Better AI in BNW?

[Greizer85]

A few simple rule changes would enhance the AI immeasurably:

1. Never embark units if they can be fired upon / attacked by boats.
2. Concentrate fire: aim to kill one unit, not injure two or three.
3. Build 2/3rds ranged units (i.e. bows, not trebuchets...) at all times (before Industrial anyway).
4. As a general rule, put melee units in front of ranged, yet do not shy away from shooting instead of moving if the offending unit can be killed on the same turn (hardest rule to implement, but that's what we pay these people for!).

With these four changes, well mainly #2 and 3, the game is suddenly 50% harder. Is it really so hard, Firaxis?

 

[BluegrassGeek]

Asking if the Civ AI has been improved is like asking if they've fixed all the bugs in the latest Elder Scrolls game.

 

[apocalypse105]

A few simple rule changes would enhance the AI immeasurably:

1. Never embark units if they can be fired upon / attacked by boats.
2. Concentrate fire: aim to kill one unit, not injure two or three.
3. Build 2/3rds ranged units (i.e. bows, not trebuchets...) at all times (before Industrial anyway).
4. As a general rule, put melee units in front of ranged, yet do not shy away from shooting instead of moving if the offending unit can be killed on the same turn (hardest rule to implement, but that's what we pay these people for!).

With these four changes, well mainly #2 and 3, the game is suddenly 50% harder. Is it really so hard, Firaxis?

Making the Ai more cable of wining by a culture victory and space victory would olso fix the worthless combat AI. Because it would actually go for a other victory then conquest

In other worths make some Ai less agressive ( not the warmongers zulu , montezuma they should be agressive) ) and let them focus on development except if you piss them off of course

 

[Trias]

A few simple rule changes would enhance the AI immeasurably:

Are you sure these would not simply create a new set of exploitable AI moves?

1. Never embark units if they can be fired upon / attacked by boats.

I am weary of any instruction to the AI using the words "never" or "always" because they scream "exploit me". Nonetheless, I agree that the AI could benefit from better threat mapping.

2. Concentrate fire: aim to kill one unit, not injure two or three.

Of the rules you name, this is the only that is (relatively) simple in terms of AI coding. Simply increase target priority for wounded targets. (This could however lead to the AI being easy to bait.)

3. Build 2/3rds ranged units (i.e. bows, not trebuchets...) at all times (before Industrial anyway).

Given that one of the design requirements of the AI is that it needs to work with any set of xml rules, this rule may not be implementable.
Also note that even now the AI often finds itself in the position that it cannot take a city because it has run out of melee units. Building fewer melee units is bound to exacerbate that problem.)

4. As a general rule, put melee units in front of ranged, yet do not shy away from shooting instead of moving if the offending unit can be killed on the same turn (hardest rule to implement, but that's what we pay these people for!).

#Parsing error unknown variable "front".
The notion of "front" is a rather high level abstraction on a map that is a proiri isotropic. Implementing these rule may not just be "hard" but impossible within the available computing resources.

Is it really so hard, Firaxis?

Possibly, given that the team has no dedicated AI programmers.

But hiring some computer science grad students as summer internes could potentially move the AI along quite a bit.

 

[RohirrimElf]

I`m not buying the game yet because of the lack of AI information. 10% preoder bonus discount is not good enough. Some vague info about that they still work on it isnt good enough for me.

It bothers me a lot because i do want to play it badly but the awful decisions the AI makes destroys much of the fun im having with the game.

 

[The_CatSnack]

Yep, good call with most of those points I reckon. I suppose if there were any ground breaking improvements in AI, they would have been revealed by now.. Still with all the new mechanics in the game, some stuff would have had to be reworked and improved. Here's hoping!

 

[pilot00]

If they leave the AI as is...Well it means that they don't care enough in my book. And I know what happens when someone doesn't care enough

 

[Hulking Lummox]

I would just add: The AI should weigh opportunities to attack a unit or a city a little heavier than say, routing to a destination (usually a position near the target city they want to attack). Many units, especially ranged and siege, miss turn after turn of attack opportunities and just do nothing while they wait for the whole army get in position. It's like watching a bunch of penguins waddling in.

 

[apocalypse105]

I`m not buying the game yet because of the lack of AI information. 10% preoder bonus discount is not good enough. Some vague info about that they still work on it isnt good enough for me.

It bothers me a lot because i do want to play it badly but the awful decisions the AI makes destroys much of the fun im having with the game.

For me the diplomacy is the thing that makes me stop playing the game. There is olso not a lot information about this so not so sure if i am going to buy it.

Luckly for me i am from europe so I have to wait a few days so I can see if they fixed it by asking the american people If there isn't a lot of changes i am not going to buy it.

I might just go to a customer programme and tell my story that dennis shirk the producer told the customers that the AI would be less chizophrenic and will backstab you less. And change the warmonger penalty but he didn't if I bought the game and I don't see any changes. Hell I might as well sue firaxis and ask money because i have prove a youtube video.

