AI problems / deficiencies really need fixing

[VladTepes]

I've never played a recent game where the AI doesn't have massive problems with gold and / or happiness. I'm seriously thinking of quitting Civ until this is addressed and in a major way. Today for the first time I encountered the byproduct of AI incompetence: barbarian rebel units.

http://youtu.be/8flfhllb25w?t=4m11s

 

[justanotherturn]

I've never played a recent game where the AI doesn't have massive problems with gold and / or happiness

play on a harder level.

 

[VladTepes]

play on a harder level.

The problem, in my opinion, isn't the difficulty level. The AI seems to be a challenge even on Prince until the renaissance, when:

* It starts spamming cities with not nearly enough workers to develop them.

* It starts a "land for land's sake" strategy. It will plop cities anywhere, including right next to a civ that dislikes them. Sheer genius!

* It starts with a tall strategy but then completely falls apart by mid-game.

* It must learn that it's people come first and to not be so incredibly childish. They want to ban X (a crucial lux for me) and I vote against it, so now they won't take two of my luxuries in exchange for one of theirs because it's "unfair." Despite the fact that they have -5 happiness and my luxuries could put them back on track. But noooooo, let's be petty, screw your people, right?

 

[compwiz1202]

I had one game where it was barely started and the other civ already wanted like three of my luxuries for one of theirs.

 

[Nicasen]

Happiness is the one area where the AI never seems to run into problems from my experience (most games I play are on emperor). The only time I ever even see the AI go negative on happiness is in the late game if they're getting heavily pressured by other ideologies and are in civil resistance / revolutionary waves.

 

[VladTepes]

Happiness is the one area where the AI never seems to run into problems from my experience (most games I play are on emperor). The only time I ever even see the AI go negative on happiness is in the late game if they're getting heavily pressured by other ideologies and are in civil resistance / revolutionary waves.

In my experience the AI often 1.) has a number of luxuries but doesn't harvest them for a long time and 2.) when it does harvest them, it does one of my chief complaints, not trading them because of some petty hypocrisy or squabble because it didn't get it's way in the WC.

 

[chazzycat]

huh, of all the complaints about the AI, them not having happiness & gold is a new one. I thought those were the strong suits...lol

 

[Johnpecan]

* It starts a "land for land's sake" strategy. It will plop cities anywhere, including right next to a civ that dislikes them. Sheer genius!

This depends a lot on the leader and what policies they take. At higher levels, with the AI happiness bonus, they can get away with it.

* It starts with a tall strategy but then completely falls apart by mid-game.

The game is very snowbally. Meaning if you have an advantage in the beginning, it will snowball into a big lead by midgame. Higher difficulties give the AI enough of an advantage so this snowball is much harder to achieve.

* It must learn that it's people come first and to not be so incredibly childish. They want to ban X (a crucial lux for me) and I vote against it, so now they won't take two of my luxuries in exchange for one of theirs because it's "unfair." Despite the fact that they have -5 happiness and my luxuries could put them back on track. But noooooo, let's be petty, screw your people, right?

That is a good point. Right now. The AI always values their last resource at a very high price, regardless of whether or not it will benefit them.

I agree with you that the AI is quite weak at some of the stuff you mentioned and other stuff. Personally, if they just fixed how well the AI performs combat, it would be a huge boost and allow the AI to be much more efficient. I would agree with the first response that difficulty sufficiently makes up enough to make the game enjoyable.

 

[Magma_Dragoon]

I've noticed the AI will sometimes not improve more than one copy of the same lux. 140 turns into the game, Russia's second city had 4 unimproved spices, most of the rest of her territory was undeveloped as well. This was on emperor.

 

[tekjunkie]

AI has been a problem since it came out. I have since gave up on firaxis ever making it worth while. I really did get into it after the 1st expansion but there lack of community involvement and slow patches (not to mention multiplay is just now getting sorted out.) I have moved on to paradox games such as crusader kings and europa universalis 4. been out 3 weeks and already 3 hotfixes with numerous things done.