New Version - November 10th (11/10)

[Boombar]

Hey guys,

The AI is WAY to stubborn to remain at war, even when:
a) has lost one or more cities
b) has no units in the front
c) has no feasible counterattack in the short term
d) war score is around clearly in my favour
e) I am stronger and more technologically advanced


Cheers.

I agree 100% with this. AI war/peace logic is so dumb. Also, war score system doesn't make any sense. I am at war with monty and I killed nearly everything he sent at me without losing a single unit. 10 turns later, 4 out of 6 cities he has are about to fall and he has nothing to defend with, yet war score shows only 35+. If this was a player instead of AI monty, he would have quit a long time ago. If this was a real life situation, monty would have capitulated a LONG time ago. He should beg for peace and he won't accept even capitulation.
The problem with war score IMO is that overall army strength doesn't affect it at all. Same for tech. Killing a unit gives around 1-2 warscore and capturing city seems to give around 20-30 depending on the size of the city. When i kill his entire army i should have 100 war score regardless of how many cities I took and Ai should beg for mercy please fix!

 

[Gazebo]

I agree 100% with this. AI war/peace logic is so dumb. Also, war score system doesn't make any sense. I am at war with monty and I killed nearly everything he sent at me without losing a single unit. 10 turns later, 4 out of 6 cities he has are about to fall and he has nothing to defend with, yet war score shows only 35+. If this was a player instead of AI monty, he would have quit a long time ago. If this was a real life situation, monty would have capitulated a LONG time ago. He should beg for peace and he won't accept even capitulation.
The problem with war score IMO is that overall army strength doesn't affect it at all. Same for tech. Killing a unit gives around 1-2 warscore and capturing city seems to give around 20-30 depending on the size of the city. When i kill his entire army i should have 100 war score regardless of how many cities I took and Ai should beg for mercy please fix!

War score depends primarily on capturing cities. Not changing that.

 

[Txurce]

When i kill his entire army i should have 100 war score regardless of how many cities I took and Ai should beg for mercy please fix!

If he has no army, why don't you take his cities? Is it because you can't absorb them, but want him to pay you off or capitulate, thereby making it easy on you?

That's not how VP rolls.

 

[Meticulous]

Also, while we discuss war and the AI:
The AI is WAY to stubborn to remain at war, even when:
a) has lost one or more cities
b) has no units in the front
c) has no feasible counterattack in the short term
d) war score is around clearly in my favour
e) I am stronger and more technologically advanced

Hope I made myself clear. English is not my first language.

Thoughts?

IIRC, peace is blocked for a number of turns after you capture a city, so you have to stop capturing if you want them to sue for peace.

I agree the AI can be very stubborn about wars, though. I prefer to keep the AI in the game if I'm not going for a straight conquest, but a lot of the time they refuse to negotiate for so long that by the time they do it seems silly to not just absorb the rest of their cities, especially when the best offer they'll give me is some 1 pop city they just settled in the middle of a desert or something when I've got their last three major cities surrounded.

If he has no army, why don't you take his cities? Is it because you can't absorb them, but want him to pay you off or capitulate, thereby making it easy on you?

That's not how VP rolls.

That's still a little silly considering the goal is to make the AI play more like a human. The AI choosing certain defeat over a bad deal is about the most artificial decision it can make.

 

[Stalker0]

Sometimes its feels like there should be 2 warscores. One for white peace and one for more one sided victories.

If the AI's army is wrecked, then the AI has nothing to gain by staying in the war, and everything to lose. So a white peace makes sense to try. Now, the AI may not be willing to give up anything at this point (as that simply weakens itself unnecessary), but a white peace would make sense in human thinking.

 

[Txurce]

That's still a little silly considering the goal is to make the AI play more like a human. The AI choosing certain defeat over a bad deal is about the most artificial decision it can make.

First of all, humans are notorious for making irrational decisions... including choosing death over surrender.

That aside, if the AI's army is destroyed, it's going to lose the game regardless of what deal it strikes. At some point, the AI almost always opts for capitulation rather than death. And capitulation allows it to recharge and at least become viable. (I've had the AI insist I free it from vassalage, and I decided it wasn't worth the fight.)

Sometimes its feels like there should be 2 warscores. One for white peace and one for more one sided victories.

Two war scores is too complicated, because it would make too many assumptions about the war status.

