There is no Question that the A.I. Cheats

re: Galleys:

whatever I`d do in the editor - the problem would persist that the AI does things I can`t or won`t risk because my chance of getting a miracle is maybe 1% - for the AI it seems to be decidedly higher...


re: Wonder cheat:

I`ve seen the AI build a wonder in 1 turn. No sweat, she (Cleo) obviously used a leader. Problem here: I destroyed the town building the wonder and the next turn it was done somewhere els. now how did Cleo retroactivly hurry the wonder? Changing when hurrying isn`t possible and the new city wasn`t in the wonder builing list and anyway the AI shouldn`t be able to change production during turns. I can`t either!
 
I don't know that this is a cheat, but having a rival civ settler unload on the quarter-inch square piece of land that isn't within your borders, when it is CLEARLY your territory (surrounded on all sides by your territory) and then building a freakin' city!

Territory should not be marked by the cultural influence of each city. All things surrounded by YOUR territory should BECOME your territory...more preciseley, there shouldnt be unclaimed spaces between a bunch of your cities...

I think the AI EXPLOITS this all the time. Whenever I see a wonder galley rolling around my coastline, I start looking for holes - the AI will take a quarter inch (one grid) space and build a city on it, even if it has to follow that one grid if it happens to lead into the heart of your empire....

This is more of a logic thing...It would be like the Russians walking into the middle of the US and claiming a chunk of land since there was no city nearby...ludicrous and an act of war..
 
This penchant the AI has for claiming a little toe hold on YOUR continent is one reason I'd like to be able to tell my workers and settlers to join the foreign city. I don't think it is unrealistic for the AI civ to grab a toe hold, but what would happen in the real world IMHO is the locals would go to work in the city, and eventually it would be assimilated. Since the game doesn't allow this kind of migration, these little toe hold cities are not as likely to get assimilated as they should be. Also, if this migration was a known possibility, it would serve as an appropriate disincentive to create those little toe holds in the first place, since you would know that you are just giving the other guy a city.

I can't say that I've seen the AI cheating in any real obvious, undocumented way. For those who are suspicious, remember that each civ has different inherent strengths and weaknesses and may have an advantage in some area over your civ because of that.

Overall the AI seems at least smart enough to give me a good game. I haven't beat it on Regent level yet, so I shouldn't say the AI is dumb. They do dumb things sometimes though. In my current game, Egypt nuked Rome twice within a couple of turns. I thought that was a waste of a good tactical nuke; seems to me it would have been better used to hit one of my fresh cities. Oh well maybe next time.
 
Umm you do know you can delcare war if that happens to you right. I mean for once I`ll defend the makers of this game.war doesn`t have to be declared automaticly for you if you don`t like what the other civ is doing declare war or just let them push you around

and I`ve had that wonder thing happen too it has to be a cheat also I`ve done wonders that take about 50 or so turns to finish and then find out the A.I. has started the same wonder on my 40th turn no way it could finish the wonder before me but it does usually happens when I only have 2 turns left to finish it really annoying and don`t say it's because of their leaders there were no wars when this happens
 
Yes Gerad, I'm well aware that I can declare war. However, with a democratic governement, after a prolongued war with this same rival civ( hence a good deal of your cities contain rival civ's workers) You wind up with near-instant civil disorder in every conquered city, and eventually get toppled into Anarchy.

My point is that the rival Civ's should recognize that this is NOT free territory..why put the border one grid unit away from the edge of the landmass, when in reality the border would stop five miles off shore or so....
 
I hate those toe hold cities also. I also think the AI creates them just to annoy us. I mean why would they sail across the world to found a city in tundra? But that's just my opinion and may be coloured by how much it annoys me.
To stop it I usually have to station a unit there until the borders grow, a good use for swordsmen after Chivalry. If it's a larger gap then I bite the bullet and build a city, just to deny it to the AI. If there are any resources around and its near enough to my capital that its not completely corrupt then I build a Temple, Market and Harbour in the city and let it grow to 6. This way it can contribute money and science to me as well as block the AI. If its truly a horrible city then it can later be removed by building workers or settlers. Its a crappy use for a city, one less to make a really useful city, but sometimes it just has to be done. There is also an unusually high occurence of resources right next to these toe hold cities, almost as if it knew Oil was going to appear there.....
I would have to say that was the most annoying cheat the AI uses, its apparent knowledge of resource locations long before they are visible. For example the AI crosses an ocean to my island, drops off a Settler and then marches it inland 6 squares thru jungle and drops a city down, completely surrounded by jungle, nothing else. Research Steam Power and hey presto the only Coal on the island is right next to that size 2 city. I hate it when this happens. I haven't even started in on the jungle because there is plenty of good land around to settle much easier, the AI sailed past a bunch of it too. It means a war with that civ and possibly a long one as this will often be the only city it has on my island so no quick crushing victories and then peace. It does however, explain later some of the truly awful city sites that the AI picks to build.
 
