RHQ Artificially Intelligent AI Mod RHQ AI Mod 2.10

[notque]

I’ve heard it suggested that some ruins are player only. No idea if that’s true, but it might explain this behavior.

I've heard that too. I've seen no evidence for it. It's more to do with there being jobs, and if you're not in the explorer job, you don't have in your list of options picking up the ruin right next to you.

 

[Morgawr]

Based on my observations the AI is currently programmed with a bias towards unit self preservation. They tend to opt to heal and retreat vs focus target enemy units if given the choice. This plays very well when they are on par or the relatively weaker.

They thus play defensive battles pretty very well. (As long as they are not broke and can buy units every turn behind their walls)

On offensive operations AI makes a decent effort but lacks the necessary intensity to make it a success. Especially if AI is stronger in army and has plenty of gold per turn and extra units, it should play less risk-averse when it comes to these operations IMO. Then it would pose a much bigger threat. Not talking about ground breaking behavior here, used to be programmed like that in prior Civs. I am sure we will get there, Q is how fast..

 

[ggalindo001]

I have an immortal difficulty v2.05 game where I am after Exp. Age

Ant. Age was great play. Early in the age AI Augustus was close to me, he attacked me, I had to defend, which I did.
Then Augustus allied with AI Xerxes, so I did not dare to attack either of them.
They attacked the other AI, Hatsy north of me, with no success, as that AI had 2 city states to her help.

In Exp. Age I colonized 4 treasure islands. AI Lafayette was on the other continent, he DoW-d me.
He got to one of my islands with 3 ships and 1 land unit - BUT then all units stopped 3-4 tiles away and did NOT ATTACK -
this allowed me to buy ships and units in the next 5 turns and then kill AI off from there...
So that was no good AI operation...

He attacked an other one of my treasure coastal town on a bigger island at the same time, with 3-4 land units - and almost got it!
But my ships arrived and saved the situation. Here the AI sent more troops against me, but my defense was strong to keep the town.
Then we made peace.
My two homeland AI neighbors did not ally in this age - and did no war.
I had built up defensive military in my 4-5 border settlements, had 3-4 commanders there. Maybe this scared them off?

AIs did ZERO treasures...
At the end of Exp. Age I have 20 legacy points, best AI has 17, and then 15-15, I think...

Something I noticed --- I started a game on 2.03 (Soverign) -- and once I got to the modern era, was locked into wars with several opponents. After a save, I upgraded to 2.05 -- and that is where I started to see similar behavior -- units stopping tiles away, not attacking, not even moving. Both land and sea units.

I uninstalled 2.05 and went back to 2.03 and reloaded a save game prior to 2.05 -- and the units started attacking again.

I didn't think this is an issue with 2.05 as I thought this may be an issue with changing any version in the middle of the game since it affects saves.

I finished my game with 2.03 -- and about to start a new one with 2.05 this weekend (was hoping a new release might be ready before I start) -- and am locking the mod for the duration of the game. If I see similar behavior, it might be 2.05. It is just very peculiar behavior.

 

[ggalindo001]

Based on my observations the AI is currently programmed with a bias towards unit self preservation. They tend to opt to heal and retreat vs focus target enemy units if given the choice. This plays very well when they are on par or the relatively weaker.

They thus play defensive battles pretty very well. (As long as they are not broke and can buy units every turn behind their walls)

On offensive operations AI makes a decent effort but lacks the necessary intensity to make it a success. Especially if AI is stronger in army and has plenty of gold per turn and extra units, it should play less risk-averse when it comes to these operations IMO. Then it would pose a much bigger threat. Not talking about ground breaking behavior here, used to be programmed like that in prior Civs. I am sure we will get there, Q is how fast..

I agree with this 100% -- it is the intensity and the risk taking that is lacking. I've found myself at times thinking I am going to lose a settlement only to find the AI making some questionable decisions vs. "going for the throat".

I'm upping to Deity for my next game -- on Deity, the Ai really should be much more aggressive. I know it isn't something that can be done in this mod as it is deep in the program code -- just a shame that the base game AI is just "more of the same with handicaps" vs. different ways of truly operating.

