Prince AI is pathetic

[Big J Money]

In Quill's Rome video I get the impression that Japan is still playing like how they would in Civ V; expecting both cities to be strong enough to hold off the attackers long enough for all those southern support units to arrive. But the cities fall like paper mache in Civ VI. I don't dislike it, but yeah I hope it's not too long before city defense AI is more adequate. I almost want to bet they will patch cities closer to civ V strength in the first major balance patch.

Also, I though walls prevented melee attacks but it seems they have changed how that works. So maybe they'll revert that change.

 

[Miravlix]

I had Quill's twitch in mind where his capital had very bad production and he also had bad luck with brabarians, but then He took over his neighbours with little effort eventually from land and from sea.

He doesn't have "bad luck", he just not all that good a gamer. Civ VI might be a really hard game, VI seems to be fighting with Paradox for the crown of hardest to learn games.

Last time I played Civ V on Prince, the AI was just as bad as Civ VI, but it seems like VI could be making bad choices and small tweaks could improve it, but I don't expect it to compete with a player ever.

 

[Magil]

To all of those hopeful that the AI will be "improved" in the last month, why do you think that? Given the state the AI in Civ V was left in as of BNW's final patch. It took modders to fix that (showing that it could be done, Firaxis just was not inclined to do so). There's optimism, and then there's this.

Yeah, maybe the AI's play is comparable in VI to what a Prince-level AI in V would be. But you cannot simply play VI like you would V and expect to compete or even provide a minor obstacle. You need units, cities won't defend themselves. You have to defend settlers, because the player keeps them as settlers if they capture them, which is a huge advantage. You get the idea, as the player simply cannot play VI as they would V, the AI cannot be allowed to do so either.

 

[Siptah]

I don't know if this was clear already (probably it was): Prince is level 3 in civvi, not 4 like in CiV. Which of course makes sense since there are less difficulties.

 

[jjkrause84]

I don't know if this was clear already (probably it was): Prince is level 3 in civvi, not 4 like in CiV. Which of course makes sense since there are less difficulties.

Really? Heck, I remember when Prince was level 5!

They'll have us starting on Immortal soon!

 

[zocki]

In Quill's Rome video I get the impression that Japan is still playing like how they would in Civ V; expecting both cities to be strong enough to hold off the attackers long enough for all those southern support units to arrive. But the cities fall like paper mache in Civ VI. I don't dislike it, but yeah I hope it's not too long before city defense AI is more adequate. I almost want to bet they will patch cities closer to civ V strength in the first major balance patch.

Might be a huge balancing problem. Japan is a civ without any early UU or military oriented bonus. Similar with other videos i have seen where non-early civs got steamrolled. Things seem to be much different if you look at AI's like Scythia and i haven't seen any videos where players had to deal with a civ like them. In addition i realy think that cities fall way too fast to something like just 3-4 unuts. Players didn't even have to care about siege mechanic. While AI needs improvement i think its way more important that early warfare gets some balancing attention before release.

 

[jjkrause84]

Might be a huge balancing problem. Japan is a civ without any early UU or military oriented bonus. Similar with other videos i have seen where non-early civs got steamrolled. Things seem to be much different if you look at AI's like Scythia and i haven't seen any videos where players had to deal with a civ like them. In addition i realy think that cities fall way too fast to something like just 3-4 unuts. Players didn't even have to care about siege mechanic. While AI needs improvement i think its way more important that early warfare gets some balancing attention before release.

A better way to use the siege mechanic (one of the many great ideas Civ 6 has) would have been to allow substantial stacking in a city, and get rid of city health. City health doesn't make sense anyway.

Once a city is surrounded it starts a timer, based on the size of the city and on improvements (granaries, etc.). If the siege is not broken before the timer runs out then the units in the city are all forfeit and the city falls.

Boom. Done. It'd be totally awesome, interesting for both attack and defense, and create a really flexible, complex system that still relies on easy-to-understand rules.

 

[Evs]

Might be a huge balancing problem. Japan is a civ without any early UU or military oriented bonus. Similar with other videos i have seen where non-early civs got steamrolled. Things seem to be much different if you look at AI's like Scythia and i haven't seen any videos where players had to deal with a civ like them. In addition i realy think that cities fall way too fast to something like just 3-4 unuts. Players didn't even have to care about siege mechanic. While AI needs improvement i think its way more important that early warfare gets some balancing attention before release.

