The Civ4 AI does "cheat"

[Volstag]

Your story isn't really proof of cheating AI. The only thing you can infer is that the AI had destroyers in the vicinity of your work boat. The developers have said that the AI doesn't cheat in this manner. Why would they lie about this? What could they possibly gain by doing so?

I have a story to the contrary. I'm the first to discover an unexplored continent in the ocean. I take the opportunity to settle it at my leisure. As soon as I traded my world map, many turns later, it touched off an immediate increase in naval traffic to/from the "new" continent.

 

[Ariks]

In a complex game like Civ - until there is a way to ship a cloned human brain to plug into one of your PCI slots to control your opponents - the AI will have to be coded to cheat once in a while. It can be hidden or tried to masquerade as good as it gets but most AI's in most games will have to cheat IMO for the games to be a challange next few years at least. Civ4 does a great job to hide it I think - and that is what counts IMO.

 

[69king]

How long did it take for their destroyers to enter your territory??

It sounds like they came right away as soon as you sent your work boat out.
That would mean that they were parked right outside your territory and were within vision of the tile you were sending your boat to but outside of your own vision. That would not be cheating.

On the other hand, if they came a few turns later then that could be cheating because how would they know you sent the boat out if they were not nearby? Unless they were waiting for you to build the fishery first to pillage it instead of simply destroying your boat.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

I have to say that in my current game I have YET to see any indication of AI cheating. They aren't getting cities, wonders, religions, missionaries et al any quicker than me, and have also missed some golden city spots close to resources which appear later in the game (like iron). They also don't tend to abuse my Open Borders with them-sending, at most-about 1 unit through every 10-20 turns (and never any settlers to date!)
Anyway, that said, if the witnessed behaviour can be explained in a logical way that actually disproves AI cheating, then it would be great to see one of the Firaxians/Beta Testers stop by and give us those explanations-just to ease our troubled minds .

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Mujadaddy]

I seem to recall it not letting me cash rush the SS parts. Though you can throw great engineers at them all you like.

So far the most blatant cheating I've seen the AI do involved a small war I started. I had cavalry out keeping my borders safe(er). Moved one in to intercept some units he has moving across my borders. From no less than 5 tiles away, through hills and forest, he attacks my cavalry with spearmen (which somehow win, I guess it's the mounted bonus, but that's still pretty lame since cavalry use rifles and cost a heck of a lot more).

Haha, yeah, I don't think that "mounted" should actually be a unit type---Archers, Melee, or Gunpowder only...

It wasn't a game breaker for me, as India was WAY ahead of me, but I thought I had another few turns (I was building nukes for his capital Take that Ghandi!!!! )

 

[Grimshok]

Haha, yeah, I don't think that "mounted" should actually be a unit type---Archers, Melee, or Gunpowder only...

Actually, there should be like.. Melee1 (unmounted), and Melee2 (mounted), or BETTER YET, because mounted could be archers, melee, or gunpowder, have a MODIFIER

'Mounted = Bonus vs. Unmounted', for thus it has always been. Make Pikemen immune to this bonus.

 

[lebowski]

(I hate Google forum searching).

I hate Google.

 

[Kazper]

How long did it take for their destroyers to enter your territory??

It sounds like they came right away as soon as you sent your work boat out.
That would mean that they were parked right outside your territory and were within vision of the tile you were sending your boat to but outside of your own vision. That would not be cheating.

On the other hand, if they came a few turns later then that could be cheating because how would they know you sent the boat out if they were not nearby? Unless they were waiting for you to build the fishery first to pillage it instead of simply destroying your boat.

ARGH. People READ his post?!?!?

The city was in the FAR end of his empire. it was NOT next to the enemy, and there is NO way the computer could "legally" see him move his work boat out.

There is another thread on apolyton dealing with the issue too - I consider this pretty much a proven point now:

http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=142303

It includes a Save Game so go check it out.

 

[LoneWolf5050]

I had only my own state religion in the city, and the opponent (Incans) did not share the same state religion as me.

While I don't dispute that this may in fact be a case of AI "cheating", your description here does not conclusively rule out the AI having line of sight in that city. If the Incans founded your state religion, but then later switched to a different religion, and they had built a shrine for your state religion, then they would have line of sight in that city.

It is a very interesting thing in Civ4 that your state religion and religions you found are really directly related. The state religion is relevant for civics bonuses and diplomacy. Founding religions is good for line of sight (military) purposes, and increased income if you successfully spread it.

--Julian

 

[Kazper]

Yes. But the ambiguity on that point aside, please check the thread I linked - the poster there leaves no ambiguity as to possible religious LoS (it's not happening).

