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Increasing Naval Transport Capacity to Boost AI Invasions?

SayHayKid

Prince
Joined
Oct 30, 2022
Messages
320
The AI is really weak at naval invasions, often sending one ship, at least in the first couple of ages, for an invasion. Has anybody tried doubling (or even more) the transport capacity (especially in the first two eras)? I guess the flip side is that it will make human invasions even easier as we will still build more ships, and have a greater invasion force, but it seems like it would make the AI invasions something we might have to consider.
 
The AI is really weak at naval invasions, often sending one ship, at least in the first couple of ages, for an invasion. Has anybody tried doubling (or even more) the transport capacity (especially in the first two eras)? I guess the flip side is that it will make human invasions even easier as we will still build more ships, and have a greater invasion force, but it seems like it would make the AI invasions something we might have to consider.

The AI rarely loads up a transport to its maximal capacity. So you're likely to boost the human player since they now have to spend less shields on their well escorted transports.
 
The AI is really weak at naval invasions, often sending one ship, at least in the first couple of ages, for an invasion. Has anybody tried doubling (or even more) the transport capacity (especially in the first two eras)? I guess the flip side is that it will make human invasions even easier as we will still build more ships, and have a greater invasion force, but it seems like it would make the AI invasions something we might have to consider.
I have boosted the Industrial Age transport to as high as 10 units. The AI still only uses it for 2 or 3 units. I have no idea why that happens.
 
From what I've read over the years on the forum, the general consensus is that the AI can't plan a proper naval invasion since it only considers strategies for each unit separately rather than on an overall scale. This means that the unit only gets loaded into a transport if they happen to enter or be in a city where the transport is, and then that transport might get an order to move out since it has units in it, meaning no more units can get into it since it already set out.
 
From what I've read over the years on the forum, the general consensus is that the AI can't plan a proper naval invasion since it only considers strategies for each unit separately rather than on an overall scale. This means that the unit only gets loaded into a transport if they happen to enter or be in a city where the transport is, and then that transport might get an order to move out since it has units in it, meaning no more units can get into it since it already set out.
So the answer would be for the AI to have more transport ships around? The more ships, the more units will be sent? Also, the harder it is for the human player to intercept and sink them. This coupled with amph. atk units and modding out those silly outposts can force the human to dedicate quite a chunk of their defense on guarding the coastline.
 
So the answer would be for the AI to have more transport ships around? The more ships, the more units will be sent? Also, the harder it is for the human player to intercept and sink them. This coupled with amph. atk units and modding out those silly outposts can force the human to dedicate quite a chunk of their defense on guarding the coastline.
I removed outpusts, radar towers, and airfields. Building outposts to block invasion is lame and the AI doesn't use the other two. I introduced amphibious infantry earlier (at the end of the 2nd era), but maybe to make AI invasions more challenging I should do like RARR and make units starting all the way back with the warrior amphibious, Though then what role does the Marine have?
 
They dropped the transport from 8 to 6 for a reason. My guess was the larger capacity favored the human.
 
I removed outpusts, radar towers, and airfields. Building outposts to block invasion is lame and the AI doesn't use the other two. I introduced amphibious infantry earlier (at the end of the 2nd era), but maybe to make AI invasions more challenging I should do like RARR and make units starting all the way back with the warrior amphibious, Though then what role does the Marine have?
Marines can be the upgrade line for swords and archers. They can play the amph attacker that only requires 1 resource to build.
 
I'm wondering what to do with Transports myself. It seems like there's not much one can do to make the AI use them better, so why not make them stronger for the player? The AI can certainly make doomstacks on it's one continents, especially at higher difficulty, so I'm thinking of giving lagte came transports a huge capacity to make it easier to naval invade, for the player.
 
I'm wondering what to do with Transports myself. It seems like there's not much one can do to make the AI use them better, so why not make them stronger for the player? The AI can certainly make doomstacks on it's one continents, especially at higher difficulty, so I'm thinking of giving lagte came transports a huge capacity to make it easier to naval invade, for the player.
I have done that, increasing the Transports to carry 10 units, allowing for 2 increased size armies, or a Settler, two Workers, and 7 military units as guards. I have gone higher in Theov's mod with the Ocean Liner, but allow only Foot Units to be carried.
 
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Marines can be the upgrade line for swords and archers. They can play the amph attacker that only requires 1 resource to build.
I have the Berserker with amphibious capability, along with the Crusader in Conquests. The Berserker upgrades to the Marine. The Crusader stays a Crusader. I have boosted the hitpoints ad combat data of the Crusader.
 
The AI is really weak at naval invasions, often sending one ship, at least in the first couple of ages, for an invasion. Has anybody tried doubling (or even more) the transport capacity (especially in the first two eras)? I guess the flip side is that it will make human invasions even easier as we will still build more ships, and have a greater invasion force, but it seems like it would make the AI invasions something we might have to consider.
Yes. I think I stole it from another player. Galley capacity of 3 and increases of 2-4 in capacity for all later units. AI much more likely to have successful naval based assaults. In my most recent game Ghandi landed about 10 elephants and a couple of other units from what appeared to be 2x galleon and a below average AI Civ stuck on an island stole a city from the number 1 AI and held it for 5 turns. Things that would simply not happen with default settings. Highly recommended.

The human can always stick to default capacity limitations if they feel it can be abused.
 
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