How is the Civ 5 A.I. these days?

[ywhtptgtfo]

I've stopped playing Civ 5 long before Gods and Kings (~ the release of Polynesia, I think). Has the A.I. become much more challenging? One of the things I dislike about Civ 5 is that I have to ramp up the difficulty sliders for the A.I. to have any real chance and I dislike ramping up difficulty sliders because that'd let A.I. spam cities everywhere.

 

[sufficiency]

So this is what happened during one of my games today:

My army in information age: 4 xbows, 1 warriors, 2 bombers (I only built the bombers because Austria has a single city with 7 pop left, but she does have a few riflemen... I didn't want her to get the wrong ideas.

Alexander is probably 1000 times my sticks, but he didn't dow me a single time in the game (he did denounce me XXXX times).

 

[Aaron90495]

I've stopped playing Civ 5 long before Gods and Kings (~ the release of Polynesia, I think). Has the A.I. become much more challenging? One of the things I dislike about Civ 5 is that I have to ramp up the difficulty sliders for the A.I. to have any real chance and I dislike ramping up difficulty sliders because that'd let A.I. spam cities everywhere.

AI has improved tremendously IMO, but while G&K made AI city spamming more reasonable, the Fall Patch made it ridiculous again. Some people like the increased difficulty of the ultra-aggressive AI expansion, and some don't; I personally fall somewhere in the middle.

Don't let that dissuade you, though. AI has improved a ton since Vanilla, and G&K fixes so much stuff, in addition to adding an awesome religion mechanic and a pretty good espionage mechanic. The game is definitely harder than before (King in Vanilla = Prince in G&K, Emperor in Vanilla = King in G&K, etc.). Some of this is due to city spamming, but a great deal is due to much better AI, specifically in combat. Do yourself a favor and pick it up. It's not perfect, but it's a heck of a lot better than Vanilla.

 

[JanghanHong]

It's okay, the Iroquois AI seems to be so broken, it's good. They create carpet doom of cities and consistently rank high in the scores.

 

[WChrisMullen]

The AI still has some problems with tactics, though. It will often attack the weakest units rather than the most important ones, so if you send in some cheap meatshield units they'll take them out first rather than the artillery batteries behind them. I once had Siam DoW me and then send elephants stumbling around my cities without actually doing anything to it. It gives the human player an edge in combat, but then again that's what the AI bonuses are for.

 

[sufficiency]

It's okay, the Iroquois AI seems to be so broken, it's good. They create carpet doom of cities and consistently rank high in the scores.

I don't actually think their AI is good, it's just that their UA + starting bias is way too broken. It's almost impossible to invade Iroquois.

 

[Cedbird]

Ha ha funny that the Iroquis were mentioned a couple times this thread . My last game they dominated . I was in the top 3 , but man they were tough to fight .

But to your question . I play with 12 players . MUCH more interesting games on Emperor . Much better tech competition and everything else . But yeah the Ai still is bad . Civ 4 Ai was better . One of my biggest things is Amphibious attacks need to be better . Especially from other Continents .
That will put some fear in some human player hearts lol .

 

[Aaron90495]

Pretty sure my last 5 games with Iroquois have all had them the runaways - as others have said, they're impossible to invade, and when they control half the land in the world, that's a lot of land that you're never gonna get back.

 

[Civking5]

At this point, the AI can bring good challenge with city spamming. This is the only strategy that AI does quite well, unfortunately.

 

[Matthew.]

Just got out of a game where a far away Civ declared war on me, got stuck trying to get past one of my allied city-states, lost entire army to city-state, then offered a peace deal with me giving me one of their cities. Free city with zero effort on my part other than having a CS ally.

It's improved a bit since vanilla, but the difficulty still comes from insane bonuses given to the AI. It still can't play on a tactical level even against itself (such as above example and a 5 city empire loses everything to a single CS)

 

[Heretiv]

AI is ok because it provides a reasonable threat level but ultimately is beatable making it an enjoyable game. If you want a real wart I guess you had better to go MP>

 

[joncnunn]

Several changes in G&K directly or indirectly helps the AI:

1. Embarked defense: It helps AI on pre D Day offenses since the human won't wipe out units for free via run over.

2. Massive nerfs to RA: (Both DOF requirement and the number of turns reduced) On balance helps the AI by massively slowing down human progress via RA.