I think we need to accept that this is a fact - the question is how much the AI can see, and what it does with it.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Well, I personally am reserving final judgement until I hear something from either Firaxians or Beta Testers-I confess that it does not look very promising though-perhaps it is just a BUG rather than a genuine cheat.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[turdish]

It really depends on the difficulty you're playing i guess. The AI shouldn't be allowed to 'cheat' on Noble, but since they're handicapped already on higher levels maybe they're entitled to a little cheating

 

[69king]

ARGH. People READ his post?!?!?

The city was in the FAR end of his empire. it was NOT next to the enemy, and there is NO way the computer could "legally" see him move his work boat out.

There is another thread on apolyton dealing with the issue too - I consider this pretty much a proven point now:

http://www.apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=142303

It includes a Save Game so go check it out.

It was a coastal city, his borders only extend a few squares out into the ocean. The destroyer could have been sitting out in the ocean just outside his border.

I actually don't dispute that this is a bug any more, it certainly sounds like it. But there still may be an explanation.

 

[Vizzini]

A lot of you guys aren't reading his post. He had no religion but his own, no subs there, no spies. So stop asking him that.

Sorry but this isn't proof of AI cheating. If you're up to Destroyers then the possibility of an un-spotted Submarine cannot be discounted.

If you want proof you're going to have to go into World Builder and set up controlled and observable scenarios. I'm inclined to believe the OP, but you can't call this proof.

 

[ported]

So far, the only explanation that makes some sense to me (aside from AI cheating), is if the Incans adopted my religion and then changed. But I didn't think the line of site persists... if I change to "free religion", for example, my view disappears. I've never tried adopting a foreign state religion yet, so maybe...

Otherwise, there were no other ships, and no other submarines, and no other spies (neither of us had Communism yet). Of this, I am certain. Optics lets me see an additional square beyond my coast, and I did run my destroyer around a few times (always landing back in the city) because I was curious as to whether or not there was a sub or "something" out there.

It was just so obvious, move my workboat out, IMMEDIATELY the destroyers would enter my waters-- my borders were adjacent to the Incans, so my cities nearest them gave me the heads-up long in advance. However, my fishing city in question was clear across on the other side... it would take the Incan destroyers about 3-4 turns to hit the fish net (when I had them built).

As more evidence to me was the AI behavior of their destroyers in between my little workboat gauntlet runs. They would just sort of meander around right up against my borders when I had no boats in the water. Move the workboat out (NOT building the nets at this point), and they would make an immediate b-line toward it... and destroy it, if I left it out a second time. Once I moved it back inside the city, wherever the destroyers where, they would do their little "loop" maneuvering and eventually end up back in their waters, albeit at a much slower pace.

I'll load a previous save up in worldbuilder to check things out.

 

[ported]

From no less than 5 tiles away, through hills and forest, he attacks my cavalry with spearmen (which somehow win, I guess it's the mounted bonus, but that's still pretty lame since cavalry use rifles and cost a heck of a lot more).

There are a couple factors that may be at play there. One, maybe one of the advance promotions (Guerilla XIIV or something ... increased movement in trees or hills). Two, I seem to recall once accidentally stacking a rifleman on a cavalry unit, and moving at the cavalry's distance. I thought-- as in past Civ's-- it takes the lowest movement rate of the stack, but I think I may have moved further. Maybe it was just a bug, or I had railroads on the tiles that I don't remember having, but it's something else to test I guess.

 

[Dairuka]

Possibilities.

#1 - Flight Recon Mission.

#2 - Spy set up in your city.

#3 - Submarine doing routes.

#4 - Enemy religion in your city.

There seems to be holes in your story that you keep adding on to, which drives me to not believe you. However, I'm sure you bringing up this awareness will inspire some of the regulars here to produce controlled tests.

Still, the game is pretty new, and everybody is still trying to work out the Mathematics... So it may be a while before a definitive, "Yes", or, "No", as to whether the AI cheats, is concluded.

I personally feel that the AI does not cheat. It handles itself very well, better than most players I've played against on MP.

 

[Si_Lurker]

In the time of destroyers everyone knows entire map (trading, scouting, open borders, etc...)

They could know about location of resource (they traded with you or other AI for entire map, they like you know about all visible resources) and that your city is nearby. AI is common to send units pillaging resources, so if it was pangea and they had a fleet without much work, it would be natural to send them to pillage water resources.

 

[Plug]

It is worth reiterating again that even if there is no explanation for the destoryers knowing that the work boat was going out (and I have seen a similar thing in one of my own games which I didn't feel was explainable) this is not proof that the AI is cheating. Firaxis have said that the AI does not cheat in this way, so it may be a bug.

Has anyone posted this into the bugs section as a potential section? If Firaxis have not lied about no AI-cheating they might be interested in working on this in a future patch.

 

[Randall_Flagg]

Do you have Definitive proof that is not a spy just sitting in that city?