AI reasons to go to war

[eyrei]

In my last game as the Greeks, the continent I was on housed 8 of the twelve civs. Wars were frequent. In fact they were so frequent that I never had a chance to switch to democracy, which was ok since I don't think anybody else did either. Anyway, the Zulus were at war with the Iroquios and my civ was between them, along with the Aztecs. The Zulus apparently got right of passage with the Aztecs to move their horde of cavalry and knights toward the Iroquios. When they got to my border though, they didn't bother to get right of passage, they decided it was a better idea to fight their way through me to fight the Iroquios. This was particularly idiotic since I was the Zulu's source of saltpeter. I barely fended off the attack on one of my major cities, and then formed an alliance with the Russians and Aztecs to crush the Zulu. Needless to say, the Zulu never got to the Iroquios, and their power rapidly declined, especially since they were using knights against riflemen. My point is that this was a truly moronic reason to declare war. My military was reasonably large (I had been fighting wars for the last 2000 years) and so was not an easy target. They seemed to declare war only because I was between them and their current chosen enemy. The funny thing was, I would have been quite willing to give them a right of passage to go after the Iroquois, but, while they obviously asked the Aztecs, they didn't even bother to ask me. I think the AI needs to approach the human player as often as it surely approaches other AI civs.

 

[Hobbes]

Here is a thought, and I have used it before, go to the other civ and offer a RoP. When he is done moving his troops through your lands, blockade the return route and pick off as many of his cities as fast as you can, works every time.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

you got that one right, eyrei: the AI it thick as a brick! Some of the things I`ve seen I can`t really believe but - well - they happened. Like cheating me out of 10 Gold / turn for the remaining 8 turns = 80 Gold - for Coal and Iron!!!! I mean I was doing my best to support a culturally strong but militarily weak friend so someone else wouldn`t get CulturVic - and he suddenly needs these 80 bucks so desperately that he invokes his own instant death?????

 

[Woody]

Ahh, stupid AI tricks, dont you just love em. The stupidest thing I ever saw the AI do was this. I was playing the americans and was neck and neck with the Romans. The Greeks were wedged between us and were in about 8th place in the game. Anyway it turned out that the Romans got coal and I didn't so I needed to go get it from them before the could take advantage of it. So I bribed the greeks silly and got a ROP. I took my calvarly army through greece and quickly obtained coal, and kept the romans from the supply. I captured about 4 cities as a buffer around the one with coal and sued for peace. I quickly built a couple of rail lines through greece to keep my supply lines open. It stayed at this level for quite some time. When I got tanks I figure it was time to do away with the romans for good so I start cranking them out and moving them to the front, which was through greece which I had kept happy with horses, luxeries and gold. So I have 30 to 40 tanks built, half on one side of Greece ready to go after the romans, and half on my side as homeland defenders/reserves, with more building all the time. Just a turn or two before I was going to sart war with Rome, Greece just outright declares war on me without even talking. Needless to say my tanks made quick work of his pikeman (yes he had no saltpeter). So about three turns later, no more Greece.

I was going to let them live because they were a very minor Civ in this game and they had helped my in the early parts of the game. But they had to have a major brain fart.

 

[eyrei]

Situations like that have a lot to do with the way the military advisor rates armies. It is purely based on size, which is bad news for the AI because they have to listen to their advisor, when the human can take his advice with a grain of salt. Sometimes, I think the AI declares war because one of your units gets in the way of one of its units, and for whatever reason, the movement of that unit to its desired destination supersedes everything else in the world. I definately see this when the AI tries to get a settler across your empire. They don't care that you tell them to get out, it is when they have to get out that they feel they must declare war, because keeping that settler moving towards that one spot of tundra you left open is the most important thing in the world.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

rather stupidlyy programmed if the AI doesn`t take unit placement into acoount - and I get the distinct feeling it only does if it has "reason" to feel threatened. If they are polite to you and you never cheated them you can basically ruin them by planting forest all over their place, putting armies right next to their citites, building fortresses on their essential rail and so on - they never get it.....

 

[Dark Sheer]

I am not sure if anyone notice. During peace time if an AI has RoP with you they will use their unit to patrol your territory as well and sometime even end their turns inside your territory (spying ?).

However, the AI will get annoyed if you left your military units inside its territory too often even if you have a RoP

If you keep doing that they will either bombard your units with a terrorist or turn to furious. And a war can start just like this

 

[SlightlyMadman]

The AI is extremely opportunistic by design, and is absolutely short sighted.

You can see this by the way they move their units. They'll be heading for a city to take it, then you pile defenders into it, so they start going for another city. You move the defenders out, they come back, put them back in, retreat. You used to be able to do this indefinitely before the patch.

It seems like they have no concept of goals or missions. They see an easy to take city, and throw units at it. The next turn, they totally reevaluate. Since the city is still undefended, the units move towards it again, but at no time did they have any thought that they have a mission of "go to the city to take it," that just ends up happening if conditions remain. If they decided on the goal of taking that city, and you piled more defenders, they would simply order those units to wait for more backup or something similar, instead, they just forget what they were doing and move on.

