Opinions on the "AI"

[eleven11]

I feel like I am playing a different game than you are! In most of my games the computer players are absolutely working really hard on their space race projects.

Hmm, could be my play style then. Maybe I just sap their spirit! I like to cull the herd and keep the AI in line. If Alexander is next door I'll DoW him and let his forces be decimated by mine rather than have him take over a couple of his neighbors. Eventually he'll sue for peace and I've lost nothing and gained a lot. Or I may DoW a civ on the other side of the map and raid their coasts tiles, missionaries and traders. If I have the firepower, I may even capture a city and let it rebel. I usually don't play domination but I'm kind of a jerk now that I think about it.

 

[Victoria]

without ANY opposition whatsoever.

 

[Aristos]

View attachment 493116

Illegible thumbnail here...

 

[ashendashin]

I don't like resurfacing old arguments, but since so many people are repeating the same ones(specifically the AI doing fine in things they don't) and I happen to not have the patience for Civ6 myself...

Modern CPUs can perform billions of calculations in the blink of an eye and have significantly more memory available, it's not really comparable.



Extremely.
Unescorted settlers run back and forth instead of settling
In wars, 60%+ of units are just loafing around, the AI is incapable of using more than 10 units or so at once in vanilla
Doesn't really make an effort to protect its own cities under siege
It makes peace against players while surrounding their capital with units an era ahead
Fails to take 0 health cities with melee units adjacent
Archers and cities frequently fail to fire on units in range and prefer to end the turn
Policy choices are incomprehensible and worse than what random picks would give you
Unnecessary wonders built all the time
Failing to capture freebie civilians
Builds wonders while being invaded
Builds settlers/workers while surrounded by barbs
Takes so long to regroup if it happens to capture a city it loses all momentum
Almost completely ignores aircraft and nukes
Does not use support units properly, they often run around unprotected
Appears to have little concept of the rock-paper-scissors in melee, mounted, anti-cavalary
Runs streams of units into chokes to die
Places units on spots where they can be killed with no effort, including valuable high promotion units
Settles cities it loses in a couple of turns due to loyalty
Does not send governors to cities it slowly loses due to loyalty
Settles a tile away from rivers instead of on top
Frequently does not attempt to kill off barb camps
Barely scouts on land after the first 100 turns
Frequently 'zones out' late game and ends up not doing anything
When low on gold, will build units only to be forced to disband them a few turns after
Doesn't really attempt to stop people from winning
Declares random joint wars without followups
Religious units walk across the map to try to convert random cities
And the list goes on...

 

[MaryKB]

Hmm, could be my play style then. Maybe I just sap their spirit! I like to cull the herd and keep the AI in line. If Alexander is next door I'll DoW him and let his forces be decimated by mine rather than have him take over a couple of his neighbors. Eventually he'll sue for peace and I've lost nothing and gained a lot. Or I may DoW a civ on the other side of the map and raid their coasts tiles, missionaries and traders. If I have the firepower, I may even capture a city and let it rebel. I usually don't play domination but I'm kind of a jerk now that I think about it.

It probably is your play style! lol if you conquer everyone early they can't try to win late? I play nice with the other civilizations, only getting mean if they force me to. I know they definitely do those things! And for my game to be fun, the AI does not have to beat me, it just has to make me feel pressure.

 

[Aristos]

It probably is your play style! lol if you conquer everyone early they can't try to win late? I play nice with the other civilizations, only getting mean if they force me to. I know they definitely do those things! And for my game to be fun, the AI does not have to beat me, it just has to make me feel pressure.

Interesting. I play similar to you, or try to. Yet...

Question: how can you feel pressure if you know the AI can't beat you?

 

[FearSunn]

At last. We've found the root of the problem! It is not AI it is my playstyle!

 

[Aristos]

At last. We've found the root of the problem! It is not AI it is my playstyle!