 

[Boombar]

War score depends primarily on capturing cities. Not changing that.

I've been playing a LOT of games lately, and from what i can tell, war score depends ENTIRELY on city capture and everything else is nearly irrelevant.
I agree, city capture should be an important factor in determining war score, but it shouldn;t be the only one. Things like a difference in tech level, military and economic power etc... I feel like those things should be calculated in war core and Ai should consider that instead of just saying "impossible"

 

[Stalker0]

That aside, if the AI's army is destroyed, it's going to lose the game regardless of what deal it strikes.

I disagree. If the AI still has the resources to make units (cities are intact and resources mostly unpillaged) they can regenerate an army decently fast. So if they can manage a white peace, they should be all for it.

 

[Txurce]

I disagree. If the AI still has the resources to make units (cities are intact and resources mostly unpillaged) they can regenerate an army decently fast. So if they can manage a white peace, they should be all for it.

The only way that works is a real white peace -- the sort Napoleon makes after an attack fizzles out. But if you've wiped out an opponent's army and left them essentially defenseless (which is what both you said), that AI is not going to win the game. Period. And if that's the case, I have no problem with the AI doing a version of the human quitting the game, which basically comes down to "I'm not going to accept your world, if I can help it."

 

[Argentino]

I guess my point comes down to: I was ATTACKED, but my only way of ending the war was going on the offensive ie: taking agressor cities. And after I'd shown the AI a "lesson" by not being annihilated I couldn't return to my peaceful game, it was "destroy me o be at war for ever the time for diplomacy is far gone". I would have taken an option: "Nice try, but you lost; let me in play in peace and either attack someone else or comeback when you are ready to take me down".

I was not interested in being a warmonger, I was playing a culture/science game (as I usually do); so each city I took made me look like more of an arse to the rest of the world, getting denounced by a few powerful civs.

The AI doesn't seem to understand that it's attack has failed, and if I were more inclined I'd wipe them out. In this case it was particularly obvious because not ONE of Byzantium's units could get to my territory.

EDIT: Maybe war score should be easier to accumulate for the defender, as in: killing a unit as the aggressor should count less than the same thing done by a defender...I remember there being an option in previous civs that said "our units surround your cities, it will be no time before you are mine" and that forced the AI to offer unfavourable terms.

Ideally I'd say peace should have 3 options for a human player:
1) offer a player-loses option (I'll pay to stop the war, literally; this could be tied to both warscore and length of the war)
2) White peace (no gains for either)
3) AI loses option (same as 1, but reversed)

 

[Txurce]

I guess my point comes down to: I was ATTACKED, but my only way of ending the war was going on the offensive ie: taking agressor cities.

I was not interested in being a warmonger, I was playing a culture/science game (as I usually do); so each city I took made me look like more of an arse to the rest of the world, getting denounced by a few powerful civs.

I only play science games, yet I have never experienced a never-ending successful war. In some cases I've taken cities to end it. But most of the time the AI eventually sees the light and backs off. Usually it's when it's on the verge of losing a city.

You had a very different experience. I don't know how common they are. (By this I mean never-ending wars -- not "wars I wish would end when I think they should.") Gazebo, how likely is it that a losing civ with no historical hatred will permanently refuse to make peace?

 

[Gazebo]

I only play science games, yet I have never experienced a never-ending successful war. In some cases I've taken cities to end it. But most of the time the AI eventually sees the light and backs off. Usually it's when it's on the verge of losing a city.

You had a very different experience. I don't know how common they are. (By this I mean never-ending wars -- not "wars I wish would end when I think they should.") Gazebo, how likely is it that a losing civ with no historical hatred will permanently refuse to make peace?

Very low. The duration between city captures plays a big role in the AI's proclivity towards peace.

 

[Txurce]

Very low. The duration between city captures plays a big role in the AI's proclivity towards peace.

This reminds me... from Moi Magnus:

Explanation of why the AI refuse to make peace :
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=571340

 

[Bromar1]

I guess my point comes down to: I was ATTACKED, but my only way of ending the war was going on the offensive ie: taking agressor cities. And after I'd shown the AI a "lesson" by not being annihilated I couldn't return to my peaceful game, it was "destroy me o be at war for ever the time for diplomacy is far gone". I would have taken an option: "Nice try, but you lost; let me in play in peace and either attack someone else or comeback when you are ready to take me down".