3. Conversion of HS to free Great Prophet with the old power moved a few era later: Major help to the AI as that wonder was skipped by AI and often used by human for GE for a more expensive wonder.

4. Relocation of PT to a couple of era later: Another major help to the AI since the human can no longer use it to get Astronomy and start Rationalism tree extremely early.

5. Great Scientists nerf from a full tech to X turns; human was really good at picking free expensive techs.

The following major change doesn't really impact AI: Liberty finisher slightly nerfed / Tradition finisher majorly boosted along with a minor boost to Legalism. (It has changed the favorite first starting policy among humans from Liberty to Tradition)

The following additions appear to have hurt the AI:

1. Introduction of CN Tower & Hubble, especally in combination with great people from religion. (AI doesn't know to beeline to these techs and so if the game was competive they lose the space race.) If the game wasn't close though Hubble helps reduce the number of turns for a game you've already effectively won.

2. Adding 10 points of free influence for pledging to protect city states: Human combines this with the 20 point of free influence policy after completing first tree while waiting for Rationalism to open up to become free friends with every city state on the map. (Massive culture, food in the capital, happiness, and religious gains along with free units; this player also becomes a shoe in to win any new most cultural point quests for additional free influence)

3. Humans appear better at picking beneficial religious beliefs, especially the pantheon than the AI.

The following changes sometimes benefits AI and at others the human:

1. Spies are currently imbalanced in favor of offense. (Too high a chance that a spy steals tech even if defended by another spy running counter intelligence) Most of the AIs love to steal techs; who benefits depends on tech progress

2. Tall empires are punished in spy mechanic. (It's based on that city's science rate). When a human is playing ICS, they punish the tall AIs; when a human is playing tall; the AI punishes the human.

3. Both the human & the AI are good at rigging elections via city state and coups.

 

[Sidor1982]

Several changes in G&K directly or indirectly helps the AI:

1. Embarked defense: It helps AI on pre D Day offenses since the human won't wipe out units for free via run over.

2. Massive nerfs to RA: (Both DOF requirement and the number of turns reduced) On balance helps the AI by massively slowing down human progress via RA.

3. Conversion of HS to free Great Prophet with the old power moved a few era later: Major help to the AI as that wonder was skipped by AI and often used by human for GE for a more expensive wonder.

4. Relocation of PT to a couple of era later: Another major help to the AI since the human can no longer use it to get Astronomy and start Rationalism tree extremely early.

5. Great Scientists nerf from a full tech to X turns; human was really good at picking free expensive techs.

The following major change doesn't really impact AI: Liberty finisher slightly nerfed / Tradition finisher majorly boosted along with a minor boost to Legalism. (It has changed the favorite first starting policy among humans from Liberty to Tradition)

The following additions appear to have hurt the AI:

1. Introduction of CN Tower & Hubble, especally in combination with great people from religion. (AI doesn't know to beeline to these techs and so if the game was competive they lose the space race.) If the game wasn't close though Hubble helps reduce the number of turns for a game you've already effectively won.

2. Adding 10 points of free influence for pledging to protect city states: Human combines this with the 20 point of free influence policy after completing first tree while waiting for Rationalism to open up to become free friends with every city state on the map. (Massive culture, food in the capital, happiness, and religious gains along with free units; this player also becomes a shoe in to win any new most cultural point quests for additional free influence)

3. Humans appear better at picking beneficial religious beliefs, especially the pantheon than the AI.

The following changes sometimes benefits AI and at others the human:

1. Spies are currently imbalanced in favor of offense. (Too high a chance that a spy steals tech even if defended by another spy running counter intelligence) Most of the AIs love to steal techs; who benefits depends on tech progress

2. Tall empires are punished in spy mechanic. (It's based on that city's science rate). When a human is playing ICS, they punish the tall AIs; when a human is playing tall; the AI punishes the human.