Would that be your plAIstyle then? Careful with where you are going, don't give FXS ideas like banning your plAIstyle...

if Game.GetPlayerID(pLocalPlayer)  == "FearSunn" then
    insert routine for spawning 27 Giant Death Robots in Medieval for each AI here
end

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Would that be your plAIstyle then? Careful with where you are going, don't give FXS ideas like banning your plAIstyle...

if Game.GetPlayerID(pLocalPlayer)  == "FearSunn" then
    insert routine for spawning 27 Giant Death Robots in Medieval for each AI here
end

The ultimate in adaptive AI

As long as they never find out what I truly fear most

 

[FearSunn]

if Game.GetPlayerID(pLocalPlayer)  == "FearSunn" then
    insert routine for spawning 27 Giant Death Robots in Medieval for each AI here
end

 

[Eliminator_Sr]

This is incorrect. I have played games like @MaryKB says, one the other day India had about 15 cities and 12 spaceports, they both use defensive spies and repair spaceports.

This is case in point for this thread. Why would you ever need to build 12 spaceports? They routinely build way too many. The fastest I have ever seen an AI finish the space race is around turn 280. I did lose that game but I'm admittedly not very good at SV. At least they repair spaceports now so that's a step in the right direction but there is tons of room for improvement. Their research is way too slow given the bonuses they have. How hard is it to program campus prioritization and adjacency? I think there is some really low hanging fruit here for improving AI competitiveness. Combat is more difficult but still - just force them to throw most of their units to the nearest city and attack everything in their path where combat odds are within a certain threshold. A brute force attack still presents a significant obstacle when a player is neglecting their military.

 

[Karpius]

And for all supportive "mechanic" folks here I would ask: dont you see you are supplied with collection of cute toy soldiers, cows and tiny oranges which do not fit together. You could spend hours and hours analysing how this pretty things interact together, but this is naive and silly as there is no brain behind to put all this elements together into coherent game. You are deceived just dont realise this.

So are you saying that those of us who do not reach the same conclusion as you are somehow naive and/or flawed in our approach to the game? If I enjoy the game; if I become immersed in the features provided; if I find challenges in the many features or even simple entertainment in them, am I then the village idiot? Is there something wrong with me for not hating on the game as you do?

Moderator Action: Characterizing someone as "hating" or being a "hater" of the game is considered trolling on this forum. Just as "fanboy" is trolling. Please do not troll. leif
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

I get it. You don't like the game. You see gazillions of flaws. Should I be mesmerized at your brilliance for pointing out the flaws? Should I turn away from a game that I obviously have no business enjoying because you have deemed it broken?

Unfortunately for me, I think for myself and make my own choices. But I appreciate your efforts to save my civilization-soul.

Why would you just not accept it?

Why can't you accept the experiences of others? It is obvious there have been a number of wildly different experiences accounted here, yet some people seem to simply dismiss them out of hand and judge - yes "JUDGE" - other people for expressing their continued interest and enjoyment in the game. That is the part I don't understand. We have heard it a million times now about the "AI". We don't even disagree that the AI has flaws! And yet, somehow, so many of us continue to enjoy the game without bashing it to bits as though Firaxis committed some great insult upon us all and failed to build a better AI because of whatever reason the haters choose to believe.

Firaxis produces a product that has NO other purpose than to entertain. If people are entertained, they make money. People have been entertained by this product. Win for Firaxis. Do they have any further moral obligation? Nope!

Want to hurt Firaxis? Do not buy their products. Is the market frantically clamoring for a better AI? Until I see other companies surpassing Firaxis in this genre, I will conclude the market is essentially pretty small....which will then affect the amount of investment capital into this genre.

Business first...fun later.

 

[Bitterman]

I feel like I am playing a different game than you are! In most of my games the computer players are absolutely working really hard on their space race projects.

In wich difficulty are you playing?

