Some things I hate about the AI

[Sweetchuck]

Yeah, nothing new here - but I'm in a pissy mood and feel like venting.

a) I find it a slap in the face the way the AI cheats. Specifically, when at war (I spend a lit of time at war), the AI does little to hide the fact that they know how many defensive units you have on your cities. Have that one city in the middle of your empire or on a distant coast that you have that 1 warrior guarding when the rest of your cities have knights and musketmen, and the AI will send it's units past the rest of your cities to that one town.

b) When at war, the AI will empty it's town to go after that worker or injured unit several tiles off while you have a stack of doom right on their doorstep. Not much of a strategy.

c) Never send a settler on a direct route several tiles away to settle (pre-picking the spot so that it moves automatically). The AI will race a settler toward that exact same spot.

d) Funny how the AI knows every spot of un-settled land. Sack a city and every AI on the continent regardless of weather or not they should know this spot has become open suddenly throws settlers toward it out of nowhere.

e) The "move your units or declare war" comment should be optional. Seems that, when the AI is marching a settler through my territory to that one tiny spot of unsettled coastland on my distant shore, I only get that option after several turns - but when I step on to that land, they throw the "declare war" thing at me right out of the gate.

f) The ONLY time the AI ever tries to barter techs with me is when I'm one turn away from completing the research on a tech and they offer to trade that same tech to me for one they don't have. Cognitive error? I don't think so.

Ok, I feel better now.

 

[timerover51]

Yeah, nothing new here - but I'm in a pissy mood and feel like venting.

a) I find it a slap in the face the way the AI cheats. Specifically, when at war (I spend a lit of time at war), the AI does little to hide the fact that they know how many defensive units you have on your cities. Have that one city in the middle of your empire or on a distant coast that you have that 1 warrior guarding when the rest of your cities have knights and musketmen, and the AI will send it's units past the rest of your cities to that one town.

"Having had that problem, I make sure that I have a minimum of 3 up-to-date defensive units on each city. I know some players will bait the AI to attack that one city, and then destroy the attacking units."

b) When at war, the AI will empty it's town to go after that worker or injured unit several tiles off while you have a stack of doom right on their doorstep. Not much of a strategy.

"I have noticed that as well, but I sort of like the idea when it is their last city that they are emptying. Take that and the units go away."

c) Never send a settler on a direct route several tiles away to settle (pre-picking the spot so that it moves automatically). The AI will race a settler toward that exact same spot.

"I have gotten around that by prepositioning a military unit or two on the square that I am going to settle. Bit of a problem, but also helps to keep the barbarians away."

d) Funny how the AI knows every spot of un-settled land. Sack a city and every AI on the continent regardless of weather or not they should know this spot has become open suddenly throws settlers toward it out of nowhere.

"Again, it is a case of exploiting the AI actions. If I am at war with one or more AI, always nice to get some free workers out of it when that happens, especially when I am building Airbases."

e) The "move your units or declare war" comment should be optional. Seems that, when the AI is marching a settler through my territory to that one tiny spot of unsettled coastland on my distant shore, I only get that option after several turns - but when I step on to that land, they throw the "declare war" thing at me right out of the gate.

"Now that one really bugs me, one reason why I no longer play on Pangaea or large continent maps, unless I generate the continent map. Got so very tired of constantly having the AI declare war for that reason."

f) The ONLY time the AI ever tries to barter techs with me is when I'm one turn away from completing the research on a tech and they offer to trade that same tech to me for one they don't have. Cognitive error? I don't think so.

"The AI actually barters techs with you?! Have yet to have that happen to me. One reason why I do all of my own research. Besides, since I am normally on an island, waiting for contacting the AI would be a real waste of time. Since I normally play on maps that I have modified to boost research, I can usually get ahead and stay ahead of the AI. Prior to doing that, I simply ignored them and did my own."

Ok, I feel better now.

Some of your points are one reason why I no longer play the straight version of the game, or play on my own maps. I really do not enjoy dealing with deliberate biases built into the game, so I do my best to mod them or their effects out of it.

 

[Kumquat]

e) The "move your units or declare war" comment should be optional. Seems that, when the AI is marching a settler through my territory to that one tiny spot of unsettled coastland on my distant shore, I only get that option after several turns - but when I step on to that land, they throw the "declare war" thing at me right out of the gate.

They ignore 1 unit in there territory but if you send in anymore they will give you the ultimatum

 

[dexters]

They will ignore galleys and units with attk/def ratings (such as explorers) though occasionally they will decide they've had enough and ask even those to leave (it gives the AI nice personality of its own)

As for all the rest, yes the AI knows the map but it needs the help in the settling phase.
Also, the AI programmer figured out a way to fix the 'puppet string' problem with the AI of bouncing it around empty cities or keeping an invasion fleet perpetually out at sea by making the AI check the map data at a random interval and ignoring the latest results (to prevent a human player from moving units and and out of cities) sadly the fix wasn't fully implemented in Civ3.

