Late Game Panics

[KaiserKevin]

I remember in Civ 4 at least for the space race victory there would be a countdown, and on many games right after I launched a multitude of my neighbors would DoW against me immediately. I have yet to see anything like that happen consistently in Civ 5 and think it would be appropriate behavior for the 'AI wants to win' thing they are going for. Although annoying at the time I sort of miss it now.

I think AI should have this mindset re-instated. After certain conditions are met the AI should become extremely aggressive against a potential win, such as when 5 SP tracks are complete, a civ has taken 3 or so capitals, completion of Apollo and Manhattan projects, and perhaps UN.

The victory that bugs me the most is Diplo, it is just so anti-climatic and cheesy. The hell every other nation would be like 'ok your our new leader,' right after the vote. There should be like a 10-15 turn countdown after the vote for the leader to 'consolidate power' in which the other civs have a chance to nullify the vote by destroying the elected civ or destroying the UN. Think that would be a lot more fun.

 

[civnoob13]

I personally agree with you, but I have read that plenty of others have said that the AI will DOW on you when you are about to win. Maybe it's to do with difficulty level. I like your suggestion about the 15 turns, that would spice up diplomacy. I have my own idea regarding diplomatic victories too:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=426617

 

[aimlessgun]

I believe they will DoW you when you start the Utopia project. Space and diplo though, they just let you get away with it. Which yes, is quite ridiculous if the AI is theoretically "playing like a human, trying to win" (which they mostly are not).

However, having everyone go to war with you is the worst way to fix this problem. If someone wants to win with a builder victory, it sucks to force them to fight a world war. The AI should try to stop you from winning by actually being competent at getting policies or building a starship or bribing the city states.

 

[BobDole]

I'd say the AI was never really aggressive in IV when it came to preventing victory. As long as you kept them at a level where they couldn't DoW you (for many of them, Pleased, others Friendly) they couldn't do anything about it. And even if they could, they typically didn't bother to.

Anyway, I think in general, players want the AI to be somewhat aggressive in preventing victory, but it's a careful balance, or else it's just not fun. Most players wouldn't enjoy being backstabbed by their friends just because they filled up a 5th SP tree, or DoWed by everyone just because they almost finished their spaceship. Right now the AI seems to me to be fairly oblivious to victory, so maybe there's more room for aggression, but that's just in my experience, and again, it's a balancing act.

As for anti-climactic victory types, not much to disagree on there. It's something that hopefully is worked on in the future. At least give me a victory movie so it feels a little more epic.

 

[Buccaneer]

I believe they will DoW you when you start the Utopia project. Space and diplo though, they just let you get away with it. Which yes, is quite ridiculous if the AI is theoretically "playing like a human, trying to win" (which they mostly are not).

However, having everyone go to war with you is the worst way to fix this problem. If someone wants to win with a builder victory, it sucks to force them to fight a world war. The AI should try to stop you from winning by actually being competent at getting policies or building a starship or bribing the city states.

or trying to militarily destroy you? Just because you want to limit your play does not mean your opponents have to do the same. You already have an advantage and you want to restrict the AI even more?? The AI should try to beat you in any way that it can, esp. militarily. It forces you to actually play smarter since you can't neglect military units.

 

[KungCheops]

or trying to militarily destroy you? Just because you want to limit your play does not mean your opponents have to do the same. You already have an advantage and you want to restrict the AI even more?? The AI should try to beat you in any way that it can, esp. militarily. It forces you to actually play smarter since you can't neglect military units.

You can always neglect building units for the simple reason that the AI can't fight a war.

 

[Hakizo]

I played a game pre-patch where as soon as I started building the utopia project 2 civs DoW me and dropped nukes on all 3 of my cities.

I was not a happy camper.

 

[Buccaneer]

I played a game pre-patch where as soon as I started building the utopia project 2 civs DoW me and dropped nukes on all 3 of my cities.

I was not a happy camper.

Shame on you for letting two civs get strong enough to have been able to nuke you.

 

[KaiserKevin]

Hmm, I never had a Civ DoW on me as I start Utopia, then again by that time they're usually too far behind to be much of a threat. Seeing the Manhattan or Apollo being completed by anyone is generally a red-flag for me to go get them, dunno why it isn't so much for the AI. I play prince/king level, so maybe higher tiers the AI is more of a threat.

If the AI is too far behind during the UN votes what they could easily do is attack the CS not allied with them, which I don't see happening enough. UN vote usually doesn't trigger the AI to go after a CS.

And I usually play builder but I'm getting board of coasting to victory at the end, just waiting out the turns to finish utopia or the SS parts. The late game wars are the most fun anyway, would like to see the AI up the ante during the clutch times.

 

[aimlessgun]

or trying to militarily destroy you? Just because you want to limit your play does not mean your opponents have to do the same. You already have an advantage and you want to restrict the AI even more?? The AI should try to beat you in any way that it can, esp. militarily. It forces you to actually play smarter since you can't neglect military units.

I think you're taking my words too far. I'm saying 'solving' the problem of the AI letting you win by making them automatically declare war on you once you start a spaceship, or once you build the UN, is silly. The warlike AIs who want to win conquest victories should DOW you. But the other civs should compete in different ways. War should not be the only part of the game where you have to compete directly vs the AI.

 

[Buccaneer]

I understand but if they are too far behind in techs or SP or spaceship parts, then the easiest thing for them to do to stop you is to rush some units, including nukes. I have said several times about CS-centric civs not being aggressive enough in winning UN when it is sitting on a pile of gold. But part of that aggressiveness (as I had seen Alexander do a couple of times) is to not only outbid you, but to forcefully take some of your CS by war. And if it comes down to it, they should start weakening you directly. They are still trying to win by UN votes but they have to use every trick to make that happen. Simply playing peaceful and trying to outbid you is not enough against a human player.

 

[Camikaze]

I believe they will DoW you when you start the Utopia project.

I've never had that happen to me, which I find quite odd. You're much more of an easy target for a big army if you're going OOC Cultural, so it would seem to make sense for the AI to go after you in this instance. They don't like you if you try and win the game in the same way as them, but then won't actually do anything to stop you.

 

[cccv]

I've been dogpiled for science and culture VCs before (for science it was when I built apollo. For culture it was actually a bit before utopia, when I was close to filling out all my policies). Diplo is a bit different. You don't have to buy out a single CS until the turn before the vote, so the other civs can't do much about it. They (or at least the one you're fighting for the CS's over) will DOW on you, however, if neither of you has enough votes (thus locking them out of the ability to buy your CS's, go figure).

Anyway, I think it's stupid and immersion-breaking and wish it wouldn't happen at all, much less more consistently than it does now. And no I'm not crying that it's not easy enough, I had no trouble fending off my dogpiles. It's just incredibly frickin stupid is the problem. "hey, france is trying to colonize another galaxy! Time for the entire world, including their long-time close allies-- to drop some nukes on them!!" Bullcrap. I absolutely did not miss this garbage when I went from II to IV, and the only reason I don't complain loudly and often about it in V is that most of the time it actually doesn't happen in my experience. It happened with the new patch for the first time going for a culture win though, so I'm wary about whether or not this kind of thing just happens more frequently now or if that was just a fluke.