They need to hotfix AI agression now

[Evie94]

You guys simply don't care about anyone else. You don't see a single person complaining about the PEACE PARTY trying to burn your bridges in the new features or late game.

But you want us to just accept losing our only joy in this game which was THREAT.

You think its "smart ai" when attila trades peacefully with a civ next to them that has a monopoly on a highly lucrative resource and wonders.

He should risk a non-risky easy war to double or triple his score and take a major late game threat out with his vastly overpowered early game UUs that he ALREADY spammed and are now dancing in his base.


If all the AIs are "trying to win" as you say. Why are the civs who were suppose to take a huge early game advantage through the UU and UAs just sitting around trying to out tech a damn tech civ. It will never happen.


Certain civs are catered to certain victory conditions. When an entire group of civs WILL NOT go for their victory condition or atleast gain an advantage from it....Something is wrong.


But let's be unreasonable about it. Let's tell people who want compelling drama in their games to FUK themselves even though they don't want to take away any features added that was consider fun.

so basically, the game is fun for some but not for you and therefore the AI must be fixed by the devs?

 

[Buccaneer]

So you think the AI should be tuned to give you fun and easy victories?

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

While my first game was a dull low-aggression match, my second one featured Rome as an early aggressor. So I guess it is somehow a function of map spacing (trade route hinderance), and whatever the AI chooses as a strategic plan.

 

[Buccaneer]

Eagle, at what level? I'm trying to find a pattern here.

 

[Aristos]

While my first game was a dull low-aggression match, my second one featured Rome as an early aggressor. So I guess it is somehow a function of map spacing (trade route hinderance), and whatever the AI chooses as a strategic plan.

That is exactly my impression, summarized in two expressions: variability, and situational awareness. If my impression is right, it's a very good thing. We should not try and destroy it because we want more "Panzer General with cities in between".

The whole debate has nothing to do with "Builders vs Warmongers", if you dig deep enough. I LOVE war... meaningful, hard thought and costly war, hopefully against a somewhat prepared and cautious (not suicidal, ergo easier) opponent... THAT is what I am seeing in my games.

 

[apocalypse105]

So you think the AI should be tuned to give you fun and easy victories?

Most AI are verry good at the culture victory not to Mention science i olmost lost on emperor because of the great art spam of portugal

And yes the Ai still declares war but not so early usally around turn 100 so don't see the problem really its usally more prepared to fight I olmost lost my city to napoleon.

he brought a lot of units

Game is harder then gods and king in my opinion especialy in the mid late game you will lose to a culture or science victory and diplo victory if you didn't win early enough

 

[JohnBlack]

I'm playing Rome on Terra, huge map, 17 civs and 17 city states.

280 BC, I believe most civs have met everyone else, and still, no denouncements, or for that matter, wars. I've also noticed that there are very few friendships. In fact, most remain neutral/indifferent. Diplomatic relations generally seem muted.

Of course, a quick scroll through my diplomacy window reveals that all civs are poverty-stricken.

PS: It should be noted that this is my first BNW-game.

 

[godman85]

Ideological conflict is indeed more interesting than conflict used to be, with the ability to form factions and stable alliances.


But I'm a little confused. Why would you complain about the AI not declaring war when you yourself aren't declaring war? If you want conflict, you can start it in just a few clicks. I'd imagine with a warmonger rep you'll find getting into conflict easier. Otherwise, there seems to be some disconnect between complaining about an AI peacefully developing your empire when you're doing the same thing-and for good reason. There are stronger incentives for peace in BNW.

Like I said, going to war is often a terrible decision for an AI. Usually, it doesn't pay off. It seems more rational to go to war less-though on Immortal, I've certainly experienced AI aggression when I was weak and seen the AI fight it out plenty. Less war, but hardly no war. I'd recommend upping the difficulty-the AI has never been very threatening on lower settings.

What is a 'real' game of civ? The thing he was talking about was how the AI could be counted on to behave randomly and refuse to cooperate even to their detriment. That's wasn't interesting to me, just frustrating.

