Is my AI stupid(er than usual)?

[Dr. S. C.]

I've read many suggestions and guides on here, and it's all helped me, but there is one strategy I've never been able to follow, thanks to the stupidity of the AI:

Selling luxuries to get RAs. Too often in my games, it seems the AI struggles with managing their gold. If I'm lucky, there will be one that manages to runaway with gold, getting into the 10,000s while everyone else lives in their >300g poverty...

Which means, once I sell any luxury, they have no gold to sign a RA with! Sometimes, I can't even sell open borders to half the civs when my last sell ran out!

It's gotten to the point where, at least one AI in each game, I'll notice will get into the negatives; IIRC, the worst I've seen is -54 income (I don't remember if they had just come out of a GA, which might have helped explain that, but still: "REALLY?!").

For reference, I usually play prince/king, small, standard/occasional epic, random maps (so I've noticed this happening on everything from pangaea to tiny islands).

EDIT: I don't play with any mods

Does anyone else experience this? Is there anything I can do to fix it? I've been thinking about moving up difficulty; would that help?

((PS, not sure if this is the place to post this... I'm new, obviously))

 

[Dr. S. C.]

What difficulty are you on?

The strategies than involve living off the AI gold only really work on emperor+

prince or king, depending on the Civ I'm playing.

I must have missed that part on difficulty while reading about those strategies; I'll try a game on Emperor, then, and see how it goes. Thanks!

 

[Smokeybear]

In general if the AI doesn't have enough cash, ask for GPT. It's better than nothing. Get as much cash upfront as you can though.

I've noticed that AI civs rarely want to pay the full cash price for your luxs or resources, but will pay the full price in GPT to you. For instance- in my usual marathon games, on friendly terms with a civ and no diplo negatives yet, I can get 7GPT and 30 gold cash for a lux... but when I ask for the exact same amount of cash up front instead (660 G in a marathon game), the civ will almost always so no, and force me to ask for much less cash before it will accept the trade. This happens even when they have oodles of gold banked, and hundreds of GPT rolling in.

I don't understand it. Why are the bastidges so stingy with cash, even when they have tons? I've very rarely seen it where they will pay you full cash price for your goods, and it happens so seldom that I don't even bother anymore.

 

[NotSure]

You have to finance the RA at King/Prince. Well, I mean you have to front them the $ for GPT. So, in order to make that very effective RA/PT/Rationalism strategy work at King/Prince you have to do ALL of the work.

You have to expand (or conquer) enough to get good GPT and a good reserve. If you expand that much you'll need the happiness, so luxury for luxury trades with the AI will suit two needs - let the AI keep a little gold, and improve your happiness situation. I would say that when Napoleon declares on you next game, take all of his cities and settle at least 4 or 5 more. If you get it all done before you enter Renaissance you're set.

Oh, and there are some (fewer, granted) poor AI even on Emperor & Immortal. The "everyone is rich except the human" absurdity only happens on Deity.

 

[TPQ]

Even on Emperor I usually have to loan or give many AIs cash for RAs. It's probably best to just do that to get ahead if you have the excess gold. As long as the AIs aren't signing RAs with each other, you'll come out ahead even if you have to pay for their half of every RA.

 

[Venger]

I don't understand it. Why are the bastidges so stingy with cash, even when they have tons? I've very rarely seen it where they will pay you full cash price for your goods, and it happens so seldom that I don't even bother anymore.

I think it's to prevent gaming the trades so that you get the cash up front, then DoW, pillage, or otherwise void the deal - you've already got the cash, they no longer get the merchandise. You can then reconnect the resource or have peace, then do it again to them. It's frankly more realistic, to pay for the resource on a turn by turn basis, than to pay all up front on a promise of down the road delivery. Especially with untrustworthy human players....

 

[Smokeybear]

I think it's to prevent gaming the trades so that you get the cash up front, then DoW, pillage, or otherwise void the deal - you've already got the cash, they no longer get the merchandise. You can then reconnect the resource or have peace, then do it again to them. It's frankly more realistic, to pay for the resource on a turn by turn basis, than to pay all up front on a promise of down the road delivery. Especially with untrustworthy human players....

Yes, that does make sense- but it doesn't jibe with all the anecdotes I read on here where people say to "always get cash up front for your luxs, don't accept GPT for them". I would love to have that option, but if I tried, I'd have to settle for far less than I can get out of the long-term GPT deals.

 

[Smokeybear]

Not sure what's going on. I only play on standard speed. On that speed the going price is 240 gold per luxury. The AI only wants to pay that when they are friendly. The less they like you the less they pay. I hate to make you feel bad, but maybe they just secretly hate you. The AI lies as well. If they say friendly and will not pay full price for luxuries then they are lying. They aren't really friendly, and you can expect trouble. For most AI's I can get about 200 gold. If they hate me they only want to pay about 109 gold.

