around. The reason that I ask that is because the AI does consider if you're at war with other enemies when it evaluates its position. An AI is for instance more willing to declare war on you when you're already at war with another civilisation.

The only other thing that I could think of is maybe relative power rating. It does matter how the relative power rating develops during a war. So if the enemy is a lot stronger than you at the start of the war and is still a lot stronger when you've captured 3 cities, then it will not be so willing to sign a peace treaty. You can find the power rating in the graphs in the Info Screen (F9).

 

[holiday_hawk]

Hmm, that's weird. I rarely have trouble getting out of a war like the one you described without any payments from me and with some minor payments from my enemy.

In what order did you do these deals? Did you first declare war on the Greeks and then tried to get peace with the Arabs or the other way around. The reason that I ask that is because the AI does consider if you're at war with other enemies when it evaluates its position. An AI is for instance more willing to declare war on you when you're already at war with another civilisation.

The only other thing that I could think of is maybe relative power rating. It does matter how the relative power rating develops during a war. So if the enemy is a lot stronger than you at the start of the war and is still a lot stronger when you've captured 3 cities, then it will not be so willing to sign a peace treaty. You can find the power rating in the graphs in the Info Screen (F9).

When the scenario began i was at war with the Arabs and the Byzantines don't have a ruler you can contact so i am always at war with them

 

[Roland Johansen]

When the scenario began i was at war with the Arabs and the Byzantines don't have a ruler you can contact so i am always at war with them

Ok, in that case, your strength is compared to the combined strength of your enemies to see whether you're a threatening opponent. And I guess that your power is fairly weak compared to the combined strength of both civilisations. So for the AI it must seem fairly attractive to continue the war.