I was not interested in being a warmonger, I was playing a culture/science game (as I usually do); so each city I took made me look like more of an arse to the rest of the world, getting denounced by a few powerful civs.

The AI doesn't seem to understand that it's attack has failed, and if I were more inclined I'd wipe them out. In this case it was particularly obvious because not ONE of Byzantium's units could get to my territory.

EDIT: Maybe war score should be easier to accumulate for the defender, as in: killing a unit as the aggressor should count less than the same thing done by a defender...I remember there being an option in previous civs that said "our units surround your cities, it will be no time before you are mine" and that forced the AI to offer unfavourable terms.

Ideally I'd say peace should have 3 options for a human player:
1) offer a player-loses option (I'll pay to stop the war, literally; this could be tied to both warscore and length of the war)
2) White peace (no gains for either)
3) AI loses option (same as 1, but reversed)

I had a recent game where I was (foolishly) attacked by Austria. Only a handful of her units ever set foot in my land (maybe one tile pillaged) and I proceeded to steam roll her army and capture her capital and a few other cities. I then spent the next 30 turns with 100 warscore repelling small attacks with out losing a single unit. And every single turn, she refused to make peace. 30 turns at 100 warscore was not good enough. I eventually just used IGE to force peace but it was still such a waste of time.
I understand that we don't want people gaming the AI. I understand having a timer after city capture to give the AI a chance at coming back. I'm even okay with a civ across the globe declaring war and not peacing out for a long time (can't trade with them or their CS allies, affects diplomacy, etc.)

But something really needs to be done about 100 warscore. 100 warscore represents total defeat. Total defeat implies the war is over or soon to be over. For the AI to sit at 100 warscore for any more than 5 turns past the city capture timer makes no sense at all.

 

[Stalker0]

The formula for a AI to determine peace (Moi Magnus' article) is War_state + War_projection + City_danger + Others

So maybe an adjustment to City Danger or the Others category is in order, especially the Others category so that the number of turns before peace is requested goes down a bit.

Or perhaps add a "MaxWarScore" modified. If warscore is at 100, its +1, to again make peace negotiations occur quicker.

Another note: T/4 + W/10 + WPC. W/10 only kicks in when the war weariness makes you unhappy...would it make sense for it to be when you are below +10, as technically anything below 10 is a penalty due to happiness.

 

[Guynemer]

FWIW, I've had Warscores of 50+, even up to 100 IIRC, by wiping out the opposing army and pillaging every tile in their empire, and taking no cities. Sometimes the AI agreed to peace; often times, they did not. Even the ones who did would often declare war as soon as they were able, even before rebuilding a fraction of their army or repairing their tiles.

 

[Edaka]

Here's a wild guess: what if the turn timer that starts after you capture a city from AI and prevents peace from happening isn't reset after multiple city captures? That'd mean you'd have to wait only for X turns after capturing one city, but 3X turns after you capture three cities, and no peace can be made until the timer runs out no matter how high warscore is.

 

[intelli]

The problem I had in my last game - with a world dominated by peace lovers plus a couple of warmongers stirring up trouble - was that capturing cities to end wars can rack up your warmonger score very quickly. The peace civs forced through Global Peace Accords, which just seemed to make things worse, capture a city or two, denounciations start flying around and the peace loving civs start declaring war on aggressive civs with much bigger militaries, leading to more denouncements... pretty ironic really that GPA seemed to trigger a world war resulting in the peace lovers getting themselves steamrolled on both continents.

 

[intelli]

Also the AI seems to not give a fig about the penalties for attacking city states, maybe that depends on personality traits but some of them seem hell bent on getting sanctioned to hell in the WC.

 

[Enginseer]

The problem I had in my last game - with a world dominated by peace lovers plus a couple of warmongers stirring up trouble - was that capturing cities to end wars can rack up your warmonger score very quickly. The peace civs forced through Global Peace Accords, which just seemed to make things worse, capture a city or two, denounciations start flying around and the peace loving civs start declaring war on aggressive civs with much bigger militaries, leading to more denouncements... pretty ironic really that GPA seemed to trigger a world war resulting in the peace lovers getting themselves steamrolled on both continents.

Not a world war. A global peacekeeping.