Breed Like Rabbits.

[Dinorius R.]

..no, I don't mean you, I'm talking about the AI civs under 1.21f.

I ventured to play a couple of 1.21 games this weekend and, yes again, the AI is overpopulating as badly as it ever did. I thought I read somewhere (was it in that incomprehensible Readme file?) that this had been fixed, or was I just dreaming? I haven't seen too many comments from the punters about it, so have people just accepted settler diarrhoea (as Zouave so aptly puts it) or am I alone in finding it a real pain in the...oops, bad choice of words?


:love2: - "I love you, lets go somewhere and have babies, quickly!"

- "OK, how about a horrible place on the tundra or in the desert?"

:love2: - "Oh, I don't care, just anywhere will do!"

 

[wohmongarinf00l]

AI expansion is substantially reduced in 1.21.
of course some skill and a good starting location
would be nice if u want to keep up with their expansion.

 

[Dinorius R.]

hmmm, maybe so, but it sure didn't look any different to me and my starting position wasn't that bad really.

I'll play another game or two, and if I'm not having fun, I'll try using Dreifel's anti-diarrhoea/anti-corruption mod with 1.21 (or if it doesn't work, go back to 1.17 with that mod) or maybe even chuck Civ3 altogether and buy some other game.

I must admit I haven't found any of the 3 official versions to be much fun playing so far, even at the easy levels. I thank Heaven modders are out there.

 

[FM_Freyland]

This is not meant to be critical in any way, but in my last two Regent games of Civ I have been able to match or surpass the ai in settlements, keep up an army big enough to keep people from attacking my willy nilly, and even pose a cultural advantage. What I *am* seeing is that the ai blows me away in tech until I get the Great Library, at which point, over several turns, I get many free techs and catch up. I suppose I should try a different tech method to see if it works out differently.



Jonathan

 

[God]

I can out expand the AI easily on regent and usually on monarch too, unless a really crappy starting posistion. Not much a problem for me.
On a cheiften game i started recently the AI still had 1 city while i had about 4-5! I sacked three civs with 2 warior gambit. But thats chieften on a large map.
i guess on emperor and diety where AI gets big advantage over you it makes a difference.

 

[No.Dice]

With an average start on emperor difficulty, the AI was never more than one city ahead of me, where pre-patch those with exceptionally fertile starts could be as much as 3-5 cities ahead.

I've only played a few games so far, but it seems toned down a bit.

However, i am noticing a considerable delay in the early game, even for actions as simple as initiating diplomacy. The game is feeling very sluggish.

 

[cephyn]

Ive noticed that in 1.21 the AI *seems* to be less aggressive in settling...but its a small sample size...

 

[TedG]

Yeah, the AI seems to be expanding at a much more manageable rate, but they STILL like to build cities in crappy places, such as areas completely or almost completely surrounded by jungle, desert, or tundra squares. I don't know why they would build a city in a crappy place like that when not too far away there's a patch of grassland/shield squares???

 

[Tweedledum]

If anything, the flood of settlers seems to have got worse - they're running around all over the place.

I've just had 6 (!! count them) English settlers start wandering through my territory all at once (and of course when I ask them to leave they say they will, but just keep going). I can't imagine where they are going to go, there's nowhere left apart from the odd bit of desert...

 

[TedG]

Originally posted by Tweedledum
If anything, the flood of settlers seems to have got worse - they're running around all over the place.

I've just had 6 (!! count them) English settlers start wandering through my territory all at once (and of course when I ask them to leave they say they will, but just keep going). I can't imagine where they are going to go, there's nowhere left apart from the odd bit of desert...

I've had similar situations before - when the only way for the AI to get to where they want to go is through my borders. But they should leave if you tell them to. Probably not the first time, but the second time you warn them they'll have to leave or declare war. Make sure you tell them to leave twice, then they'll have to leave the second time. This way, you can at least temporarily keep them from building more cities, but eventually they'll find another way to get to that crappy desert and build their city.

Alternative: Make sure you're prepared, then declare war on them.

 

[damunzy]

Originally posted by TedG
Yeah, the AI seems to be expanding at a much more manageable rate, but they STILL like to build cities in crappy places, such as areas completely or almost completely surrounded by jungle, desert, or tundra squares. I don't know why they would build a city in a crappy place like that when not too far away there's a patch of grassland/shield squares???

