How to "Read" the AI?

[VCrakeV]

I actually have a few questions, but they're all related to the first: How do I know when an AI is preparing for war? You might have to be explicit, because I have a mild form of Autism, and have difficulty understanding real people (I don't understand what makes do/say what they do). I was DoW on by an AI I paid tribute to, traded with, and opened borders with. Yet affinity was -1 for not aiding him in war (I wasn't prepared). On a side note, I had nothing but positive affinity with another AI, but he was cautious... How does that work? I have more to mention, but I'm a little busy. I'll post again later...



EDIT: Should I ever have border cities prepared for war before I see it coming (extra garrison)? How much, generally, is enough? Should I drop *everything* and pump military units during/before war?

 

[Tatran]

he was cautious...

Every AI can plot and start a war against you when cautious, annoyed or furious.
You should look for the "Knowing your enemy guide". It will give you all the info about the civ4 leaders.
Here's an example :
Catherine will still trade techs when she's furious at you. (probably not when you're her worst enemy.)
Other leaders, like Stalin and Ragnar, will only trade techs when they are at least pleased with you.

 

[VCrakeV]

Every AI can plot and start a war against you when cautious, annoyed or furious.
You should look for the "Knowing your enemy guide". It will give you all the info about the civ4 leaders.
Here's an example :
Catherine will still trade techs when she's furious at you. (probably not when you're her worst enemy.)
Other leaders, like Stalin and Ragnar, will only trade techs when they are at least pleased with you.

Thanks, but I seem to have problems with every leader. They're always cautious. What makes leaders cautious/pleased?

 

[georgjorge]

1. The most reliable way to see if an AI is plotting against you is to go to the diplo screen and see what they say about waging war against someone else. If they say "We have enough on our hands right now" that means they are either already in a war or are plotting one. Since you don't want to go to the diplo screen every turn you should use the BUG mod or BAT mod, which basically doesn't alter anything about the core game but gives you a lot of useful info. It will make a red fist appear beside a leader name if they are plotting war or are in a war. It is EXTREMELY useful for avoiding war.

2. You can ask any AI which is Pleased with you to gift you something of small value (1 gold, small tech). If they give it to you they automatically have a 10 turn peace treaty! So if you see them plotting war, 10 turns is a lot to put up a defense.

3. On the highest levels it's pretty hard to have enough units to survive attacks, so you mostly rely on diplomacy (getting AIs near you to Pleased/Friendly). Up to Emperor I'd say you can maintain a good defensive army in addition to diplomacy.

4. The AIs most likely to attack you are your neighbours, so they are the ones you want to get to Pleased/Friendly to be safe from attacks. How to do that?

Open Borders gives you +1 and after some time +2
Resource trades give you +1 after some time and later +2
Shared Religion can give you between +1 (early on) and +7 I think (later with very religious AIs)
Shared favorite civic can give you about the same as shared religion
Making trades favorable for the AI (tech or gold) can give you up to +4 (the more favorable the better)

Those are the most common ways to get an AI to Pleased/Friendly. You will need between +3 and +5 to get them to Pleased so you don't need to use all of those. Note that you should at least get your immediate neighbours to Pleased unless you plan to attack them soon. Open borders, pick a religion they share (if they have different ones you might not want to pick any), make them favorable trades, see if they have a useful favorite civic. And try to avoid negative attitude (from trading with their Worst Enemy or refusing their demands) from them.

5. The very comprehensive guide to see which leaders will give you which attitude bonuses is here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=478563

6. All AIs can attack at Cautious. A good part of them can attack at Pleased (but is less likely to do so than at Cautious). None can attack at Friendly (save for Catherine being bribed to do so).

 

[Tatran]

They're always cautious. What makes leaders cautious/pleased?

At the start of the game each leader is cautious towards you, although some leaders (like Montezuma and Stalin) will like you less if you are doing better as them.
(Doing better (iirc) has something to do with the upper and lower half of the score board.)
Each leader has a (hidden) base attitude towards the human player, from -1 to +2. (see picture.)
Gandhi and Zara Yaqob only need one more point to become pleased and sometimes they are already pleased towards you when you meet them the first time, because they are doing better then the human player.
The pleased status is at +3. Your relationship points with a leader is the sum of all the positive and negative diplomatic modifiers. Is it +2 -> they are cautious. The relationship status (friendly, pleased, cautious, annoyed or furious) determines their willingness to trade with you, to go war with you. etc.
Trading with the AI (open borders, resources and techs), sharing the same religion, running their favourite civic, etc. will increase your diplo points.

 

[VCrakeV]

Looks like I'll just build a lot of defences and/or stick lower difficulties. I hate the idea of choosing a civic/religion not for it's direct benefits, but because someone else has it (also hate emancipation). Nor do I like giving stuff away or doing unfair trades. I think I'll take my hate out on the AI next time. 😤

 

[Lazteuq]

You can sort of tell what strategy they are pursuing by watching what they are doing. If they are spamming wonders, they probably aren't a threat. If they look like they are preparing for war, send in a spy or 2 and look at where their soldiers are concentrated. If they have a dangerous stack but it is being prepared in a city next to someone else, then you are probably safe.