 

[Morgawr]

Based on my observations the AI is currently programmed with a bias towards unit self preservation. They tend to opt to heal and retreat vs focus target enemy units if given the choice. This plays very well when they are on par or the relatively weaker.

They thus play defensive battles pretty very well. (As long as they are not broke and can buy units every turn behind their walls)

On offensive operations AI makes a decent effort but lacks the necessary intensity to make it a success. Especially if AI is stronger in army and has plenty of gold per turn and extra units, it should play less risk-averse when it comes to these operations IMO. Then it would pose a much bigger threat. Not talking about ground breaking behavior here, used to be programmed like that in prior Civs. I am sure we will get there, Q is how fast..

Caveat - AI performance on this varies a lot. This is general behavior I observed, not in the absolute sense. In the end it really builds down to that AI leader’s intent in that situation and what he chooses to do. Nothing obvious is missing or broken in their logic / code IMO, its all about the complexity and nuances..

In my current deity game I’ve seen the AI perform its best yet. Tecumseh put up an astonishingly amazing performance despite being at war by himself against an alliance of 4 I engineered to destroy him. Well I failed to destroy him and he even gained cities over the two ages. He cost me thousands and thousands of gold in defense in exploration. Nearing end of exp and still haven’t taken a single city from him. His offensive tactics are FLAWLESS, the intensity (that I mentioned in my previous post) IS there.

So good news is what we want is already there.. I believe because the AI has lots and lots of choice in this game every turn, there’s 100s of behaviors it could land on. What we see often from AI in this “oh I’ll dip my toes into this battle but not really committed” attitude which is not really a flaw but a choice.

When more AI’s make the “I will destroy you and make you regret this “ choice like Tecumseh it makes it super fun.

I’ll post about score performance later when I finish the game.

 

[notque]

Yeah, you guys are seeing all the same things I see, and continue to try and address.

It's very difficult without documentation. It is very easy to just twiddle knobs to try and get it unstuck, but that can get you in a loop where it just stops working entirely.

But I am doing what I can.

 

[Morgawr]

Not sure if this is something others previously have discussed, but I've felt compelled to create an account on here just to start a discussion about this topic: the AI has become incredibly war hungry, on deity at least. I've had to quit 4 games now in exploration because the AI gets insane bonuses and declares war on me EVERY exploration age. Disregarding the fact that the AI gets a ton of units AND has an inherit +8 strength on deity, but the AI's ally with each other and end up chaining war declarations on you; even AI's you are allied with will switch sides against you if they are also allies with the other AI. This makes it impossible to survive exploration age on deity. Maybe I need to rethink diplomacy strategy so that I'm constantly appeasing the AI to avoid this, but it otherwise seems impossible to just play a normal game and maybe have a war with an AI without another 2 of them railing you from the opposite side of your empire.

This is great IMO, goal is to make Deity extremely hard to win (like in a normal game > highest difficulty level).

Not my experience unfortunately as I’ve consistently ended Exploration on top in 13 games in a row (how I found so much play time is a story for another day..)

If you drop down difficulty level that’s huge success.

 

[Morgawr]

Maybe I need to rethink diplomacy strategy so that I'm constantly appeasing the AI to avoid this, but it otherwise seems impossible to just play a normal game and maybe have a war with an AI without another 2 of them railing you from the opposite side of your empire.

And yes IMO it all indeed boils down to successful diplomacy strategy that wins the game. Isolate / prey on / bully the weak, ally with the strong / majority.

Make sure to seal alliances BEFORE the AI that don’t like you seal their alliances, so you know for sure where the teams will land. Otherwise they will switch sides as you said. So if A doesn’t like you and B does, ally with B. Plus, if A is getting to “helpful” with B, DECLARE WAR before they ally so they become enemies forever. You dont have to fight even, just defend behind your walls. Purpose is to ruin his diplomacy and isolate .

Eg Tecumseh hates those that disperse IP which is what I do for a living. So from T1 I know we will be enemies eventually. I play with that in mind in Antiquity, appease him because I’m weak but make sure he has no allies by the time Exp comes, then strike / defend when ready. Of course things don’t always go to plan but just to give you an idea.