 

[ashendashin]

Why can't you accept the experiences of others? It is obvious there have been a number of wildly different experiences accounted here, yet some people seem to simply dismiss them out of hand and judge - yes "JUDGE" - other people for expressing their continued interest and enjoyment in the game. That is the part I don't understand. We have heard it a million times now about the "AI". We don't even disagree that the AI has flaws! And yet, somehow, so many of us continue to enjoy the game without bashing it to bits as though Firaxis committed some great insult upon us all and failed to build a better AI because of whatever reason the haters choose to believe.

Oh wow, this is a goldmine for more of that judgement us haters are the most prone to. Our judgement that has been so often dismissed due to 'strong words' and being in the apparently crying minority. The nature and root of those flaws doesn't even need to be acknowledged so long as people say it has a few hiccups.

This is ridiculous. If this thread blinds people so much to their own judgement then how can you expect to make progress on a game aspect that currently pleases only the blind, when the purpose of a better AI is to expand beyond those who ignore it without leaving anyone behind. If you acknowledge the problem then why defend a multi-million dollar company refusing to fix a broken part of their game? And yes, people are defending it. "It's just business" is one excuse among many. This isn't China where it's expected to get crap and stick with it.

 

[Eliminator_Sr]

Firaxis produces a product that has NO other purpose than to entertain. If people are entertained, they make money. People have been entertained by this product. Win for Firaxis. Do they have any further moral obligation? Nope!

I certainly agree that the game is fun and Firaxis definitely deserves a lot of credit for much of the design, but they also completely deserve fair criticism for releasing a game with an arguably broken AI. No - I guess they don't have an obligation to improve it but I have come to expect better based on prior installments of the series and Firaxis has failed to preserve that legacy here. This game deserves a better AI in the spirit of the original games.

 

[MaryKB]

In wich difficulty are you playing?

I usually play on Emperor.

The ai not being what some people want isn't the same thing as it being broken! For me and many other people the computer works just fine to provide amazing enjoyment. If it was broken it would be totally unplayable.

 

[ashendashin]

I usually play on Emperor.

The ai not being what some people want isn't the same thing as it being broken! For me and many other people the computer works just fine to provide amazing enjoyment. If it was broken it would be totally unplayable.

Considering that there is very little actual design involved with the current AI, I doubt it's a case of being what people want. The code itself is broken in many areas. Functions that should work don't. An AI for a singleplayer game should be able to appease all sorts of players, after all, it's supported by the game design. Yet it fails at that on a huge sale. What you believe to be working fine is bonuses the AI receives to give some semblance of keeping up.

It is a core component for a singleplayer strategy game and it consistently fails to properly use most basic functions. That's the objective viewpoint from those who actually work on it.

 

[Gedemon]

Oh wow, this is a goldmine for more of that judgement us haters are the most prone to. Our judgement that has been so often dismissed due to 'strong words' and being in the apparently crying minority. The nature and root of those flaws doesn't even need to be acknowledged so long as people say it has a few hiccups.

This is ridiculous. If this thread blinds people so much to their own judgement then how can you expect to make progress on a game aspect that currently pleases only the blind, when the purpose of a better AI is to expand beyond those who ignore it without leaving anyone behind. If you acknowledge the problem then why defend a multi-million dollar company refusing to fix a broken part of their game? And yes, people are defending it. "It's just business" is one excuse among many. This isn't China where it's expected to get crap and stick with it.

"It's just business" is not an excuse, it's an explanation, people are asking "why the AI is bad ?", and that's the answer.

 

[Gedemon]

Moderator Action: and please everyone, keep the discussion civil, you can judge the game, but do not attack the players and their different experiences, thanks

 

[ashendashin]

"It's just business" is not an excuse, it's an explanation, people are asking "why the AI is bad ?", and that's the answer.

Since we are their business, I consider it an excuse. I was trying to add support to my argument that areas where the game suffers shouldn't be ignored.
I will try to be more considerate to that particular point in the future though, thanks.