Does AI ever build great navy?

[planetfall]

I've tried a variety of maps and raised sea level to high if the map allows it, but AI never builds more than a handful of naval units. Have you seen the AI ever build a strong navy? Often vikes will complain that navy is weak but they just don't really launch any good navy and have never seen a combination of naval bombardment along with land unit attack.
Is this beyond the scope of civ6?

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I've tried a variety of maps and raised sea level to high if the map allows it, but AI never builds more than a handful of naval units. Have you seen the AI ever build a strong navy? Often vikes will complain that navy is weak but they just don't really launch any good navy and have never seen a combination of naval bombardment along with land unit attack.
Is this beyond the scope of civ6?

The only fleets I've ever seen in Civ VI have been Barbarian or my own.

A Barbarian Camp on the coast will spawn early Galleys and Quadriremes by the half-dozen, but I've rarely seen them spawn much after Caravels at all (to be honest, by then the original Camp has usually been picked off by another AI Civ or City State if not by me)

Even supposedly 'naval' Civs like Phoenicia, England or Norway in my experience will rarely have a navy or more than 4 - 5 ships total by the Medieval Era - unless their last city on the coast is under siege, then they will spawn ships as if preparing an evacuation fleet until the city is captured.

And I have NEVER seen any AI entity spawn Aircraft Carriers, Destroyers, Missile Cruisers, or anyone but Brazil (which has a Battleship Unique) spawn Battleships. Naval play simply stops by the Industrial Era (again, admittedly by the Industrial Era the game is usually almost over in my experience, with either a cultural or domination victory firmly in hand)

This is one of the reasons I play mostly on Pangaea maps now when I play at all: any game requiring naval play is essentially a Solo Game after a certain point . . .

 

[Miserable Old Git]

I play deity on huge splintered fractal maps. Almost every game the AI spawns one or two massive navies. Admittedly, it doesn't use them particularly cleverly; its main aim seems to be pillaging any of my coastal tiles it can find, and making movement of my GDRs to new lands very awkward. Sometimes, it masses enough to actually kill GDRs (sometimes with missile cruisers, but more normally nuclear subs).

 

[planetfall]

TY, haven't tried either fractal or Pangaea maps. Currently trying small continent maps. Much more water, but early in game and only a couple galleys so far. I have yet to see more than one Frigate, and Brazil had a battleship, but did nothing with it.

Does difficulty level have any effect on naval activity? Just curious.

 

[Disgustipated]

I have seen it on Earth maps, but it's pretty rare. And usually only one AI will build a Navy (and sometimes not even the Navy centered civilizations) while the others have nothing.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

Does difficulty level have any effect on naval activity? Just curious.

Only indirectly, in that the ai has better production and ramps up quicker on higher difficulties. It does not however prioritize production differently, including ships. The easiest way to cheese a deity win if you're not used to playing on it, is to just pick an island heavy map with few landmasses and spam longships as Norway. The ai is utterly incapable of defending it properly.

 

[planetfall]

Thank you Oberinspektor. Your notes are always right on the mark.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

Cheers.

Related: I just finished a recent domination game on deity as Kublai Khan on a continents map, and I counted a total of two(!) frigates from Russia despite him having half his cities along the coast.
The other leaders on that continent (Khmer, Persia, Maya, Scotland) had zero ships, making the seaborne invasion of that continent a sad joke (for my targets).
Norway (on my home continent) built some 4-5 longships, and apart from that the only real contesting of my waters were from suzerained city states that I was at war with.
Norway often seems to be the exception here, and the reason (I think) is that the AI generally tends to prioritize building unique units whenever they are available.
That being said, even in this case, the absolute bulk of Norways military was concentrated in land units (about 80%, perhaps more), despite him only having two cities that were settled inland off the coast.
Apart from that, I saw Turkey building one (useless) galley, sitting still on a two tile lake outside his city while I mowed him down with my land forces.
City states often seem to be the exception to the rule, but I have a strong suspicion that the reason city states often tend to have a lot of ships, is that I play with barbarian clans active.
Thus the reason for the high ship count seems to be that they are leftovers from when the city state was a barbarian camp, because a city state in itself doesnt seem to prioritize building ships any more than a regular leader AI does.

Thus we can safely conclude that whether on prince or on deity, the AI does in fact not understand how to use sea units (let alone build sufficient amounts), unfortunately.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I an confirm part of that: I play exclusively with Barbarian Clans activated, and every City State that upgrades from a coastal Clan site brings with it a fleet of galleys and/or Quadriremes, and as far as I have been able to tell, stops building anything naval as soon as it becomes a City State.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

My experience. only Vikings (as a rival) did bother to build their longships. (galley), and very few kind of CS also care about navy. (one even meets me at my domain!)
and only if player went to wars against them (or they indeed invade players) did they bother to build warships... a good fleet of warships.
Just one warship built and Harald would praise player, without a single ship (and with territories expanded into seas.) he would mock player until they build any.

In Terra Map. by the Renaissance Era. Barbarians still use Galleys and Quads. but right after player clears these fleets, they did bother modernize their fleets, even brings up their own caravels and frigates to bear. (and these are indeed tough), sometimes even ironclads (Not what they will do IRL)