This strategy would not win you the game in Civ 6 - your allies would get fat and win. However it does currently work on deity Civ 7. Your allies DO get ahead of you but DO NOT WIN because currently the AI is so bad/slow at Modern age victory. Even when they are far ahead in their yields at Modern T1, you can still “buy” quick culture victory with enough gold. (Which is another problem devs and modders will tackle but later)

 

[ggalindo001]

This is great IMO, goal is to make Deity extremely hard to win (like in a normal game > highest difficulty level).

Not my experience unfortunately as I’ve consistently ended Exploration on top in 13 games in a row (how I found so much play time is a story for another day..)

If you drop down difficulty level that’s huge success.

I absolutely agree.

Deity should be every AI in it to try to wreck your progress.

I just made the jump to deity from sovereign and am finding it to be quite a challenge. Through Antiquity I was behind -- tho I came very close to quick taking a city from Benjamin Franklin right before the end of the era, only for him to basically Stalingrad me (his city had one last unit with barely any health and then counterattacked my positions and I could not finish the deal) -- fortunately, the end of age happened before his counterattack could get any real momentum.

Not sure if this is something others previously have discussed, but I've felt compelled to create an account on here just to start a discussion about this topic: the AI has become incredibly war hungry, on deity at least. I've had to quit 4 games now in exploration because the AI gets insane bonuses and declares war on me EVERY exploration age. Disregarding the fact that the AI gets a ton of units AND has an inherit +8 strength on deity, but the AI's ally with each other and end up chaining war declarations on you; even AI's you are allied with will switch sides against you if they are also allies with the other AI. This makes it impossible to survive exploration age on deity. Maybe I need to rethink diplomacy strategy so that I'm constantly appeasing the AI to avoid this, but it otherwise seems impossible to just play a normal game and maybe have a war with an AI without another 2 of them railing you from the opposite side of your empire.

@notque you can consider this a success if that was your goal

Edit: I want to note that on those games my benchmarks at the end of antiquity were really good, ended with +150 culture/science per turn and 1 future civ/tech complete. I'll have 10/12 legacies (you can forget about completing the culture legacy path, good luck getting to even 4 wonders).

First -- welcome!

I really just hate the fact that the AI gets insane bonuses on Deity vs. having better decision making skills, but that is where we are. I personally think it is appropriate for Deity AI to be "war hungry" at this level and for there to be alliances and back stabbings, etc -- but on a more realistic playing field (the +8 combat is just too much IMO).

I'm hopeful one day that this mod (or the devs or both) will be able to get the AI tactics to such a level that the +8 combat is just seen as insanity -- and that even strength or maybe +1 or +2 is all that is needed at Deity due to improvements elsewhere.

And really hopeful that it will also eliminate the need (or lower the need) for production, food, etc. bonuses as well.

 

[Morgawr]

I see, that's a very interesting method. I think I'll give it a shot and reload my last exploration age early enough to see if I can dodge that outcome. I've also noticed a few things about the AI's behavior (unsure if it's due to the mod or base game) but they will denounce you, then declare war within a few turns without waiting for it to complete or for the relationship to be hostile.

I've also noticed that they disperse IP's so fast, even when they are befriending them. I'm not sure if they do that randomly or because I'm beating them in befriending the IP, but it sure feels like the latter to me.

Yes they do the surprise war because they don’t want to lose the tactical advantage by waiting 5+ turns for relationship to degrade to <-60. They do need better planning yes but I admit I do that too sometimes. It’s that tactical advantage (take city, eliminate wandering army etc)

Dispersing IP is also strategy - that’s what I base my own game around actually - because befriending takes too much influence and patience and risk. So in short run the quick boost of eg 200 production is worth a LOT more than suzerain down the line 30 turns later. (Eg complete wonder, churn settlers etc). Friendly IP 15 turns changes the equation a bit. Its case by case of course.

Both are base game not mod to my knowledge.

 

[Morgawr]

Also please feel free to fully abuse the AI’s weaknesses in deity. Eg I always shoot down their embarked land units when in water and try to cause as much damage as possible. Then come here report findings and our modders try and improve the AI. Then we find another weakness to focus on and the dev cycle continues and the AI gets better.

Kill lone wandering commanders they can’t even fight back

Try to pull battles so watery areas where you can use your ships, the AI is bad at that currently.