There are moments when it seems the AI will attack a well fortified city, while sometimes they will go for the bait of the empty undefended city.

 

[PaperBeetle]

d) Funny how the AI knows every spot of un-settled land. Sack a city and every AI on the continent regardless of weather or not they should know this spot has become open suddenly throws settlers toward it out of nowhere.

That's nothing to do with the AI cheating. Territory is updated on the map even when the change happens under line-of-sight fog. You benefit from this just the same as the AI.
The AI is often quick to send settlers to such spots, because it overbuilds settlers during the rex phase; it builds settlers to send to unclaimed land, but sometimes those spots are taken before they can get there. A human player might just cram a town in nearby anyway, but the AI is so averse to settling next to claimed territory that it will end up with a settler that it can't use. So that settler hangs around until later in the game you start opening up space with a war.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

a) I find it a slap in the face the way the AI cheats. Specifically, when at war (I spend a lit of time at war), the AI does little to hide the fact that they know how many defensive units you have on your cities. Have that one city in the middle of your empire or on a distant coast that you have that 1 warrior guarding when the rest of your cities have knights and musketmen, and the AI will send it's units past the rest of your cities to that one town.

Why vent about that? I find that this makes the games so much more easy.

c) Never send a settler on a direct route several tiles away to settle (pre-picking the spot so that it moves automatically). The AI will race a settler toward that exact same spot.

I have different experiences.

e) The "move your units or declare war" comment should be optional. Seems that, when the AI is marching a settler through my territory to that one tiny spot of unsettled coastland on my distant shore, I only get that option after several turns - but when I step on to that land, they throw the "declare war" thing at me right out of the gate.

With how many unit did you step there? And where did you step exactly? Remember, it makes a difference whether the units have attack/defense rating, how many units there are, and how close they are to a city.

f) The ONLY time the AI ever tries to barter techs with me is when I'm one turn away from completing the research on a tech and they offer to trade that same tech to me for one they don't have. Cognitive error? I don't think so.

You have the initiative in trading and should take it.

 

[dexters]

If you get lazy and just drag and drop a settler in an unclaimed tile, the AI does seem to know this and rush a settler there.

You can beat this by microing your settlers and moving them turn by turn.

 

[darski]

I always wanted a "Shot across the bow" option when the AI won't leave your territory. Just a ping to let them know that you mean business.

 

[jlvfr]

Invisible units... the AI simply can't go around (say) a submarine when it finds one on it's way. It HAS to declare war... dumb dumb dumb...

 

[dexters]

You can run into an AI sub as well and war will be declared.

This was a bug that was fixed in vanilla but reintroduced in C3C and not fixed because Atari sucks and cut funding.

 

[jlvfr]

You can run into an AI sub as well and war will be declared.

No, because the game asks me and I say no! so, it's the dumb AI that chooses to go to war, simply not to make a detour...

 

[Rodent]

I find the AI tendency to go for my workers annoying.

 

[jlvfr]

I find the AI tendency to go for my workers annoying.

I use captured workers as bait!

 

[ZzarkLinux]

I find the AI tendency to go for my workers annoying.

Especially for barbs. They're bugged 5 ways to heaven, so those huge horsemen stacks just
sit outside of your territory, waiting for unguarded workers...

At high levels & high barb settings, this can end your game quickly, since the barb units don't
just suicide themselves on your spear-wall-hill cities...

 

[dexters]

No, because the game asks me and I say no! so, it's the dumb AI that chooses to go to war, simply not to make a detour...

Nope, if you set a destination for your sub and its happiply travelling for the next few turns, if it crosses an enemy sub, it won't ask you if you want to declare. It will just attack the sub to pass.

This has nothing to do with the AI, its just a bug.

 

[axehaxe]

Make sure not to put a privateer inside one of your cities because an AI will try to attack it and end up in war with you!

 

[jlvfr]

Nope, if you set a destination for your sub and its happiply travelling for the next few turns, if it crosses an enemy sub, it won't ask you if you want to declare. It will just attack the sub to pass.

This has nothing to do with the AI, its just a bug.

No no no... I didn't explain myself...

My sub is on sentry. AI fleet comes along, stumbles on it, and will AUTOMATICALLY attack it... won't even try to go around...

 

[TheOverseer714]

The Sub bug strikes! It can be used to your advantage if you want war happiness. Just park a sub in the way of the targeted enemy, they attack, declare war and its WLTKD all over the place. Same with privateers, can get you a free war if you want it.

 

[dexters]

I would consider using the sub bug to trigger a war a major exploit if it was done for the war happiness which allows for an extended period of warrning for 'free' under republic/democracy.




just my 2 cents.

 

[pickle]

could you fix the sub bug by giving them hidden nationality? they would still get run over occasionally but no war would come of it