If they don't change the warmonger modfier and backstabs they are basicly lying to the customers

 

[ptoss1]

You guys seem to have forgotten how Vanilla AI told you they weren't happy when you got close to victory, which was a major immersion breaker. They fixed that. I only get backstabbed when I'm a warmonger, and that was because I kept annexing allied city states, threw 2 nuclear missiles at Babylon, and 3 atomic bombs at Memphis. The nearby city state which I had allied declared war on me immediately which made lots of sense because I just created a nuclear wasteland not 3 tiles away from their territory. Seems pretty legit to me.

 

[HeraldtheGreat]

They put an end to lump gold-sum exploitation in the AI. Now you need a DOF.

 

[Gort]

If AI would also bring a melee unit when it is actually capable of taking the city, I'd be so happy..

Also AI should also be more aware of its uniques. No more Hiawatha chopping forests please, especially when that causes loss of trade route.

I can tolerate all the ******** moves of barbarian units, but civ AI should really be decent enough to make game challenging, instead of recieving bonuses and units.

To be honest, I'd love to see the barbarian units and AI reworked. I see melee barbarian ships just circling continents endlessly until they're shot, and I don't think I've ever seen a barbarian attack a city.

They should beeline to attack cities, and they should get that promotion that lets them steal half the damage they do in gold.

 

[pilot00]

You guys seem to have forgotten how Vanilla AI told you they weren't happy when you got close to victory, which was a major immersion breaker. They fixed that. I only get backstabbed when I'm a warmonger, and that was because I kept annexing allied city states, threw 2 nuclear missiles at Babylon, and 3 atomic bombs at Memphis. The nearby city state which I had allied declared war on me immediately which made lots of sense because I just created a nuclear wasteland not 3 tiles away from their territory. Seems pretty legit to me.

Raises one brow in confusion.

What has vanilla to do with our expectations? Vanilla as far as I am concerned was a beta version not a finalized product.

IDK when they backstab you, but I have been backstabed repeatedly when I was fostering thousands of years of friendship. Backstabing is not the problem, the reason and the mechanic for it are.

 

[ptoss1]

To be honest, I'd love to see the barbarian units and AI reworked. I see melee barbarian ships just circling continents endlessly until they're shot, and I don't think I've ever seen a barbarian attack a city.

They should beeline to attack cities, and they should get that promotion that lets them steal half the damage they do in gold.

I have. Only in vanilla though. One random barb got himself killed for no reason.
I want to see a barbarian invasion event where all the existing barbarians target a random city and try to conquer it. If they manage to that city should become a fantasy fictional new civ.

 

[Winston]

I remember someone on the forums who was planning to have a crack at AI modding once BNW was released, hopefully he can come up with something good.
He made the AI more focused on end-game victory goals like culture and space race so that's a good start in my book.
I'm astonished that Firaxis has no dedicated AI team, surely AI is key area and deserves a dedicated team. I personally think that Firaxis should drop 1UPT for the next Civ game as this is an area where the AI struggles - instead maybe they should bring in an army system that allows limited stacking?

 

[ptoss1]

I remember someone on the forums who was planning to have a crack at AI modding once BNW was released, hopefully he can come up with something good.
He made the AI more focused on end-game victory goals like culture and space race so that's a good start in my book.
I'm astonished that Firaxis has no dedicated AI team, surely AI is key area and deserves a dedicated team. I personally think that Firaxis should drop 1UPT for the next Civ game as this is an area where the AI struggles - instead maybe they should bring in an army system that allows limited stacking?

I don't think I can go back to stacks tbh. At the least have limited stacks or 2.
Imo it's not the unit placement that's the biggest problem. It's the amount. Sometimes the AI will declare war but only send 3-4 units in a half-assed attempt at war. Preparation is important. Also AI units should actively seek to gain experience.

 

[Petiscator]

You guys seem to have forgotten how Vanilla AI told you they weren't happy when you got close to victory, which was a major immersion breaker. They fixed that. I only get backstabbed when I'm a warmonger, and that was because I kept annexing allied city states, threw 2 nuclear missiles at Babylon, and 3 atomic bombs at Memphis. The nearby city state which I had allied declared war on me immediately which made lots of sense because I just created a nuclear wasteland not 3 tiles away from their territory. Seems pretty legit to me.

Then you have probably never had a friendship with "loyal" Suleiman

 

[Winston]

@ptoss1

1UPT is what really kills the AI militarily and I'd be happy if they went back to the drawing board for Civ 6. I still think Sulla's critique of 1UPT is valid (http://www.garath.net/Sullla/Civ5/whatwentwrong.html) and I think Firaxis should try something else for the next one.

One thing I do like about Civ 5's 1UPT is there is less tedium moving units compared to Civ 4 so I would like it if they consolidated movement into army groups for the next one as I think the AI would handle it better.

With regard to Civ 5 AI I suspect there will be very little improvement in BNW as they haven't highlighted this as a marketable feature - hopefully there will be some improvements though.

 

[ptoss1]

Then you have probably never had a friendship with "loyal" Suleiman

Can't say I've ever had much interaction with Suleiman.

 

[Putmalk]

Making the Ai more cable of wining by a culture victory and space victory would olso fix the worthless combat AI. Because it would actually go for a other victory then conquest

This makes no sense, since the AI already goes for other victory conditions besides World Conquest.