Marbozir's play though has Scythia in and he rolls over her just like the others. She has more troops than I've seen from any of the other AIs but is completely inept at using them to attack or defend with.

 

[Zanteogo]

A better way to use the siege mechanic (one of the many great ideas Civ 6 has) would have been to allow substantial stacking in a city, and get rid of city health. City health doesn't make sense anyway.

Once a city is surrounded it starts a timer, based on the size of the city and on improvements (granaries, etc.). If the siege is not broken before the timer runs out then the units in the city are all forfeit and the city falls.

Boom. Done. It'd be totally awesome, interesting for both attack and defense, and create a really flexible, complex system that still relies on easy-to-understand rules.

I was just about to post how the game (and all previous civ games), have lacked "starve them out" siege mechanic.

 

[Magil]

Might be a huge balancing problem. Japan is a civ without any early UU or military oriented bonus. Similar with other videos i have seen where non-early civs got steamrolled. Things seem to be much different if you look at AI's like Scythia and i haven't seen any videos where players had to deal with a civ like them. In addition i realy think that cities fall way too fast to something like just 3-4 unuts. Players didn't even have to care about siege mechanic. While AI needs improvement i think its way more important that early warfare gets some balancing attention before release.

I on the other hand am happy that cities themselves are much weaker this time around, but can be enhanced if you actually build walls and use units to defend. I didn't like V's passive system where the city would be able to defend itself against anything but a dedicated siege. This encourages and rewards being proactive in your city defense, and can lead to you paying the price if you neglect early defenses.

On the other hand, I'll freely admit that the passive city defense was very beneficial for the poor tactical AI that V utilized. If they're going to switch to this system, they need to improve the darned AI.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

The ai do get a combat bonus on higher difficulties so that should make it somewhat more dangerous on those difficulties.

 

[CaiusDrewart]

In Quill's Rome video I get the impression that Japan is still playing like how they would in Civ V; expecting both cities to be strong enough to hold off the attackers long enough for all those southern support units to arrive. But the cities fall like paper mache in Civ VI. I don't dislike it, but yeah I hope it's not too long before city defense AI is more adequate. I almost want to bet they will patch cities closer to civ V strength in the first major balance patch.

Also, I though walls prevented melee attacks but it seems they have changed how that works. So maybe they'll revert that change.

I think an increase in city combat strength may be coming, but I hope it doesn't. It helps the AI defend, sure, but it also makes it completely impossible for the AI to attack. I really want a combat AI that can threaten the human. I want declarations of war to be scary moments. I also want walls and fortifications to be worth building, just like they were in real life.

Or maybe on high levels they could give a city defense boost only to the AI. I'd prefer that.

 

[King Jason]

There's clearly some kind of inconsistency in play. Quill's rome game isn't the only playthrough were a city-state inexplicably has an army that dwarfs the combined forces of half the world, yet most everyone else barely has anything.

What was it that made brussels produce and keep so many units? Not it's speciality, because it's industrial, not militaristic - plus Toronto was in the same game and barely had any forces. Kongo had a sizable military, yet Japan, Spain, and England (who kongo pretty much took out) had next to nothing.

Also, apart from the occasional mistake - Barbarian combat A.I. seems really really good. Yet the surprisingly clever moves that I've seen the Barbarians make simply have not translated into any observational Opponent A.I. play.

Something is off. Whether it's an easy fix or not, I don't know. But I don't think everything is working quite as intended just yet - Why do barbarians know how to use their army - but civs don't? Why do city-states maintain reasonable force levels - but civs don't?

 

[Wolle68]

This is because certain pillars of Civ 5, like 1UPT, are simply game-breaking. By carrying them over into Civ 6 it ensures that Civ 6 will also be inherently broken. An AI that can't handle it is par for the course, as are traffic jams that are more frustrating than fun.

Return unit stacking (preferably limited stacking with ZOCs), make units defend cities, and either grow the size of the map of make cities smaller and then Civ can begin to heal. I love a lot of the new ideas Civ 6 is bringing to the table (especially the incredible flexibility the government and casus belli systems offer). Unfortunately, in my opinion, 1UPT means a broken game no matter what you do. The AI cannot handle it

What? 1UPT is causing the AI to build too few units? How does that even work?