They seem to have no concept of long term concequences, either. All they see is that they'd rather have that city than the iron you're trading them, or whatever. They see an immediate gain, that's currently attainable. They don't notice that you have armies of tanks with which retake the city instantly.

It kind of goes along with how they make the game harder by making your citizens less happy, and letting the AI cheat. It's a total hack, but it achieves the desired effect. You can't blame them, though, AI is tough to write, and civ3 beats all the previous AI's hands down.

 

[zebomba]

I guess the AI sums up its troops and their allies' too.
In my current game I had almost 200 units of the last type. And they decided to blackmail me, nevertheless. Not a smart move, since only the defensive armor sums up to 30 :crazyeyes .

 

[Psychlone]

The trick to getting a civ who's moving through your empire to sign a right of passage is fairly simple, but it doesn't always work.

What you do is move some of your units into his territory, then when he objects, you say "we could sign a right of passage agreement." If you have polite relations with them and they have been slowly crossing your territory anyhow, they will usually agree.

 

[Greadius]

Originally posted by SlightlyMadman
The AI is extremely opportunistic by design, and is absolutely short sighted.

And that makes the AI like most despots in history; which is realistic.

I like the erratic nature of the AI since it makes the game more interesting. I just wish that Democratic nations were much more hesitant to enter into wars they might not win. Propensity to actually START a war should be much more influenced by government type.

 

[Zouave]

Wrong. There is a difference between erratic. . . and illogical, goofy, and stupid, Besides, the AI regularly cheats. And none of that is "historical".

I expected the Civ III AI to be a lot better than Civ II. Well, at least it's learned to attack en masse.

 

[Zorbop]

the ai HAS to declare war if they owe you trbute but can't pay it.

 

[zebomba]

Now it's a new idea...

 

[zero]

In the example first above, it is possible that the Greeks were PAID to go to war.

Also, I have noticed that if an AI civ is moving units through your territory, you do NOT have to offer or accept an ROP. Just don't ask the troops to leave, and the AI civ will march through your land to get at Civs on the other side. The more they send, and the longer it takes them to cross your territory, the less threat they are to you. If you do give ROP, then they use your roads/rail and get through faster, but you don't have to give the ROP.

I find it amusing that human players seem to be incapable of just letting the ai civ troops march through.

I let them march through until huge numbers are in my borders, then close the border by blocking it with units. Eventually they all move through my land and attack the civs on the other side of me.

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by eyrei
I barely fended off the attack on one of my major cities, and then formed an alliance with the Russians and Aztecs to crush the Zulu.

Hmmm. Their plan almost worked you say. Indeed, it took the combined forces of your alliance to put the Zulus back in their box. Hmmm. The AI worked pretty good appears.

Besides, most wars are folly. For instance, the Americans treasonously declared independence from the greatest power on earth. What are the chances of that succeeding?

 

[eyrei]

Actually, I could have defeated the Zulus myself, it just would have taken a while. The only reason I got the Aztecs involved was that it was the only way to get them to break their right of passage with the Zulu, which presented a major strategic problem sicne their railroads led right up to my territory. Also, even if the Zulus had taken the one city, I would have taken it right back, because they lost most of their units attacking it. I only got the Russians involved because they were a small civ that I hoped would gain some territory to act as a buffer against the Egyptians. All in all, it was very foolish of the Zulu to declare war on me, as they had very little to gain except pissing me off. I think it had something to do with them having a large force within striking range of my city, even though that was not their original plan. Long term effects were not considered.

 

[Dillo]

One thing that bugs me about the ai and its shadey deals, is that If you plan a sneak attack and obtain ROP to mount an attack.You will never gain another ROP for the duration of that game, because the AI of every civ will say,"It is not in our intrest to allow you ROP,We remember your treacherous sneak attack on the "insert civ". But when they do it to you, they suffer no concequences.The same goes with anything you do basically, If you do anything like breaking a Protection pact, or peace treaty you will be penalized for all eternity, while the AI ignores this junk with the other Ai civs. Its ********.I rerely do this because of the concequences, ut the ai gain ROP to mount an attack quite frequently, and why not, it suffers no concequence.

I like the Idea though when they declare war on another civ and need to pass through your empire,give them the ROP nad let them send most of their troops through,then attack them. blocking their forces return. Sweet.

I am haveing the problem right now that I have had no wars.But all civs are pretty well equal, noone has researched the republic evidently as no one has MPP.I am gonna have to research it next and then give it to the AI inorder to have some wars started. ;P

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Dillo
One thing that bugs me about the ai and its shadey deals, is that If you plan a sneak attack and obtain ROP to mount an attack.You will never gain another ROP for the duration of that game, because the AI of every civ will say,"It is not in our intrest to allow you ROP,We remember your treacherous sneak attack

Hmmm. You betray them, but want them to trust you.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

I think what Dillo meant was that the AI remembers your betrayal, but not another AIs betrayal...

Happens quite often that my opponents puul the same trick on each other again and again while I can use it only once.

btw: why is the AI pissed with me when I ask their foe to leave my territory and he declares war, shoots up my units and then I defend myself by killing those troops that are in my territory????

Doesn`t make sense! Actually he should love me for distracting his enemy!