Flexible Difficulty / Flexible AI

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I was wondering if there's a reason why we can set a maximum and a minimum difficulty for human players while AI difficulty always spans between Settler and Deity with no option to limit it. I'm going to add an option to limit maximum and minimum AI difficulty and this is because in my test games I've noticed that sometimes AI isn't expanding very well when Flexible AI is enabled because even very small civs (1-2 cities have the same strenght as well developed ones). I think this is hurting AI on the long run because humans are expanding more easily while no big AI empire is ever raising.

 

[dbkblk]

Why does Flexible diff needs a setting ? Why don't we just make two ticks available: Flexible diff / AI. There is already a lot of technical options available. Letting the user choice is good, but when there is an optimized setting, I'm not sure it's a good idea.
We should set Flex diff to 10turns/check by default and eventually remove that dropdown too.
The whole point of Flex diff is to let the user play at an optimized diff level for him. The rest is internal.

The current problem resides to the fact the human is almost always at the first place and flexible diff has just a low impact on this. If this is resolved, we don't need settings for flex diff.

I'm currently working at making the AI a real threat and capable to steamroll another AI, but I'm just at the experimental phase Afforess' changes has a good impact on this but I want the aggressive AI to be scary as in BTS (or more), not a candy distributor.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Well, in theory I think you're right but depending on different settings AI and humans perform differently. For example if you use or don't use revolution. And I remember some users asking to set AI difficulty (oldnoob?). I'm not sure if it's necessary, I'd like to hear Afforess opinion here

 

[<Nexus>]

PLEASE DON'T SET THE CHECK TO A FIX NUMBER.
It really makes a difference whether you play on Blitz or Eternity.
It would be better to have two different options for the AI and the Human player.
I'd like to set frequency to 50 turns for myself and 10 turns for the AI.

 

[dbkblk]

It really makes a difference whether you play on Blitz or Eternity.

Then the problem lives in the fact this counter should depend on the game speed ?

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

It's already gamespeed dependant for AI and manually selectable for humans. I'd like to make it manual for both and definitely not fixed.

 

[Samson]

I use the mimimum level for the human a bit, basically to be able to increase my difficultly level in game.

 

[oldnooob]

My best result was to limit the AI to settler (in the global xml) and set myself at diety in bug. that enabled the AI to be competitive through most of the the Modern era.
It also allowed me to have an out (exploit) if I got too far behind or felt immediately threatened.
BUT there is a real drawback to that strategy, because the individual AI Civ never advances faster than the one above it in line. AIs don't "break out" and pass each other so the game gets very boring half way through the game.

Another thing too is the "Big Fish" AIs don't go around and gobble up the little Civs, if anything they will only declare war, then Parade their massive fleet around the little civ for 10 turns then declare peace. occasionally a city will change hands sure, but the conquering of a whole civ? maybe 1 or2 in a long game, not every game.

I now use the default settings for the last month.

I thank dbkblk for taking on the AI challenge. Stupid AI and limited leader interactions are the two glaring defects in BTS ( and this and C2C mods). In my (aged, decrepit, worn out) mind.

 

[nionios]

I've never played with Flexible difficulty/Flexible AI because I don't like both.I'm concerned because I personally feel that the mod has been adapted to those features so it may become unbalanced for someone who plays without these options.I wish my feeling is wrong.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I've never played with Flexible difficulty/Flexible AI because I don't like both.I'm concerned because I personally feel that the mod has been adapted to those features so it may become unbalanced for someone who plays without these options.I wish my feeling is wrong.

I've tested lately with these feature but I also test with these options off. I usually check when I think an option might have a big impact on the game so that I can adjust the code to make it work with or without that option

 

[Afforess]

I've never played with Flexible difficulty/Flexible AI because I don't like both.I'm concerned because I personally feel that the mod has been adapted to those features so it may become unbalanced for someone who plays without these options.I wish my feeling is wrong.

If it helps allay your fears, I almost always play with both off.

 

[nionios]

If it helps allay your fears, I almost always play with both off.

OK.I have the general feeling that the majority of the forum members use both options.

 

[philipschall]

I play with both off. I recently played with both on, only to find myself high in score but completely outpaced in tech and military by civs half my size. The bonuses afforded to AI are too severe, I find, and the game becomes a min-maxing grind. No fun.

 

[dbkblk]

To me the problem comes from the score calculation, not the difficulty. At some point, we need to find a better formulae for this.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I play with both off. I recently played with both on, only to find myself high in score but completely outpaced in tech and military by civs half my size. The bonuses afforded to AI are too severe, I find, and the game becomes a min-maxing grind. No fun.

Well, score in the scoreboard near the minimap really has no meaning at all, so where's the problem being high in score and being surpassed by other smaller civs? By the way this also makes them a bit more competitive and harder to conquest, at least in my experience. Size isn't (or shouldn't be) everything. If it were, THAT would be no fun: just get bigger and bigger and you win the game. Easy. No diplomacy, no resources problem, no nothing. Just destroy everything and conquer anyone. I don't think this is fun. If a smaller civ can be a threat, THAT is fun in my view.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

To me the problem comes from the score calculation, not the difficulty. At some point, we need to find a better formulae for this.

Well, there's the way Mastery score is calculated. That sounds a lot better to me and the reason why I almost always play with Mastery Victory.

 

[dbkblk]

Well, there's the way Mastery score is calculated. That sounds a lot better to me and the reason why I almost always play with Mastery Victory.

Do you mean the score calculation is different with a mastery victory ?

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Do you mean the score calculation is different with a mastery victory ?

Definitely, look at the Pedia entry for mastery victory

 

[dbkblk]

Definitely, look at the Pedia entry for mastery victory

Ok, but as I always play with mastery on, it doesn't change my point of view

 

[nionios]

Well, score in the scoreboard near the minimap really has no meaning at all, so where's the problem being high in score and being surpassed by other smaller civs? By the way this also makes them a bit more competitive and harder to conquest, at least in my experience. Size isn't (or shouldn't be) everything. If it were, THAT would be no fun: just get bigger and bigger and you win the game. Easy. No diplomacy, no resources problem, no nothing. Just destroy everything and conquer anyone. I don't think this is fun. If a smaller civ can be a threat, THAT is fun in my view.

I believe that flexible AI could have a meaning because that helps a smaller civ to become more challenging but flexible difficulty for my civ just spoils my game because I've built my empire to work in a specific way.I don't want my civ to get suddenly unhealthiness/unhapiness just because my score is X and their score is Y.IMO Civilization is a very realistic strategic game and not a shoot'em up where you gain bonus or penalties when you reach a certain score.I'd rather my empire decayed and fragmented to smaller states due to revolts/revolutions or just because that is the natural fate of all the empires in real history.So the game could be more challenging by toning up the revolutions for really big and strong empires.