Better AI and AI expansion

[Grashopa]

I have a game with aggressive AI on, and my neighbors have been at war constantly. Montezuma is to the east of me across a desert. I settled only 2 cities leaving 2 decent city locations on the west edge of the desert free and Montezuma never came over to settle them.

I'm actually impressed by this if the AI is not settling on purpose. Although I played farther on and in 700 AD I saw that Montezuma had built a fort on each of the incense's and had 1 spearman guarding them A fort doesn't get you the incense right? Is there a reason for it? Or was it just guarding the border?

The game is from the ORPC War-Monger Ghandi - screenshot in spoiler:

Spoiler :

I settled vijayanagar at turn 150, and haven't settled near the horses on the north coast. This is epic speed turn 170. Khazak was a barbarian city taken recently by France at ~150.

 

[Yared]

A fort doesn't get you the incense right? Is there a reason for it? Or was it just guarding the border?

A fort acts like a city. And like a city, if you build a fort above a resource and connect it to your trade network (coast, road to coast, road, road to river, river), it's yours.

I'm not really sure about the Spearman though.

 

[r_rolo1]

It might be both a defensive fort ( in the border ) and a resource grabber. Even the vanilla BtS AI does that when it is not with the workers thorning mature towns down....

 

[Jaroth]

It's also about efficiency.

With a fort already constructed on the resource, once the required tech is researched (like Calendar), the resource will become available immediately and will be dispersed thru your trade routes.

 

[Grashopa]

Didn't know that about forts, thanks.

I had an axeman on the spot I wanted to settle, and I noticed that Montezuma is sending a settler unescorted and it is turning around after seeing my axeman. Not sure if hes been trying to settle the spot for awhile or not.

 

[jdog5000]

On aggressive AI, the AI will send out unescorted settlers so it expands faster (planning escorts ahead of time is hard for its processor ...). Once it sees your unit, it can no longer safely get where it wants to go, so it turns around ... it may have gone to a different plot he'd picked out, or it may wait for an escort.