AI not conquering each other kills this game for me

In civ5 AI was already barely capable of posing a danger to a human player and barely capable of mass conquests, often still losing many units to terrible sieges. But logistics of this game were also really frustrating me as a human - moving units through rough terrain was incredibly tedious and problematic. My worst nightmare in this game was AI founding cities in places like "mountain, river, mountain, jungles, river, swamps, bottleneck, coast" (hills in the 1st ring around the city, plains in the 2nd ring, to ensure you can't shoot at it from afar), which was like 30% of all cities anyway. Two thirds of my frustration in this game were insane siege minigames like this. On the plus side, this design ironically added a lot of challenge to warfare.

Then imagine devs sitting and designing civ6 and one of them saying: 'You know what? I want cities to become way more resistant and movement rules even more horribly painful. Also, some cities will also have a second city center (camp) shooting too. I bet AI will be able to deal with that.'
 
Is it the walls, or is it the fact that every city is defended by uber spartans? I'm not sure how I feel about cities instantaneously adapting to the most modern defences without input. Walls are meant to delay inevitable defeat, not be the the Claw of Archimedes. Not to mention this current system makes garrisons unnecessary.
 
What we need in Civ 6 is a reason for the AI to start to hate each other in late game, just as in Civ 5. The dynamics between AIs are too passive.

The AI is programmed to pursue being loved by other civs, to end wars quicky, and not start wars late game. In other words the AI feels pasive because Fxs made it passive intentionally.

What you ask for, and what many of us have asked for years is not going to happen. Fxs has designed a game were the player is the only civilization capable of dominating the world, but even so. They arguably designed a game where no civ is supposed to do that.

Is not a coincidence that city defenses are so strong, that AI values good relations so much, that large scale wars never happen; or that the AI cannot use modern navys, planes, nukes or AA. The core game concept of Civ VI is to remove the conflict from modernity, and pacifism late game being the "correct" way to play. And as so, they did not even bother to implement those systems properly after 4 years.

The only way I can accurately describe how the game feels is by saying Civilization is a woke game now. Which is mesmerizing cause it also may be the game of the series with more complex and rich combat mechanics; and at the same, may also be the civ game with weakest choices in the war/diplomacy aspect at least since III.

In conclussion I dont think Civ VI knows what kind of game is or wants to be. Yes, it is probably the more interesting civ game in city building and city design. And also the worst game of the entire series in simulation, empire management, diplomacy and war strategy. Imho, it may be the best multiplayer experience of the series, and the worst single player one.

Regardless, it is what it is, and it has been designed to be this way. I have learned after 4 years to stop pretending Civ VI to be what I want it to be, and to stop hopping it will ever be.

I think is just a game that is fun in short doses, if you want to challenge yourself or play building cities, scenarios or in multiplayer. Which is fine, but also probably a game where I should have not spent the time or the money I have. Cause personally I ended pretending to myself that I was enjoying the game more than I actually was.
 
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What settings are you people playing on, anyways? I play on Normal Sized fractal maps typiccally @ normal speed. I know the AI breaks on any island-like maps.

Almost seems like playing a different game here, or maybe something went really wrong in NFP?
 
Simple, they dont because walls in this game are most overpowered thing I ever saw. I use mod which puts walls on about 20% what they are now, and then game is really dynamic.

What is the name of this mod? I tried to search for one like this in the Steam Workshop and I could not find it. I'd love to try it out.

What settings are you people playing on, anyways? I play on Normal Sized fractal maps typiccally @ normal speed. I know the AI breaks on any island-like maps.

Almost seems like playing a different game here, or maybe something went really wrong in NFP?

I play most games on quick or online speed, rarely standard. Pangea maps 8 times out of 10. Island like maps the other times. Difficulty Emperor to Deity, just depends on the game or goal.
 
What is the name of this mod? I tried to search for one like this in the Steam Workshop and I could not find it. I'd love to try it out.

StupidWalls is mod name

And I put these values into .sql file

UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_WALLS';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_STAR_FORT';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_CASTLE';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 20 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_TSIKHE';
UPDATE ModifierArguments SET Value = 25 WHERE ModifierId = 'STEEL_UNLOCK_URBAN_DEFENSES';
 
AI definetely do better on Pangea maps, but still not really conquering.

I just thought about this lecture that was previously linked to, a long time ago in this forum. It's the AI developer for Civ III and IV that talks about all the considerations you have to take into account to create a "fun" AI. And I think the screenshot from the video is some of the problem.
city grill hampstead menu

It's also funny, at some point he talks about how bad the AI is at naval warfare in Civ III and IV because the AI needs to take protection, filling up cargo ships, etc. into account and argues that if the units where just allowed to embark directly into the water, it would solve alot of the issues. Ironic.