Edit : beating the same drum here a bit but IMO the biggest difficulty factor comes down to that leader AI’s personality/ mood. If they’re building wonders vs units that’s a good enemy, if they’re militaristic try to have them on your good side.

1 more- make yourself a less attractive target than others . Ok I’ll stop now

 

[notque]

some strange behaviour i noticed recently regarding attacking : AI does not use all his units properly . In multiple instances , AI just stood there and wathced with multiple units ready to go while my city centers were defenceless. Not sure whether it's a bug or feature

It's tough, it does that in the base game as well.

There is something holding it back, and i have logs, and details, but it's very hard to troubleshoot what could be multiple reasons it occurs.

 

[notque]

I have a new beta if anyone is available to test it. It's now the work week, so I am very busy at my job, but it has the work I did this weekend.

I am also buying a new computer since my computer is 10 years old, and autoplays and later eras just don't work well. With the new machine, I'll be able to test more effectively later eras.

If you are using civmods, you will need to lock the version in it so it doesn't replace it so you can test betas reasonably.

BTW, did anyone think the beta is an improvement? I never got specific feedback on it

 

[notque]

Weird. I don’t see that in tests. I believe you, it’s just tough if I don’t get the behavior.

 

[Morgawr]

They announced next patch Apr 22nd

Update Check-In: Apr 8, 2025 | Civ VII

A high-level overview of what you can expect from Update 1.2.0 and more planned updates for Civilization VII.

civilization.2k.com

- Resource updates (treasure)
- Food updates (faster growth)

No mention of AI except this sentence re: food update:

"And one more side benefit – AI opponents should now be much better at developing their empire. Maybe worth turning the difficulty down a notch? Let us know how it feels! "

Oh Firaxis I am so scared !!

 

[notque]

They announced next patch Apr 22nd

Update Check-In: Apr 8, 2025 | Civ VII

A high-level overview of what you can expect from Update 1.2.0 and more planned updates for Civilization VII.

civilization.2k.com

- Resource updates (treasure)
- Food updates (faster growth)

No mention of AI except this sentence re: food update:

"And one more side benefit – AI opponents should now be much better at developing their empire. Maybe worth turning the difficulty down a notch? Let us know how it feels! "

Oh Firaxis I am so scared !!

I sure hope so.

The food change will change how we handle food in the AI mod for sure.

The Ai opponents developing, is all just wait and see. I'm hoping for meaningful changes to interactions I can't control.

 

[Morgawr]

I’ve noticed the AI fight really well too lately, it does feel smarter somehow. Think it’s because I got overconfident after some wins. As I encounter the AI in different setups I am finding there’s a wide distribution of scenarios.

Eg being in a 3 vs 2 alliance with a safe a buffer, my allies doing the dirty work, getting +3 military aid, etc

.. is very different from :

Eg started boxed in, two AI neighbors both denounce me (despite using every trick possible to avoid), get dogpiled by T70 .. forfeit that game.

Not every deity game is winnable!!

Now that I learned the game mechanics, I’m paying even closer attention to AI’s moves and their motives make more sense. I’m losing more units in battles. Im really liking this, there is definitely replay ability and variety already. It may be the new standard map start location , or a combination of multiple factors.

 

[notque]

Using the new dev version, I had a peaceful antiquity but received a stiff rebuttal when I declared an turn 1 war in exploration to snipe two of Ashokas towns. I’ll need to get back to the game to see how it plays out, but my 8 units and two commanders are being overrun in the border town I captured. We are getting encircled by cavalry and picked apart by archers, and about to pack up and retreat to avoid total loss.

AI is fighting around a navigable river and mountains and is aggressive about using amphibious attacks. It’s not unheard of for the AI to swarm a captured settlement, but something feels different about how effectively they are using each unit.

This is what I see too, and the point. The problem I have is of course that it's difficult to produce a new version, with new impacts, and make sure there are no regressions without testers.

And the way people consume this kind of mod, if they see a regression, they get really upset. So it becomes harder and harder to release new versions without testing.

 

[notque]

I haven't been working on any new things because I had to wait to get feedback that this is an improvement. I'm basically at a statemate.

If I keep working, maybe it changes, and then the feedback isn't useful. But I believe the dev version is the best version we've had.

 

[Leyrann]

Base game is absolutely enough, but you won't regret buying the DLCs.