Civs that don't defend themselves

This regards those crucial early wars. (I'm a marathon Monarch player, FYI)

Most civs make a decent show of defending themselves.

Some Civs start to spam archers and other units as soon as you declare on them, never stopping, always whipping when possible, and generally making their conquest not worth it.

But then sometimes I encounter a Civ that seems to lack the will to live. They simply do not build any defenders, often having a single Archer per city...

It is this last scenario I find fascinating.

Which factors influence this happening?

Does it happen more with some leaders? Certain civilizations? Does it have to do with the techs that civ have? Resources?

At one point I thought it must be because the civ started on a Wonder, and couldn't let go; but that would only explain their capital acting this way, not the other cities...

Is there any way of predicting when this will happen?

It would be most useful to know when you could conquer a whole kingdom with only three or four units... normally, it would be a waste to declare war with such few units (except if you can steal workers) because you would simply not gain any cities.

But when this phenomenon happens it would be criminal to abstain from taking the cities of such a feeble leader!

 

I believe unit-build tendency is somewhat dependent on leader personality.

 

It's possible civs research as far as monotheism and no bronzeworking, thus no slaver. I once killed Gandhi on emperor, taking 3 cities, and seeing only 3 archers, 1 chariot and 4 missionaries! I even postponed the war by a turn so one of the missionaries could convert one of my cities.

 

Leaders have different unit training rates. Montezuma will train a lot of units, while Mansa will almost neglect this aspect of the game, for instance.

All leaders have various personality variables which influence the chances of what they do.

 

Note that since Mansa is a tech hound, his units will be more advanced.

 

Yeah... but since I also do my best to be very advanced with techs, and I do get careless/overconfident, I can tell you for certain that you can lose a city (temporarily) defended by tanks against a stack of longbowmen. More advanced units are always good, but numbers still matter quite a lot.

 

In fact, numbers usually mean more then techs do.
Monty may be out of the game, as far as winning goes, but when his forty some aught Jaguars come rampaging into your borders with 30 catapults, you may be royally screwed, no matter how many Rifles you have.

And in Emperor and above, he may turn those jaguars into grenadiers in about ten turns. So watch your butt when it comes to obsolete armies. Siege equalizes all troops, frankly.
Now, onto the original query:
Each leader does have a BuildUnitProb which is hardcoded into the game, and affects how likely they are to build soldiers. Toku, shaka, Monty, the Ottomans (Go figure) all have realllllly high buildunitprob. Gandhi, HC, WvO all have fairly low BuildUnitProb, and thus tend to have less soldiers on hand.

 

I've noticed that most of the aggresive or protective leaders tend to build a lot of units. They are already a pain to conquer to begin with BECAUSE of those traits. Usually the real tech savy or wonderspamming AI civs neglect their military the most.

 

These guys tend to train units extremely: Mehmed II, Napoleon, Ragnar and Shaka. Gandhi is the one who tends to train units rarely. Others are somewhere between them.

 

iBuildUnitProb

ALEXANDER: 35
ASOKA: 20
AUGUSTUS: 25
BISMARCK: 30
BOUDICA: 30
BRENNUS: 30
CATHERINE: 25
CHARLEMAGNE: 30
CHURCHILL: 25
CYRUS: 30
DARIUS: 30
DE GAULLE: 25
ELIZABETH: 20
FREDERICK: 20
GANDHI: 15
GENGHIS KHAN: 35
GILGAMESH: 30
HAMMURABI: 30
HANNIBAL: 30
HATSHEPSUT: 20
HUAYNA CAPAC: 25
ISABELLA: 25
JOAO: 25
JULIUS CAESAR: 30
JUSTINIAN: 35
KUBLAI KHAN: 25
LINCOLN: 25
LOUIS XIV: 30
MANSA MUSA: 25
CHINESE LEADER: 25
MEHMED: 40
MONTEZUMA: 35
NAPOLEON: 40
PACAL: 25
PERICLES: 25
PETER: 30
QIN SHI HUANG: 20
RAMESSES: 20
RAGNAR: 40
FRANKLIN ROOSEVELT: 20
SALADIN: 30
SHAKA: 40
SITTING BULL: 35
STALIN: 30
SULEIMAN: 30
SURYAVARMAN: 30
TOKUGAWA: 30
VICTORIA: 25
WANGKON: 25
WASHINGTON: 25
WILLEM VAN ORANJE: 25
ZARA YAQOB: 30

The number represents the %chance of any given city belonging to the corresponding leader choosing to build a unit as opposed to… not a unit.

 

I would have thought the AI should build more units when at war?

And is there no mechanism to interrupt/abort building a non-unit in favor of a defensive unit?

Or does that mechanism not trigger when my attacking force is small enough (say, three attackers vs his sole defender)?

If it really is only iBuildUnitProb that matters here, then the only explanation is pure chance; that is, how one civ reacts by spamming defenders and others quitely allow themselves to be killed? (I've had this behavior exhibited by leaders with as high value as 30% - it's not just Gandhi)

 

You are correct that iBuildUnitProb is not the sole factor (as you said, production gets upped during wartime/WHEOOHRN, and a besieged city with a small stack will frequently whip/draft extra defense). However, iBUP is a good yardstick, and wartime buildup may even be a function of it, but I don't know that for sure. Someone with modding experience could probably answer that for you.

 

I'm gonna play a crowded pangea with

Memed 40
Nappy 40
Shaka 40
Ragnar 40

Alex 35
Monty 35
Sitting Bull 35

And myself as somebody. Maybe Boudica or Churchill or Charles or Toku.

 

This explains why I don't seem to get easy targets plating Ghandi