Originally posted by Quokka
. If it's a larger gap then I bite the bullet and build a city, just to deny it to the AI.
I would have to say that was the most annoying cheat the AI uses, its apparent knowledge of resource locations long before they are visible.
Click to expand...

Oh yeah, how I just love that!

Strange thing is: when the AI makes a beeline for a certain spot, and you beat it, there`s rarely gonna be no resource next to it. So if you have settlers to spare you can actually use the AI`s wandering for good city placing. But it does require lots of units to block them and follow them around.... :(

I`d rather the AI had the same limitations that apply to me: BLIND! (as far as the future is concerned)
 
Yes. The computer really does cheat. Not only in Civ games but also in most strategy games seen. The reason this so-called "Artificial Intelligence" cheats is because it is PROGRAMMED TO! Yes... Programmers do it to make it harder for the player without making it harder to program. Until some genius creates an AI that can actually think for itself, to make a smart opponent in these sorts of games would be a headache for the programmer and a sensory overload for our primitive computer systems.
 
Originally posted by eyrei


I doubt this is a 'cheat'. More like the AI simply beat you to the wonder.
Click to expand...

Nope, in this case the AI does cheat. I was playing a game this weekend (Emperor, huge map) where I decided that I wanted to get the pyramids. So after having my capital produce a three warriors, two settlers and a temple I started building the pyramid's. With three turns to completion the Greeks beat me to it, the year was 900 BC. Ok, I'm ticked off, so I decide to do little test, I reload at 3400 BC, and change the strategy. My capital only produces a warrior, settler and a temple, and I maximize production/population at my capital. Guess what, the Greeks beat me to it again, this time with two turns to go, the year was 1450 BC. I had no contact with the Greeks when I started this project, how did they know to start even earlier than they did last time? :rolleyes:
 
Originally posted by Hobbes


Nope, in this case the AI does cheat. I was playing a game this weekend (Emperor, huge map) where I decided that I wanted to get the pyramids. So after having my capital produce a three warriors, two settlers and a temple I started building the pyramid's. With three turns to completion the Greeks beat me to it, the year was 900 BC. Ok, I'm ticked off, so I decide to do little test, I reload at 3400 BC, and change the strategy. My capital only produces a warrior, settler and a temple, and I maximize production/population at my capital. Guess what, the Greeks beat me to it again, this time with two turns to go, the year was 1450 BC. I had no contact with the Greeks when I started this project, how did they know to start even earlier than they did last time? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Maybe they used a leader. I do concede that the AI can tell how long it will take you to finish a project, just as it can see all of you garrisons. Then, the ai probably just did what it had to do to beat you to it.
 
Sometimes what seems like cheating by the ai really isnt:

There was one game that I had a group of tanks take out a pop20 city in one turn. No problem.

I move all the uninjured tanks, combine it with another column of tanks creating a bigger stack than my first, and try to take their pop16 capital. Now, I know there are about 3-4 defenders in there, in this case they were riflemen. Easy pickins? Hell no! Every last one of my tanks had to retreat and one even got destroyed.

Now Im pissed off, cursing at the screen, when I realize that Im attacking a city on hill, across a river!!!DOH!!!

I wish there was an option after a battle that you could see the matchup between two groups in that turn. I think a lot of new players like me get frustrated in the beggining because they dont take all the varibles into account.
 
A man and his tribe appear out of nowhere and settle in the middle of Canaan. He's called Abraham.

No fair! What was Firaxis thinking?
 
Seeing another civ's progress in wonder building is available to anybody who has an embassy with that civ and isn't currently at war with them. Press F7, that tells you what city is building the wonder. Go to your embassy and investigate that city, and you'll know how long, approximately (it can change by switching around production), it'll take for them to finish up.

AFAIK, the computer has never used a leader to rush a wonder in my games. I don't keep track, tho.

The thing about the AI knowing where resources are: I'm not sold. I haven't seen it. Why don't they war over those cities? The different AI civs must all know it's there if one does. I think this belief came into being because the AI builds cities in the jungle, where new players don't bother to build. The jungle has a lot of resources.

As to the useless cities that the AI builds up in the tundra: A big chunk of your score comes from how much territory you control. It might seem useless to have a corrupt city, but as long as you don't improve it much, it doesn't have much upkeep.