3. Both the human & the AI are good at rigging elections via city state and coups.

I would even add more of changes, that directly or indirectly increased the AI's abilities (although some are programming changes, not game ability changes):

1. Pillaging of improvements in exchange for health bonus.
2. Using of specialists by the AI
3. Programming AI's to always go for early rushes, when the human player doesn't have the production capabilities the AI has
4. Spending gold on units by the AI's
5. AI's conquering CS instead of allying them
6. AI's ICSing without any negative modyfiers preventing them from doing so
7. Introduction of new units (espacially Great War Bombers) and programming the AI's to beeline for it

All this + the insane modifiers the AI gets caused the game to be more difficult (even when in many cases it's an artificial increase, not an actual improvement)

 

[joncnunn]

I would even add more of changes, that directly or indirectly increased the AI's abilities (although some are programming changes, not game ability changes):

1. Pillaging of improvements in exchange for health bonus.

Yes, this tends to help the AI as humans have been better at avoiding having units killed.

2. Using of specialists by the AI

I'd not noticed any change there.

3. Programming AI's to always go for early rushes, when the human player doesn't have the production capabilities the AI has

One of the vanilla patches did that; the one that decreased base city defense value (the value of city defense even without walls) about a year or so after the release

4. Spending gold on units by the AI's

That patch may be in the base game; it was after G&K was released

5. AI's conquering CS instead of allying them

AI has frequently tried to conquer CS in the past; it's more effective at doing so in G&K than it has been.

6. AI's ICSing without any negative modyfiers preventing them from doing so

The second part has been in the game since the initial version of the CD game and became more and more profound during the first 12 months as the first few patches increased city unhappiness, decreased effectiveness of hapiness structures and luxuries.
As to AI tendency to ICS (appears to be in base game rather than specific to G&K): Wild swings seen here, the patch around time of G&K actually reduced this a lot. Then the latest patch restored it.

7. Introduction of new units (espacially Great War Bombers) and programming the AI's to beeline for it

AI doesn't beeline for techs in the sense that a human sometimes does. It will prefer several cheap techs adding up to the cost of an expensive tech.

All this + the insane modifiers the AI gets caused the game to be more difficult (even when in many cases it's an artificial increase, not an actual improvement)

I find Emperor level to be easier with G&K. It takes a few turns longer to win though since the tech advancement is now research driven rather than RA-driven.

Immortal level: The point at which the human researches past the AI is generally later in G&K than in vanilla; unless playing one of the overpowered civs. (e.g. Carthage on a water based map). But here the AI collapses in Information Era due to it being obvious to the human which techs to beeline for (and how to use religious points) which the AI doesn't appear to know which techs to go for.

 

[omnishakira]

1. Pillaging of improvements in exchange for health bonus.

This help drastically more the human than the AI.

 

[KerwiniusJones]

3. Programming AI's to always go for early rushes, when the human player doesn't have the production capabilities the AI has

I would argue that this makes things easier for the human at immortal and deity levels...
Maybe it's my Starcraft background thinking, but if I know the computer is going to rush me... holding it off becomes routine. If I don't know whether the computer is going to rush me or not, I may build a defense army for nothing while the computer gets even farther ahead by focusing on buildings, wonders, and expanding.

 

[Civking5]

This help drastically more the human than the AI.

To some extent you are right, but also helps AI in the assaults greatly. The AI is more effective now in conquering cities because of this.

 

[Misotu]

Well, Emperor is way too easy, Immortal way too hard. I don't really give a damn about level but I would like to have a challenging game that I have a chance of winning and can enjoy along the way. Frankly if the highest level that gave me that were Warlord, I would embrace it. But there really isn't any fun to be had with Civ V and I am really hacked off about it because I've been trying for months. Pressing the end turn button has become too tedious for words.

The various restrictions in the game particularly regarding numbers of units and 1UPT mean that strategies are very, very limited. If you build the units you need, you run out of gold. If you build the units you need, you run out of tiles. If you build fewer units, you run out of units!

What a shame. So many fighting games out there, it would be nice to have an intelligent challenge as a builder and a game that permits a multitude of strategies.

Not going to check back here, so don't waste your breath insulting me I think it would have been possible to have 2 or 3 units per tile, say, so that weak units could be covered properly by stronger ones. Embark with boats so much more interesting than auto-embark. Builder options on stronger levels are really almost non-existent.

YAWN.

 

[Rellin]

I really love the Civ5 AI. I personally think it is the best AI available for turn based strategy games right now.

But I do agree with the above poster that emperor is pretty darn easy and that immortal is extremely hard. I have been trying to beat immortal the past couple of weeks and can't seem to do it.

 

[BBMorti]

That some people find Immortal very hard is a good thing when talking AI, I suppose?