The Big Question - How Does The AI Choose Which Units To Build?

[Rocoteh]

BomberEscort,

What you mention is really interesting, and some of
it is news to me.

With all respect for Firaxis I really doubt they can make
AI unbeatable (that is without AI cheating of course).

The best AI I have seen was in Imperialism II.
In fact, when reading about strategy-games under
developement creating a decent AI seems always
to be a major problem.

Well, if Firaxis really have capacity to create a Super-AI
I hope we will see that.....

Rocoteh

 

[BomberEscort]

Originally posted by BomberEscort
...I remember reading somewhere on this forum that Mike from FIRAXIS or maybe it was Dan said that the AI could be made unbeatable and that the game was originally too hard...

Here is the link... Memory didn't serve extremely well but it is an interesting read...

Dan's AI Comments

 

[Rocoteh]

Very interesting link.

Well, after reading that, my conclusion is that there
will not be any drastic improvements in AI.

I am not surprised. There is simply no profit in making
a reallly good AI.

Rocoteh

 

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by BomberEscort
I tested the modification to the artillery I mentioned in a previous post...

I had lethal land bombard on and gave them a ROF of 8... They still only bombarded with about 25% of their arty force. The rest they just parked in the nearest city and did not use. I modded the arty to 0(12).3.1 ROF=8. I fear the AI will never use bombard correctly. When I give them an attack of 12 they use the it for a standard attack and do not bombard.

I think my next mod will be to limit the range to 1. Maybe values greater than 1 for bombard range confuse the AI. I doubt it. But I will try this [...]

PART THE FIRST

*sigh* -- Nevertheless, BomberEscort, although the results are disappointing, I must commend you on your approach and results. "I fear the AI will never use bombard correctly" is something I think we've all feared to be the case; it sounds like the bombard ability is best limited to defensive units ... ?

... Although this raises a quick question: how are you flagging your artillery units, O, D, or both?

PART THE SECOND

I'm sure, just like the rest of us, I'm mulling over what this all means ... Having spent so many years working with algorithms, I find it literally unimagineable that workarounds cannot be found, although it might take literally viewing the AI as a set of algorithms and nothing more -- i.e., using what the AI does with combat and working our mods farther and farther away from "vanilla" Civ.

This is at once more and less drastic than it sounds.

Consider, by analogy, the Civ "Religious" trait. Forget the word "Religious" and all it brings to mind. Consider what it DOES -- ANY improvements FLAGGED "Religious" will be built in 1/2 the time as usual, and the time of anarchy between governments is greatly diminished. So (again, by way of example) let's posit a "Confucian" ability -- post-Confucius pre-European-invasion can be viewed as remarkably stable: internal struggles were dynastic, out with the old etc., yet retaining the same gov type. So a "Confucian" Civ -- or any other one thinks of as particularly stable -- can be modded using the "Religious" flag.

Now, insofar as units are concerned (and, believe me, this is very off the cuff) given a presumed global or continental scale, maybe the solution is to have artillery as primarily defensive weapons -- yes, there certainly were offensive artillery bombardments from the 30 Year War on, but e.g. ACW and WWI artillery were overwhlemingly effective on the defensive. Aggressive use of artillery as with Napoleon can MAYBE be modded with decent bombard range 0 or 1 units flagged "offensive" and maybe with ZOC; they certainly wouldn't be the first units in the stack to suffer casualties if attacked but could nonetheless cause havoc in combat ...

Again, this is all very off the cuff -- but I DO have some other ideas and, trust me, I'm certain we'll have a thread on mod design based upon our collective results thus far.

Onward & Upward,

Oz

 

[BomberEscort]

Originally posted by ozymandias


... Although this raises a quick question: how are you flagging your artillery units, O, D, or both?...

I did not check this, I guess it would be whatever they are by default... I will do the Range=1 test soon. I have recently just finished a Comprehensive Retreat Study. Part of the retreat 'code' seems broken also *sigh*... I will start the Range=1 tests tonight, but I don't hope for good results... So much testing, so little time...

 

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by BomberEscort
I did not check this, I guess it would be whatever they are by default...

Yeah, I'd recommend playing around with O/D to see if that has any effect, especially with changed AF/DF values.

I will do the Range=1 test soon.

I have recently just finished a comprehensive survey of the retreat ability. Part of that seems broken also *sigh*...

I know -- that discovery does not diminish your excellent efforts!!! -- indeed, it validates them (Ye Gods, was that a PEP TALK on my part!?!?

... So much testing, so little time...

Tell me about it ...

All The Best,

Oz

 

[Rocoteh]

Question to all who plays on Earth-maps:

Does AI produce naval units in any numbers
at all??

