Real Strategy (AI) 2.3.1

[Seven05]

Nice, I'll test that out for this weeks game.

For my last game Real Strategy worked very well. I think the biggest change was that it was more difficult to steamroll the AI civs which I had to actually try to not do in the base game. You do eventually win via attrition in almost any war without trying too hard but war weariness will start hurting since it takes a lot longer with your mod running. I tend to play long games on big maps but seldom last the full 750 turns like I did with this one, I also don't really play to win as much as I play to make sure my opponents don't win if that makes sense. I had the CV disabled but all other victory types were on and it was generally pretty clear what each AI was going for even without reading the logs.

It's the first time in a Civ 6 game that I actually wanted to take a break from war to build back up rather than just switch targets and keep going. It's not really that I was losing battles, I only lost a few units, but they were very actively contesting my naval supremacy (that's a first) and using cav units to counter attack my siege army. It felt good, it was a fight much of the way and not just a slow march from city to city... well it was that when they were down to their last few cities but even they they still continued to produce units and at least try to slow me down.

The AI was keeping up well in tech and income too, although some of this may be from my own modification to the game pace there is no doubt they were doing a better job of selecting what to build and which technologies and civics to pursue.

What really impressed me the most was how well some civs did that normally don't really perform very well in the base game. The top three AI at the end (by score) were Georgia, Mongolia and Spain. Macedon, Congo, England and Australia had been eliminated by other AI players and Egypt and the Zulu had been repeatedly beat up by Mongolia and Georgia so they survived to the end but were insignificant. The French and the Scythian AI had the misfortune of starting on my continent so they didn't get to see the medieval era. Scythia took out Australia very early in the game, before I took them out in the classical era (while I was dealing with the French).

I also noticed that we had 9 or 10 of the 18 City States still in the game at the end which was kind of nice to see too.

My game is so far from vanilla it's pointless to go into great detail but the fact that Real Strategy had such a positive impact was great.

 

[Infixo]

@Seven05
Besides the strategy core, I've added some "enhacements" to almost all civs. They should use their abilities and uniques better, I hope. Georgia can be powerful, if she goes for conquest. Sometimes she goes for religion and then it varies. Spain also performs quite good usually. However, I still cannot make Zulu properly scary. He has such great abilities but I rarely see him conquering and generally warmongering.
All in all, I believe every civ has a potential, it just needs proper situation (map, neighbors, etc.)

 

[V. Soma]

You know you can use FireTuner for that? Plus in FT you can see how RST works using a special tab (see my 3rd post in this thread).

I am new to FT, I now have it, it runs but how to make it so that you see those tables you show in post 3...?
All I se in FT is a black screen and when I open a new panel with Real Strategy checked, I do not know what to do...
EDIT:
I put the zipped lpt file in the debug folder...
EDIT 2:
I got it File - Open panel...

 

[Infixo]

I am new to FT, I now have it, it runs but how to make it so that you see those tables you show in post 3...?
All I se in FT is a black screen and when I open a new panel with Real Strategy checked, I do not know what to do...
EDIT:
I put the zipped lpt file in the debug folder...

FireTuner must connect to the game. There is a parameter in AppOptions.txt that must set to 1 (Enable FireTuner). When the game is in FronEnt menu, then there will be only 2 tabs active. Only when you start a game, after the loading screen, it opens by default few panels (like AutoPlay, Player, etc.) Then you can also open RealStrategy panel. You can open it from anywhere on the disk, Debug is just a default folder where all other panels are.

 

[Infixo]

Re: FireTuner. I uploaded an updated version of the panel. The new one (marked as v1.1) supports Diplo strategy.

 

[V. Soma]

Re: FireTuner. I uploaded an updated version of the panel. The new one (marked as v1.1) supports Diplo strategy.

In the top-right panel, what are the letters S C and L are meaning?
You wrote about P W C E D... but not the S C L after them...

I try to guess
S = more science
C = more culture
L = more GW (aka Literature)

and:
Is there a way to save in FT what panels are open by default?
Do I have to open the file every time I use FT?

 

[Infixo]

You guessed correctly L is for more sLots, for GWs.
FT remembers opened panels.

 

[V. Soma]

Game 3 - turn 472

Two of us left - Gilga and me...

I could renew my ally relation with Gilga - does he know that we are going only DV...?
I mean, if we are allies, he can't attack me... - it will be a "draw" then...

 

[V. Soma]

Infixo, can you teach AI to speed up SV at the end with those extra Laser Station projects?

 

[Das Capitolin]

Game 3 - turn 472

Two of us left - Gilga and me...

I could renew my ally relation with Gilga - does he know that we are going only DV...?
I mean, if we are allies, he can't attack me... - it will be a "draw" then...

The player with highest military might wins if you've both taken equal number of capitols.

 

[V. Soma]

The player with highest military might wins if you've both taken equal number of capitols.

yeah but I set no turn limit... anyways, I think I will not make to war vs Gilga...

my Game 4 plan is

smoother immortal,
tiny archipelago map,
I'll be Japan
vs Kupe, Haralda and Dido...
SV, CV, DV and Score victories

(Quo mod still with 2UPT, and the many other things
and no walls mod as new thing)

 

[Das Capitolin]

@Infixo : I have created my Disable Space Race mod, which prevents the construction of Space Ports. This could be useful when Science Victory is disabled in the game. Feel free to incorporate into RST if you feel it could be beneficial.