I'm pretty sure I've seen (once) an AI controlled galley in the open ocean. I figured that after navigation was available, the AI galleys could go out to sea. I didn't think to watch if it sank out there. It could've.

I don't think it's been mentioned here in this thread, but I've read claims that the AI knows the entire map. This is obviously false or the AI would do a much better job of colonizing islands that I can beat them to, if I make the effort and am in a position to do so.

Another common "AI cheats" story is that the AI knows exactly where to attack, even if the city is deep in your territory and the player never ever ever traded maps. I just haven't seen it, and under republic or democracy I sometimes leave cities totally unprotected while I push units toward the front. I can't say for sure, but to me it seems like the AI uses the same fog of war rules that I do.

If anybody wants to post a saved game that counters what I just said, I'd be happy to look.
 
I don't have a problem with those toe hold cities. They can actually be quite useful. In my current game I was the first to refining (via wonder). With no oil in my boundries I scanned the map and located two potential sources for oil. One toe hold would pull oil within the four square boundary, stealing it from another civ's cultural boundaries. The other a single square, right between two Chinese cities containing oil. I sent out a galleon and 12 turns later I secured two sources of oil for myself via toe hold cities.

The AI does this and snags its fair share of resources via dumb luck. Build tons of worthless cities now, and odds are one of them will have a resource in the future.
 
Relating to the first post, what would you rather have, a challenging AI, or a push over AI. Thats what I thought.
 
On the new town placement strategy, I often use new towns as a form of culture attacks on AI civs. In other words, I will place a town very close to one of their towns -- even their capital -- and then rush cultural improvements. It slowly strangles the opposing town.
 
Originally posted by eyrei
I doubt this is a 'cheat'. More like the AI simply beat you to the wonder.
Click to expand...

I had this happen to me too. The AI beat me to the Hoover Dam by 2 turns. This was annoying, so I experimented...

I went back to an earlier save, and got some workers building mines around the city that was building the HD. By doing this, I could produce the wonder eight turns earlier. Imagine my suprise, therefore, when the AI _still_ beat me by 2 turns!

Ok, says I, we'll see about that! So I go back to an even earlier save, and got some mines built before I even _started_ building the wonder. This shaved off another 6 turns.

Well, you can guess what happened: They beat me by 2 turns again.

My conclusion is that either the computer was cheating directly by granting itself the wonder, or indirectly by knowning exactly when to rush-build with a leader (assuming it had one available).

I can't explain my observations any other way...

(But I don't care either way, I love the game anyway)
 
Originally posted by Quokka
I hate those toe hold cities also. I also think the AI creates them just to annoy us. I mean why would they sail across the world to found a city in tundra? But that's just my opinion and may be coloured by how much it annoys me.
Click to expand...

Because it annoys you. I enjoy doing the same to my own enemy civs.
 
Originally posted by DrEvil
I don't know that this is a cheat, but having a rival civ settler unload on the quarter-inch square piece of land that isn't within your borders, when it is CLEARLY your territory (surrounded on all sides by your territory) and then building a freakin' city!

Territory should not be marked by the cultural influence of each city. All things surrounded by YOUR territory should BECOME your territory...more preciseley, there shouldnt be unclaimed spaces between a bunch of your cities...
Click to expand...


Good choice of word, "should." The Europeans probably should not have built towns in Native lands, but they did. They probably should not have killed all the wild buffalo, but they did.

In Civ3ese, the European Civ settled in the culture cracks of the sparsely populated Native towns with dire consequences for the Native Civ.

A good solution is to pop-rush Temples in every town, like this:
http://www.crowncity.net/civ3/packcities.htm
 
Ha Ha about the Wonders. Yes you get 4 turns from the Wonder.....they start building it. They have no hero and not a war.

Now you are two away from building it, and all of a sudden the have beat you!

This is at Regent also.

I do not like this kinda of tactic, I know it's part of the game. But figuring out how to cheat, to defeat their cheating gets old.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Fergei
[C3C] Late game tech rate confusion
Replies
11
Views
696
Fergei
Fergei
K
Alternative campaign-The Russians
Replies
8
Views
886
kaskavel
K
K
Alternative campaign-the Mongols
2 3
Replies
52
Views
3K
kaskavel
K
planetfall
Is there more than early rush for difficulty levels?
Replies
9
Views
706
Askia Muhammad
Askia Muhammad
Taefin
Taefin's More AI Cheats
Replies
2
Views
712
Taefin
Taefin
Back
Top Bottom