AI too aggressive?

[iammaxhailme]

I've got about 2.5k hours in the unmodded civ V and have done a couple of games with vox populi just now... from my experience with the base game I think I have a good feel on how much the AI tends to attack, declare wars, be friendly, etc. But almost every vox populi game has just been an infinite endless slog of wars, especially from around the renaissance forward. I've given up on a few games becuase people would not leave me the fudge alone... I didn't even capture anything to get warmonger penalties, people just keep launching massive 100-unit-sized invasions of me, but I'm so far ahead in tech that they're laughably easy to repel. It's really annoying. Every AI on the map has declared war on me about four times now, for no apparent reason other than maybe because I have five or six wonders and have my own religion (but haven't even spread it to anyone except people who never formed one)

I'm only playing on Prince, too, as I test out the difference in VP. I can't imagine what it'd be like on diety with this level of invasions every 10 turns or so... I usually play on emperor or immortal without mods.

 

[Floats your boat]

Diplomacy and meaningful, though wars are one of the strongest selling points of VP. I usually get about 4-5 full wars on deity (not warmongering) and I know why and from who they will be coming while still converting founders and having more wonders. Deciding what DoF offer to accept or reject, where and where not to settle, what wonders, resolutions and coop wars to go into to strengthen alliances, etc. is a major part of the VP.

I would recommend disabling bribed wars, I don't know why they are not disabled by default, you can find how to do it easily by searching it. It's one of the files but I don't have it installed right now.
If you're outteching AIs it's time to slide the difficulty up. Emperor is usually how people here play and there's also sizable deity community.

 

[Floats your boat]

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/bribed-wars-ruin-games.663553/#post-15928858

Also, AI can hate you for competing for the same CS (you can avoid it by leaving their 2,3 chosen to them and allying the rest) and can even denounce you for having a small army IIRC. If you have small army, you will be seen as a good target even by non-aggressive AIs. Small army can be enough to defend you due to terrain, but it isolates you diplomatically.

 

[Recursive]

I've got about 2.5k hours in the unmodded civ V and have done a couple of games with vox populi just now... from my experience with the base game I think I have a good feel on how much the AI tends to attack, declare wars, be friendly, etc. But almost every vox populi game has just been an infinite endless slog of wars, especially from around the renaissance forward. I've given up on a few games becuase people would not leave me the fudge alone... I didn't even capture anything to get warmonger penalties, people just keep launching massive 100-unit-sized invasions of me, but I'm so far ahead in tech that they're laughably easy to repel. It's really annoying. Every AI on the map has declared war on me about four times now, for no apparent reason other than maybe because I have five or six wonders and have my own religion (but haven't even spread it to anyone except people who never formed one)

I'm only playing on Prince, too, as I test out the difference in VP. I can't imagine what it'd be like on diety with this level of invasions every 10 turns or so... I usually play on emperor or immortal without mods.

Are you seeing the modifiers 'They know you are competing with them, and they hate it!' or 'Your behavior infuriates them.'? Those occur because you're too far in the lead and the AI plays to win. You can disable victory competition in the file (1) Community Patch > Core Files > Core Changes > DiploAIOptions.sql to reduce AI aggression.

Additionally it is highly advisable to have an army on par with the AI to deter invasions.

If the game is otherwise too easy then you should play on a higher difficulty level. AI's aggression is lowered on difficulties below Emperor, but they still tend to hate you if you're way too far above the curve (unless you disable victory competition).

 

[iammaxhailme]

Are you seeing the modifiers 'They know you are competing with them, and they hate it!' or 'Your behavior infuriates them.'? Those occur because you're too far in the lead and the AI plays to win. You can disable victory competition in the file (1) Community Patch > Core Files > Core Changes > DiploAIOptions.sql to reduce AI aggression.

Additionally it is highly advisable to have an army on par with the AI to deter invasions.

If the game is otherwise too easy then you should play on a higher difficulty level. AI's aggression is lowered on difficulties below Emperor, but they still tend to hate you if you're way too far above the curve (unless you disable victory competition).

So I guess it's a bad idea that I'm just depending on about 10 gatling guns and 10 ironclads to fight off about 30 each tercios/skirmishers/caravels every couple of turns, ehh? It's easy to do, but I guess the AI is only looking at my low unit count and not the fact that I can easily swat them like flies, as my units are always about two tiers ahead... I guess you mean be on par with numbers, not power (in which I'd argue I'm way ahead).

I check my most recent game. I am getting the "you're competing and they hate it" on one of the four civs currently at war with me (who is not even the most belligerent one, though).

I'll try another game and just always have a big excessive force just sitting around (but stay non-aggressive) and see if I still get swamped.

Another thing I noticed... I'm playing as the Dutch and I stole lots of ships with the Sea Beggar, but those stolen ships are lower tier and immediately get slaughtered on the AI's next turn, which I think ends up with basically no change in war score. I'm not sure how it's calculated, but in one war the death count was like

AI: 20 dead triremes and caravels
Me: two dead sea beggars, and about 15 dead earlier boats, all of which were the AI's that I stole

and the war score was only like 15 in my favor or something like that. Not sure if the game engine allows for this, but it may be a good idea to not lose war score if stolen units die.

 

[Recursive]

So I guess it's a bad idea that I'm just depending on about 10 gatling guns and 10 ironclads to fight off about 30 each tercios/skirmishers/caravels every couple of turns, ehh? It's easy to do, but I guess the AI is only looking at my low unit count and not the fact that I can easily swat them like flies... I guess you mean be on par with numbers, not power (in which I'd argue I'm way ahead).

I check my most recent game. I am getting the "you're competing and they hate it" on one of the four civs currently at war with me (who is not even the most belligerent one, though).

I'll try another game and just always have a big excessive force just sitting around (but stay non-aggressive) and see if I still get swamped.

They do in fact consider your track record of unit kills vs. deaths, but the skill rating bonus is capped at 2x your military strength, to prevent exploits.

 

[InkAxis]

I think the issue is that you are too far ahead in tech. Think about it realistically. I was playing a board game with some friends and one of them started to pull ahead, so everyone worked to make sure they wouldn't win. Similarly the AI doesn't want you to win.

Another thing is VP has much more complicated diplomacy. You shouldn't just accept every declaration of friendship. In fact you should denounce your friend's enemies to get their favor.