 

[Siptah]

Barbarian AI is quite good and also the civ AI is good when it comes to religious combat/building of religious units. Maybe it really is a thing of priorities.

 

[Mathias Rex]

There's clearly some kind of inconsistency in play. Quill's rome game isn't the only playthrough were a city-state inexplicably has an army that dwarfs the combined forces of half the world, yet most everyone else barely has anything.

What was it that made brussels produce and keep so many units? Not it's speciality, because it's industrial, not militaristic - plus Toronto was in the same game and barely had any forces. Kongo had a sizable military, yet Japan, Spain, and England (who kongo pretty much took out) had next to nothing.

Also, apart from the occasional mistake - Barbarian combat A.I. seems really really good. Yet the surprisingly clever moves that I've seen the Barbarians make simply have not translated into any observational Opponent A.I. play.

Something is off. Whether it's an easy fix or not, I don't know. But I don't think everything is working quite as intended just yet - Why do barbarians know how to use their army - but civs don't? Why do city-states maintain reasonable force levels - but civs don't?

Exactly that was my thought too: city states can make huge amount of troop, AI opponents can make a lot of faith and religious unit, barbarians can make reasonable moves, so maybe it is possible that they can fine tune the AI a bit. Probably i'm too optimistic.

 

[Alkaid]

I don't get how so many can defend this. Remember the issue of whether or not this is easy or hard for the devs to change isn't the only think to consider. They also have to actually acknowledge that this is even a big problem to players. As has been said, they left Civ V in a bad state with the AI's competence, and it seems they didn't move forward much or at all since then with what we're seeing. With the examples shown, we can only hope that the AI gets lots of cheats to make it any kind of challenge to a regular Civ player on higher difficulties. I was hoping it wouldn't be totally up to AI cheats to make the AI relevant again, so that's pretty disappointing if it does indeed turn out that way.

And to people throwing development process knowledge around here, even if they do know what they're talking about, have to also realize that doesn't mean it's actually what Firaxis is doing. I think it's more hopeful thinking that they're sitting down and currently fixing the very issues we're discussing here as the final weeks to release come up on us than something that's truly likely.

If they do any AI tweaking I expect they'll get to it with a patch sometime after release, along with other things, depending if the community is vocal about various issues with the game, AI included. I just think it's too much to sit here and say "well of course they're probably fixing it as we speak leading up to release," because that just feels like too convenient of a way to dismiss the worry over the AI. I hope that were to be the case, but I think it's more level-headed to not get hopes up, knowing Firaxis' track record with this sort of thing. I'd love to be wrong though, and I'm still looking forward to the game.

 

[Jabulani]

I just think it's too much to sit here and say "well of course they're probably fixing it as we speak leading up to release," because that just feels like too convenient of a way to dismiss the worry over the AI. I hope that were to be the case, but I think it's more level-headed to not get hopes up, knowing Firaxis' track record with this sort of thing. I'd love to be wrong though, and I'm still looking forward to the game.

Exactly.

98% of posts here claim that Firaxis is fixing here and there to release a perfect game.

Wrong

The final game will be similar to what we see in the videos and hopefully months later, in 2017, new payware DLC will fix this and that along with few patches to fix the major issues only.

 

[Krajzen]

Really? Heck, I remember when Prince was level 5!
They'll have us starting on Immortal soon!

IIRC, there are just six difficulty levels in civ6 (I like that, as two easiest ones in civ5 were very redundant).

The ai do get a combat bonus on higher difficulties so that should make it somewhat more dangerous on those difficulties.

Oh come on. On the gameplays so far it was so bad it defense it wouldn't help even if its units had god knwo how big bonuses. And ai should get bonuses to help it, not for it to rely on them.

 

[Sansa_Stark]

Exactly.

98% of posts here claim that Firaxis is fixing here and there to release a perfect game.

Wrong

The final game will be similar to what we see in the videos and hopefully months later, in 2017, new payware DLC will fix this and that along with few patches to fix the major issues only.

No offense, but do you have any idea what 98% means? Your statement is silly even for a hyperbole.