The Value AI puts on different techs

[alasdairt]

The AI values techs differently - it will pay much more for some things than others, it also uses this to decide what to research yet.

Does anyone have a list of what is highly valued? Banking is a good example. Presumably also anything that has a longer base time to research (?)

In Civ 2 when editing civ.txt there was a setting for how highly the AI values the technology. I haven't seen anything similar in the Civ 3 editor.

Any ideas?

 

[Airness]

I think it depends on the cost of the TECH.

The more expensive to research the tech, the more AI will pay for to get it.

From my experience, AI offers more in exchange techs which allows building Great wonders. e.g. in one of my Deity games, AI offered my 1 tech + world map + 90g/turn + 100g for my FISSION.
hey that pays all the cost i incurred stealing that tech from the other AI


Fission enables one to build bothe UN and Manhattan Project, thats why AI likes it so much. Normally, AI just offer some per turn gold for a tech it does not have.

Airness

 

[tetley]

The AI researches techs, too, you know. If the AI is one turn away from completing a tech, then like you, it won't pay squat for that tech. In that situation I sell the tech to everyone else first, and then get what I can from the "cheap" guy.

It's when you sell the tech to a civ that: a) has plenty of disposable income, and b) hasn't started researching that tech at all, that you get the most for a tech.

 

[spork]

But this doesn't explain everything; there are some techs which the AI will sell you for cheap, but if you offer the same price for a different tech, they get insulted. This different tech is no more difficult to research... so what's it thinking? Are techs that no one else has more valuable (because they're theoretically "sellable" and not yet available on the general market)? This would make sense. It would be fun to write the AI for buying/selling prices, if you had a lot of time to screw around! Maybe civ4 will have bidding, where, if state1 decides to sell a tech to state2 and I have good relations with state2 and also have the tech, they give me a chance to outbid state1. That might open up the possibility of a bidding war. It would also limit the cheesy strategy of me buying a tech from state1 and reselling it to states2-n at a profit. State1 should get a chance to offer its tech for a lower price than what I'm selling it for.

 

[mwernecke]

Yeah, it's weird. The Indians gave me four techs for Polytheism. Even with all the factors I can think of, (Culture, Level of discovery, Cost of discovery, etc.) That is still incredibly stupid.

 

[Maugan]

Normaly they go the other way for absurd trades with me. I love it when they refuse to sell a tech for any price. I forget the tech, but the English, with their 6 cities, refuse to accept my entire empire of 30+ cities, all my tech, all my cash, and 200 gold a turn in exchange for a single tech. This has to be a bug in the AI logic. I offer complete victory, they say no for fear that with no cities, I will be able to use this 1 tech to destroy them.

 

[Moulton]

Yeah, its wierd. I can't see a pattern here.
It was fun, though to sell fission. When Egypt started building the UN, I turned and sold everybody else fission, even though I knew there was absolutely no chance they could build the Un or Manhattan
The net total was like 2000 gold per turn, techs I hadnt bothered with, and some luxuries, plus about 1500 gold cash. And Egypt will waste 100 shields per turn for the next 11 turns while I build both.
Meanwhile, she won't even discuss selling me Space flight. You think I'll sell her Miniturization?

 

[Psychlone]

From what I've seen, techs the computer values highly are those which allow the production of any wonder, great or small, or those which allow the construction of a new, powerful unit. Generally they won't trade these techs with you if they even remotely dislike or mistrust you. (Just try getting Nationalism, ugh)