I have built in the middle of jungle before....but not when there was a better patch around. Did they build there for defensive purposes? (maybe it was easier to defend that area since it was close to their cities compared to the grassland city that was right by your cities)

 

[FM_Freyland]

Originally posted by PaleHorse76
I have built in the middle of jungle before....but not when there was a better patch around. Did they build there for defensive purposes? (maybe it was easier to defend that area since it was close to their cities compared to the grassland city that was right by your cities)

Let us not forget the AI's propensity to know in advance where the resources are going to pop up. Could be a factor.


Jonathan

 

[TedG]

Originally posted by PaleHorse76
I have built in the middle of jungle before....but not when there was a better patch around. Did they build there for defensive purposes? (maybe it was easier to defend that area since it was close to their cities compared to the grassland city that was right by your cities)

I'm not sure what exactly they would be trying to defend; those "jungle cities" that they build are pretty worthless unless they get a whole bunch of workers to clear some of the jungle away. I wouldn't consider those cities to be much of a threat because they'll never amount to much in terms of production and growth, whereas a grassland/plains/hills city will be able to produce many more military units and improvements. I'm not an expert player so I may be wrong, but I think it would make more sense to go after your opponent's larger, more defended cities first, then come back for the crappy ones later.

Originally posted by FM_Freyland
Let us not forget the AI's propensity to know in advance where the resources are going to pop up. Could be a factor.

Yeah, that makes sense. If nothing else, the AI simply will want more cities, no matter how crappy they are. I personally like to have fewer but more prosperous cities, whereas the AI will keep building settlers and not seem to do much to improve their core cities until later in the game. With v1.21f, I usually end up having only a couple less cities than my opponents, but with v1.17f and earlier I simply couldn't keep up with their expansion.

 

[God]

Actually i'm not sure about their expansion rate. I was thinking it had gone lower but i just was playing a regent game as Japanese with some great terrain around me and the AI American have a 1 city lead over me! Thats never happened especially with such good terrain, and IMO some well set cities and good production on my part.

 

[damunzy]

I have played two games on Monarch difficulty and I have been able to keep up with or surpase the A.I. in building cities. I would say that they have given the A.I. some Pepto.

 

[Craterus22]

Had a handful of settlers running through my borders to fill in the gaps in my culture border...

The only problem now is that these cities never subvert to my control (as they had in the past)... I guess (maybe)the AI knows how many units to keep in the city to prevent culture flip...

I hope that firaxis will make it so that the Ai has to ASK us for right of passage before they freely cross the borders...

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

What is happening here???? I used to see slow AI expansion, maybe 110% of my rate. Now, with 1.21, I expand fast as I can, regardless of militry strength, culture, tech, and they go as fast as I am, then show up with advanced units!

I used to never give in to threats, now I have to all the time! And that is on REGENT!!!!!!! Man, Monarchy used to be a breeze with 1.16!

 

[Razorwing]

I have never had any problems with the breeding pace of the AI. And I don't think there is a problem here, either. You guys just have to learn how to play the game, not complain because the game gives you a challenge.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Originally posted by Razorwing
I have never had any problems with the breeding pace of the AI. And I don't think there is a problem here, either. You guys just have to learn how to play the game, not complain because the game gives you a challenge.

Come down, Razorwing! Can`t you read the posts? There`s many good players who said with 1.17 the AI was expanding stupidly fast. Hell yes we can keep up. But is that the way the game is supposed to be? First Temple of the World built in 10 AD because all time before was spent on expansion?????

Last game (1.21) I had three times the culture of everyone else in 100 AD. All the culture came from.....


1 Temple!!!!!


There`s something wrong here, whatever you say. We are not whining, we are not to stupid to play the game, we simply ask Firaxis to deliver what they promised. I after all delivered my 50 bucks!

 

[Dinorius R.]

To bring this back onto topic a little, I wasn't talking about how the AI settlers wander through your territory, just the rate at which the AI builds new cities (and some of the lunatic locations of those cities).

OK, I'll admit I'm not as good a player as some of the heroes that have posted here, but the rate of AI expansion should have nothing to do with how good/bad the human player is - at least in the first part of the game before you've even contacted most of the other civs, let alone had time to impede their development.

Can anyone who claims the AI is less rampant in 1.21f point out to me any settings in the Editor or any statements in the Readme which justify those claims? This shouldn't be a matter of anecdote, it should be in the game settings somewhere!