 

[Infixo]

@Das Capitolin How exaclty does it prevent building spaceports when science victory is disabled? It just increases the cost of spaceports always. No matter the victory conditions.
Please bear in mind that RST changes AI, not balance in the game. There is not (and never will be) a single change to costs, strengths, modifiers, etc. Then, you need to „disable” spaceports dynamically, and I can assure that when the game loads, the .sql scripts know nothing about options you chose. Only when the game starts, you can check params via Lua. But wait... you cannot change anything in DB from Lua.

 

[Das Capitolin]

@Das Capitolin How exaclty does it prevent building spaceports when science victory is disabled? It just increases the cost of spaceports always. No matter the victory conditions.
Please bear in mind that RST changes AI, not balance in the game. There is not (and never will be) a single change to costs, strengths, modifiers, etc. Then, you need to „disable” spaceports dynamically, and I can assure that when the game loads, the .sql scripts know nothing about options you chose. Only when the game starts, you can check params via Lua. But wait... you cannot change anything in DB from Lua.

I'm not sure if there's a language barrier, or something lost in translation, but this is the second time you've come down on me for trying to be helpful.
At no point did ever I say this mod prevents building a Space Port when Science Victory is disabled. I said it prevents the building of Space Ports. Period. The end. A player might want to use this mod when they disable Science Victory in the options.
Also, for you to say it "just increases the cost of spaceports" is ignoring that this is a backup measure to prevent the building. I could certainly remove this portion of the mod, and building Space Ports would still be disabled, exactly as it is described and explained.

 

[Infixo]

@Das Capitolin You wrote:

You are welcome to incorporate it into RST.

In the context of a discussion about preventing AIs to build spaceports when science victory is disabled.
So, yes, could be a language problem, because I naturally assumed that you would create something that I could well... incorporate.
My intention is not „coming down on you”. I am trying politely to explain to you that things are not as „easy” as you might imagine.

 

[Das Capitolin]

I am just a player who likes the AI to be a real challenge beyond overpowered production and extra units. After discovering that no mod prevents the Space Race, I thought I might tweak the game. Since editing Districts.xml is a temporary solution, I set out to build a mod. This is my very first game mod, and it was an embarrassingly simple project. Your projects are enormous by comparison, and therefore I presume your knowledge of modding to be equally impressive. This bit of code is the basis for my mod:

<District_ValidTerrains>
   <Delete DistrictType="DISTRICT_SPACEPORT" />
   <Row DistrictType="DISTRICT_SPACEPORT" TerrainType="TERRAIN_SNOW_MOUNTAIN" />
</District_ValidTerrains>

It restricts Spaceport construction to Snow Mountain Terrain, which are not found anywhere on the map. I imagined that something this small could be integrated into your mod, and activated when the Science Victory option is not present.

 

[V. Soma]

I am just a player who likes the AI to be a real challenge beyond overpowered production and extra units. After discovering that no mod prevents the Space Race, I thought I might tweak the game. Since editing Districts.xml is a temporary solution, I set out to build a mod. This is my very first game mod, and it was an embarrassingly simple project. Your projects are enormous by comparison, and therefore I presume your knowledge of modding to be equally impressive. This bit of code is the basis for my mod:

<District_ValidTerrains>
   <Delete DistrictType="DISTRICT_SPACEPORT" />
   <Row DistrictType="DISTRICT_SPACEPORT" TerrainType="TERRAIN_SNOW_MOUNTAIN" />
</District_ValidTerrains>

It restricts Spaceport construction to Snow Mountain Terrain, which are not found anywhere on the map. I imagined that something this small could be integrated into your mod, and activated when the Science Victory option is not present.

This sounds a very clever solution, indeed...
I just wonder, how come a TERRAIN_SNOW_MOUNTAIN exits at all, if there is no such terrain in the game?
Is it some hypothetical terrain type... meaning the logical "no terrain"?
I am not to provoke anything, I am just curious...

I hope the discussion here remains friendly and constructive...

 

[Exletrum]

I noticed that the AI began to spread to other continents. Special respect for that. Now I can play for Portugal on a map of the earth

 

[Smity2k1]

@Infixo
Started a game yesterday evening with your newest version of Real Strategy. Also playing with 8 Ages of Pace and YnAMP. I'm playing as French Elanor on an 8 player fractal map, Immortal difficulty.

A lot of fun, the AI really seem to be doing quite well. Poland has been on an absolute tear and is significantly ahead of several AI and myself in terms of score due to expansion. Maori are dominating culture (to be expected) and India has declared war on me 3 times (we share a border so he hates me). They have been unsuccessful at invading, but that's mostly because I saw them beginning to amass an army and built up my own during the first surprise DOW, combined that we are separated by a large mountain range with only a single tile of passable terrain between us. I may have nightmares from the war elephant sounds though!

I'm mostly through the Industrial era, and I'm not actually sure how I'm going to catch-up and win. I've finally begun recruiting some great artists and have flipped a few forward settled cities due to my unique ability. Have barely managed to stay out of dark ages and am already struggling with loyalty in my normal ages.

Thanks for all the effort you're putting into this. I hope you continue to perfect your methods.

 

[Infixo]

I noticed that the AI began to spread to other continents. Special respect for that. Now I can play for Portugal on a map of the earth

I am not sure if this is due to RST, too many things at play that could result in such an effect, e.g. what civs? Because some civs are supposed to look for other continents (e.g. England, Spain) and have a boost for plot scoring because of that.
Map is very important. If you use a map with a lot of water, then RST has some boosts for longer exploration especially on water. So, new landmasses should be found faster enabling civs to settle cities while they still can.
Also, this could be simply due to some improvements to naval area. If a civs ends up on a coastal area or an island, it should prioritize more naval units thus discovering new landmasses should be faster.