 

[georgjorge]

Looks like I'll just build a lot of defences and/or stick lower difficulties. I hate the idea of choosing a civic/religion not for it's direct benefits, but because someone else has it (also hate emancipation). Nor do I like giving stuff away or doing unfair trades. I think I'll take my hate out on the AI next time. 😤

I respect that, and you can certainly play that way. But to me it seems that religion was PRIMARILY introduced into the game for diplomacy reasons (creating diplomatic blocks, increasing the probability of war etc). The effects on your cities are just a nice bonus.

 

[nate46]

Looks like I'll just build a lot of defences and/or stick lower difficulties. I hate the idea of choosing a civic/religion not for it's direct benefits, but because someone else has it (also hate emancipation). Nor do I like giving stuff away or doing unfair trades. I think I'll take my hate out on the AI next time. 😤

you can still win up to and including immortal difficulty while pretty much ignoring diplomacy and refusing all threats/requests. If you get your power rating high enough, they're really unlikely to attack you since they'll be afraid of your army, and even if they do you can fight them if you can min-max your production correctly.

 

[elitetroops]

Looks like I'll just build a lot of defences and/or stick lower difficulties. I hate the idea of choosing a civic/religion not for it's direct benefits, but because someone else has it (also hate emancipation). Nor do I like giving stuff away or doing unfair trades. I think I'll take my hate out on the AI next time. 😤

Stop thinking of it as giving away or making unfair trades. Look at the big picture and consider the benefits. I do unfair trades and gift stuff a way all the time because it benefits me more than it benefits the AI.

You should also remember that the AI trade between them as well. Let's say your neighbours are Joao and Mehmed, both are cautious towards you and could decide to attack you at any time. You have Calendar and Code of Laws, Joao only has Calendar and Mehmed only has CoL. Let's look at the options:

a) Sell them the techs for 30 gold each, both become pleased, you don't need to worry about being attacked by either of them and you earn 60 gold.

b) Don't sell them because you hate unfair trades. Next turn Mehmed trades CoL to Joao for Calendar, they both get the techs for free anyway, you get nothing and you still face the threat of being attacked. Or even worse, Joao starts plotting on you, declares in a few turns and uses Calendar to bribe Mehmed into the war. There you have a 2 front war and Mehmed got Calendar for free.

You do not lose anything by giving things away or selling very cheap. You can only gain things.

As for religion, all religions have the same benefits. Maybe you have to choose a religion that isn't as widely spread in your lands to please the right AI. But building a couple of missionaries to spread the religion to a few more cities is still cheaper than a potential unwanted war you could be facing.

 

[VCrakeV]

Stop thinking of it as giving away or making unfair trades. Look at the big picture and consider the benefits. I do unfair trades and gift stuff a way all the time because it benefits me more than it benefits the AI.





You should also remember that the AI trade between them as well. Let's say your neighbours are Joao and Mehmed, both are cautious towards you and could decide to attack you at any time. You have Calendar and Code of Laws, Joao only has Calendar and Mehmed only has CoL. Let's look at the options:





a) Sell them the techs for 30 gold each, both become pleased, you don't need to worry about being attacked by either of them and you earn 60 gold.





b) Don't sell them because you hate unfair trades. Next turn Mehmed trades CoL to Joao for Calendar, they both get the techs for free anyway, you get nothing and you still face the threat of being attacked. Or even worse, Joao starts plotting on you, declares in a few turns and uses Calendar to bribe Mehmed into the war. There you have a 2 front war and Mehmed got Calendar for free.





You do not lose anything by giving things away or selling very cheap. You can only gain things.





As for religion, all religions have the same benefits. Maybe you have to choose a religion that isn't as widely spread in your lands to please the right AI. But building a couple of missionaries to spread the religion to a few more cities is still cheaper than a potential unwanted war you could be facing.

Thanks; that helps a lot! I'll actually try diplomacy next time, now that I have a different way of looking at it.



As for religion, I usually have free religion by the time the AI want to go to war. Is it possible to declare a state religion while using that civic? Does the AI care?

 

[unas876]

No, Free Religion means that you don't have a state religion and that all the positive or negative diplomatic effects caused by religion are gone instantly. All you can get is shared civic bonus by AIs that favor the Free Religion civic.

I don't see how you can get Free Religion before the AIs want go for war though. Ever had to build a civilization right next to Shaka, Montezuma or Genghis Khan? Those guys (and a few others) will regularly start plotting war just after getting Bronze Working.

I suppose you build the Shwedagon Paya a lot then? I don't know what other people think but I almost never build that particular wonder as 450 hammers in that time frame is a lot and usually this early in the game at least I think Organized Religion is extremely powerful should you be in a position where you can afford to choose a religion at all. Like other people said, sometimes if there are many different religions in the game and you don't want to get bad diplomacy with certain AIs its best to not have a religion at all.