Civ 1: Zulus stronger than Romans ? What does geopolitics mean in jCivEd ? What decides unit strength ultimately ??

[Skybuck]

I just played two games with Indian. One game versus Romans, one game versus Zulus.

In both games I attack the enemy with calvary. The Romans were kinda easy to defeat. While the Zulu units seemed much stronger and harder to defeat.

Granted combat against Romans was mostly on grass, while combat against Zulus was on plains, also some hills and mountains, rivers, but even on the plains, the Zulus seemed much stronger...

Grass and Plains are supposed to both have 0% defensive bonus, so I feel like something else is causing the Zulus to be stronger ? Or was it just bad luck, I don't think it was bad luck, too many times the Zulus just kept winning.

Anyway there is this screen in jCivEd, I wonder if it maybe has something to do with it:

It is the geopolitics screen, is this just a statistical screen, showing how strong the zulus are in total ? Or does this mean the zulu units are stronger ???

I wonder: Are there any other factors which decide the unit strength of civilizations ? Perhaps technology level ? Perhaps they have better barracks, because of muskets/rifflemen barracks upgrades and such ? Perhaps more food ? More luxerious ?...

 

[darkpanda]

Hi Skybuck,

I think maybe @tupi or other forum members may have looked at the AI details in depth, more than me, so I can't answer for sure how individual AI Civs have bonuses or not... I suppose their "attitudes" play a role in how AI takes decisions for each Civ, although I would find it unlikely that attitudes give attack or defense bonuses... More so, an aggressive Civ should tend to produce more attack units, and try to attack more often (as well as break treaties).

Every piece of data shown in JCivEd is contained in MAP and SVE files. I am pretty sure the contents of "Geopolitics" that you show is nothing more than the total sum of each civ units' attack values and defense values. so, obviously, if a Civ is militaristic and agressive, and produces more units with high power, then overall this Civ's total attack or defense value will be higher. But it would be just statistics as you say.

It should be quick to verify in CIV.EXE, which I have been reversing for a long time in IDA, I may have a look later on.

Cheers

 

[Mize]

There might be something else. 'Random' values in Civ are not really random. The random seed can be manipulated by the player for the desired outcome of a move (like winning a battle), by for example clicking on a city with a particular name before the move. This means that there might be some inherently 'lucky' or 'unlucky' civs. But I doubt that the AI uses the same rules as the player for the reseeding of the random numbers, so this is just a theory.

 

[GPR]

Only particular data (easily verifiable in JCivED - just create a simple map) can give the basis for the right conclusions. Everything else is guesswork.
Maybe the Zulus were produced in barracks and had a veteran, maybe the units were fortified, maybe you attacked in 2 move and had less attack power. Maybe your unit was or wasn't a veteran. A lot of these variables in addition to the terrain bonuses.

As for geopolitics, I agree with Panda and it's probably the general strength of all units (maybe with bonuses).
I'm wondering about "AI-Strategy". In my saves in this row i see only 1, 2 or 5.
I think 1 is standard, 2 its meybe development and 5 is conquest or colonization. But I only guess