Rocoteh

 

[BomberEscort]

Originally posted by Rocoteh
Question to all who plays on Earth-maps:

Does AI produce naval units in any numbers
at all??

Rocoteh

Invasion forces always seem a bit weak... I did a tweak to galleys that made them carry 3 units and this seemed to help a bit. I personally get bombarded alot by Frigates and Ironclads (because my Navy is usually weak) and have even seen Battleships and Subs (Hidden Nationality in my mod, AI builds a lot)... I would say they typically have a below average to average navy... I typically play on the Tiny Earth maps though. Don't know if this matters...

 

[Rocoteh]

I always play on huge Earth maps. I think that
matters, since AI have a faster pay-off when building
naval units on Tiny Earth maps.

Rocoteh

 

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by Rocoteh
I always play on huge Earth maps. I think that
matters, since AI have a faster pay-off when building
naval units on Tiny Earth maps.

Rocoteh

Ditto. Has anyone tried simply making ships MUCH cheaper to entice the AI to build more of them?

-Oz

 

[Yoda Power]

Originally posted by ozymandias


Ditto. Has anyone tried simply making ships MUCH cheaper to entice the AI to build more of them?

-Oz

I dont think that would work. Afaik the AI builds the ships they need, not more.

 

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by Yoda Power
I dont think that would work. Afaik the AI builds the ships they need, not more.

*sigh* so we come full circle -- how does the AI decide what ships it "needs"???

 

[Yoda Power]

Originally posted by ozymandias


*sigh* so we come full circle -- how does the AI decide what ships it "needs"???

I guess that depends on many things(map size, ocean%, islands, etc)

 

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by Yoda Power
I guess that depends on many things(map size, ocean%, islands, etc)

The implication of this is that the AI builds ships without any consideration whatsoever to strategy per se ... Not that I'm surprised ...

 

[Belial]

Thought I had posted before but not sure.

I figure I should put my two cents in, or, at least the game I was in.

I had acidently left a bunch of undefended artillery lying near the enemy borders which I had completely forgot to defend, well they transfered from my hands to the enemies hands (who were being vanquished quite quickly) and then into my allies hands. Needless to say, the war ended and the enemy was destroyed, this only left me with one civilization left to beat (minus the one city ones), and eventually they declared on me instead of vice versa. I was suprised they still had the artillery but they used them very well in destroying all my improvements, just not in the traditional way we use them against a city.

Now, this doesn't have much to do with why or why not the AI won't create them and use them in an offensive manor when created, but it does mean that if they're not in the city, they do in fact use them against their enemy.

 

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by Belial
[...]I was suprised they still had the artillery but they used them very well in destroying all my improvements, just not in the traditional way we use them against a city.

Hi Belial,

Part of our concern had been (secondarily, after the AI parking them in cities) that the AI doesn't use bombardment well against troops in the field -- to quote BomberEscort on the matter:

"I had lethal land bombard on and gave them a ROF of 8... They still only bombarded with about 25% of their arty force. The rest they just parked in the nearest city and did not use. I modded the arty to 0(12).3.1 ROF=8. I fear the AI will never use bombard correctly. When I give them an attack of 12 they use the it for a standard attack and do not bombard."

Pretty scary, hm?

SO, two questions:

1. Were the cities defended in such as way as that bombarding troops would have been more advantageous?
2. Were the improvements attacked / destroyed in some sort of "reasonable" order to aid the offense -- e.g., walls first, then airport, etc.?

Thanks!

-Oz

 

[Rocoteh]

I am sure I have never seen a report like:

"The end phase of the game was tough. I had to
destroy the huge fleet AI had built".

Can there be something like a 10% rule for AI??
I mean : AI will stop building naval units when they are
let us say 10% of total forces?


Rocoteh

 

[Neomega]

I have played games where the AI had tons of ironclads and destroyers, in fact I remember because watching them all bombard my coasts took forever.

I must also add I have played a game where the Iroquois sent 5 galleons loaded with knights to my continent.

Also, I have obsereved the AI has no clue how to use artillery offensively.

Even if artillery is parked inside a city, the AI will not fire on units immediatley outside of the city, even though there is no disadvantage to this.... especially since the AI can't move it's artillery.

 

[Rocoteh]

Neomega,

That is very interesting.
Did you play on an Earth map?

If not, do you remember the character of map (maps)?

Many continents or so?


Rocoteh

 

[Neomega]

All my games are on random huge maps, 16 players, Emporer.

More than likely the large navies were on a continent map, IIRC.

Both were a long time ago.