 
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StupidWalls is mod name

And I put these values into .sql file

UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_WALLS';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_STAR_FORT';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_CASTLE';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 20 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_TSIKHE';
UPDATE ModifierArguments SET Value = 25 WHERE ModifierId = 'STEEL_UNLOCK_URBAN_DEFENSES';

I think you'd save hundreds if not thousands of souls from damnation if you released this mod on the Steam Workshop :)
 
StupidWalls is mod name

And I put these values into .sql file

UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_WALLS';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_STAR_FORT';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 17 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_CASTLE';
UPDATE Buildings SET OuterDefenseHitPoints = 20 WHERE BuildingType = 'BUILDING_TSIKHE';
UPDATE ModifierArguments SET Value = 25 WHERE ModifierId = 'STEEL_UNLOCK_URBAN_DEFENSES';

Nice! I just loaded it up and about to start a new game. Thanks again!
 
Yeah I`m also interested in giving this a try.

I wanna see more dynamism and maybe even some AI runaways. Could be interesting to combine it with dramatic ages
 
Love this mod already.

Started a new game on Emperor. I picked Inca, and pre-picked war-like civs. I picked Zulu, Nubia, Persia, Gaul, Byzantium, etc.

I settled towards Persia and prioritized walls on those cities. I avoided settling too close to Nubia because her army is too strong early game. By the time I got much of the map exposed, the Civs were not only fighting each other more, but Persia actually surprised war me! I haven't seen him do that since gosh, I don't remember. He almost knocked my walls out, but I had 2 bowmen nearby and I slotted that card Bastions. That was the closest I have gotten to losing a city in a really long time. Nobody has wiped out anyone that I can see yet, but there much more fighting than usual that much is certain. This is all by Turn 70 btw.

You guys really are onto something. The wall strength does play a major role in conflict!
 
It seems like someone has preemptively solved this - but let me just ask you OP. Have you ever seen the AI try to siege? And I'm not talking about the starting 30 turns where they are given like 5-7 units - which is irrelevant because their rivals will have the same advantage.

It's just painful to watch and I almost feel bad playing defense. Now imagine two AI's doing that. Im positive that the traffic jam created by the AI failing the hex-based system would be way more serious of a defense than the actual military value of the respective armies.

edit - I dont know what people are going on about with Civ 5. That game was also incredibly static as far as world politics went, and i'd say was even more static earlier due to getting your more powerful city ranged strike from turn 1.
 
Indeed, Walls seem to be the main culprit why inter-AI-conquest goes to sleep for a large part of the game. Mali AI is between 1-2 eras ahead of China and suddenly after getting hand on some planes they start to tear China apart:
Spoiler :

AIOnRampageWithAirforce.jpg


I noticed them to be be at war earlier (as I was allied with both in the past), but Mali never managed to take more then one city or so. If a few aircraft suddenly allow the AI to go on rampage despite its limited tactical abilities that means something, IMO.
 
Changing modifiers for walls is nice and all but it doesn't change the behavior of the AI as such.

edit - I dont know what people are going on about with Civ 5. That game was also incredibly static as far as world politics went, and i'd say was even more static earlier due to getting your more powerful city ranged strike from turn 1.

That's simply not true. Ideology made diplomacy dynamic and early insta walls were easily overcome by both AI an human.
Anyways, nothing really improved to the better from civ 5 to civ 6 in terms of combat and diplomacy.
 
Changing modifiers for walls is nice and all but it doesn't change the behavior of the AI as such.



That's simply not true. Ideology made diplomacy dynamic and early insta walls were easily overcome by both AI an human.
Anyways, nothing really improved to the better from civ 5 to civ 6 in terms of combat and diplomacy.

That's true about ideology, can't deny that. But other than that I'd say 5 was much more static. But that was more because of the way happiness and diplomacy more heavily punished aggressive expansion.
 
That's true about ideology, can't deny that. But other than that I'd say 5 was much more static. But that was more because of the way happiness and diplomacy more heavily punished aggressive expansion.

Static? I do not know about that. Civ 5 you can see Civs losing their capitals, sometimes regain them, and sometimes get wiped out. I cannot remember the last time, if ever, an AI in Civ6 wiped out another AI. I won't even bring up Vox Populi because I've seen a city state take a capital in one game. None of these things are happening in Civ 6. It was common in Civ5 to have to take more than just a capital otherwise after a peace out, a second war was automatic.

Perhaps the infinite wide city sprawl nature of Civ6 is another component aside from the walls. Harder to take capitals or wipe anyone out when on average everyone has 9-12 cities on the map.

Don't forget, the sorely lacking agenda system of Civ6 does not have all those "negative modifiers" Civ5 had on each civ. If you owned an AI's capital, they hated you too much to reconcile that and did everything they could to re-take that. You take a civ6 AI's capital? He will denounce you, but that's pretty much the last you will hear from him. Park a unit in the capital, repair the walls, and ignore them the rest of the game.
 
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