THEY HATE ME?!?!? OMG, I am now SOOOO hurt! And here I even sent out Christmas cards.... <sob>

Yep, that's probably it, or most of it. They are without a doubt the most villainous pack of lowdown, sneering, backstabbing pondscum that ever walked or crawled upon the earth, 'tis true. Now I'm glad I injected a pint of butt-crack extract into those brownies I had sent to Alexander... may he rot in hades.

 

[builer680]

I've noticed that AI civs rarely want to pay the full cash price for your luxs or resources, but will pay the full price in GPT to you. For instance- in my usual marathon games, on friendly terms with a civ and no diplo negatives yet, I can get 7GPT and 30 gold cash for a lux... but when I ask for the exact same amount of cash up front instead (660 G in a marathon game), the civ will almost always so no, and force me to ask for much less cash before it will accept the trade. This happens even when they have oodles of gold banked, and hundreds of GPT rolling in.

I don't understand it. Why are the bastidges so stingy with cash, even when they have tons? I've very rarely seen it where they will pay you full cash price for your goods, and it happens so seldom that I don't even bother anymore.

You can usually get 7gpt + 59 gold (a bit more than your 7gpt + 30 gold) with Friendly, and sometimes even Neutral, civs on Marathon. Higher multiples tend to trend down from 0-2 gold per lux on the lump sum portion. For quick calculations on lump sums in multiples of 59, I substitute 60 in my head and subtract the relevant number(s) until they accept. If you want, you could also just multiply 50 * (# of luxuries) + 9 * (# of luxuries). I find the first method easier, but YMMV.

In the example below, you see multiples of 60 to get a round number, then a quick subtraction of 1 gold lump sum per each luxury to get the actual multiple of 59, then a further subtraction depending on the degeneration as you get more luxuries in a deal.

BASELINE:
1 lux = 7gpt + 59 gold (59 = 60-1)

-- for 90 turns, for a total of 689g. By comparison, you can sell outright for either 700g or 720g, I can't remember which.

Multiples:
2 lux = 14gpt + 117 gold (117 = 60(2) - 2 - 1)
3 lux = 21gpt + 175 gold (175 = 60(3) - 3 - 2)
4 lux = 28gpt + 234 gold (234 = 60(4) - 4 - 2)
5 lux = 35gpt + 292 gold (297 = 60(5) - 5 - 3)

Guarded will tend to get you 3gpt + 44 gold per lux (314g, compared to 300g selling outright... weird, maybe you can get more selling outright on Guarded but I've never messed with it much, preferring the income), following the same degeneration by a gold or two per lux after 2 or so on the lump sum side. I'm sure it's clear as mud, and I may be off by a gold or two on the multiples, as I'm doing this from memory. But you get the idea.

Variations happen. Sometimes a civ says friendly and will pay full price, then all of a sudden while still friendly they'll pay only 6gpt, or whatever. But the above numbers are good places to start and to get every last penny you can from the enabling AI. If you really want every last penny, best to do each deal separately I guess... though it's only a few gold difference in the end. Better yet, just sell outright. I personally prefer the gpt though, I like income because I tend to blow big lump sums fast.

 

[Smokeybear]

If you really want every last penny, best to do each deal separately I guess... though it's only a few gold difference in the end. Better yet, just sell outright. I personally prefer the gpt though, I like income because I tend to blow big lump sums fast.

I agree, GPT works better for me, and keeps me from ending up with a lot of negative red minus-gold episodes. Hate that.

 

[Silverfuturist]

"Is there anything I can do to fix it?"

Yes!!! Play humans! Try multiplayer. The game is completely different against intelligent people. Very different, I can't go back to playing the AI anymore now.

I you want a challenge, join the league at civplayers.com - the top players there will blow your freaking mind at how good they are at combat.

 

[Tabarnak]

"Is there anything I can do to fix it?"

Yes!!! Play humans! Try multiplayer. The game is completely different against intelligent people. Very different, I can't go back to playing the AI anymore now.

I you want a challenge, join the league at civplayers.com - the top players there will blow your freaking mind at how good they are at combat.

If i already beat you, does it makes me an intelligent person?

I like sp games, but under competitive ways like GOTM and HoF games. But i agree that the multiplayer mode is the only ''true'' way to play this game as we can see. Nobody would let you gold for luxuries. It's basically a paradox. But how can you sign RAs or ally some cs otherwise? That's why pure gold trading exists.

2 games in 1 box...actually i really like this.

 

[Silverfuturist]

If i already beat you, does it makes me an intelligent person?

I like sp games, but under competitive ways like GOTM and HoF games. But i agree that the multiplayer mode is the only ''true'' way to play this game as we can see. Nobody would let you gold for luxuries. It's basically a paradox. But how can you sign RAs or ally some cs otherwise? That's why pure gold trading exists.

2 games in 1 box...actually i really like this.

Most people who play Civ are intelligent people, even humans new to multiplayer will do things I haven't seen before. The AI does the same thing over and over...