Some questions:
But why is less conflict (not no conflict) in the early game a bad thing? How can we resolve their lessened aggression with the fact that the mechanics of the game seem to make war a poor decision most of the time.

Is the game most interesting when there's war? I think the answer is yes for you and many others (not saying it's a bad thing).

If so, why can't you just declare war yourself? Seems to solve the problem.

Edit: Another possible cause of the lessened aggression, posited by MadDjinn, is that there are more early wonders and buildings that the AI wants to build.

so what I got from your post is you think firaxis changing war to be detrimental to success AS NOT A FLAW.


can you read your own statements? I'll quote that particular part again and you tell me if you are defending your case or supporting mines.

"But why is less conflict (not no conflict) in the early game a bad thing? How can we resolve their lessened aggression with the fact that the mechanics of the game seem to make war a poor decision most of the time."

THe new mechanics of the game make war a poor decision BY YOUR OWN ADMISSION.


followed by a nothing is wrong approach. I win. My suggestion was to fix a flaw. Your rebuttal was the game is designed to make a particular part of the game to be flawed.

Thanks for proving my point.

 

[Falconiano]

Marathon deity game, turn 111 (aka t35 or so on std).
"An unmet player has lost its capital".

Working good.

I was the only one not at war haha. Everyone loved me for some reason.

 

[godman85]

So you think the AI should be tuned to give you fun and easy victories?

I want the game tuned so when i have 2 archers, attila with his 6 battering rams and 10 hunnic bowman kicks the ever loving crap out of me.


YOU IDIOTS in your big hats keep saying i want to win easy. My complaint was specifically about having no threat of losing.

I can be right next to monty and greece and expect to make it to the renaissance with 2 non-upgraded archers.


Moderator Action: Again, insults are not acceptable here, stay civil please.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

 

[RedFuneral]

Well, I was going to make a post agreeing with the people saying the AI is too peaceful but then I played 200 turns of a new game. The two games I've played so far have gone completely different:

First one, multiplayer/shuffle/small/quick:

Civs were: Spain(me),Germany(friend of mine), America,Mongolia,Persia,Iroquois

There wasn't one war until about 1850AD, and both my friend and I declared it(on Washington). Each civ pretty much had it's own continent and we all had very profitable sea trade routes with one another. We went after Washington as he stopped trading with us/had a ton of tourism. I had spent the majority of the game with 2-3 early game units and I attacked with 3 Privateers, a treb, a knight, and a rush-bought Gatling. My friend distracted Washington with some crossbows shooting across a 1 tile wide channel. I met no resistance taking his capital, my friend said he shot down about 10 warriors. Even worse the CB who had been guarding Washington's capital fled when my troops landed. After I took the cap he started producing minutemen, better late than never? Also worth noting that shooting off that war ticked off the whole world. We took one city each from Washington(the cap for me, NY for my friend) but the AI were acting like we wiped him off the map. OT: Without Barcelona I'd probably be far behind, having that city there let's me move ships around the world very quickly. Wouldn't have had much luck trading if I hadn't built there.

Spoiler :

The second game I played changed my mind entirely.

Singleplayer/Ice Age(Wide Continents)/Large/Standard/King

Civs: Austria(Me), Songhai, Assyria, Mongolia, America, Germany, Sweden, Netherlands, Russia, and France

Here there were 4+ wars going by turn 75. Most of the AIs were ganging up on Khan as he was attacking CSs. I captured a city from the Songhai as it had Kilimanjaro in it's borders.(and it was a good choke point off my isolated part of the continent) Somehow Khan was able to hold off 6+ of Assyria's siege towers though he did get a city razed. He also managed to take a few cities from Germany while being at war with half the world. Not much later Assyria got tired of Khan and turned on Germany instead, taking Berlin and a few of the surrounding cities.

About the same time Songhai signed OB with Assyria and marched his whole army across his borders to attack Khan. Bad move on his part, I took and razed one of his cities and headed for the capital. When I noticed his troops coming back from across the map I paid Assyria to attack him, they were cut off and slaughtered.

Throughout all of this I've maintained a good trade relationship with both Khan and Assyria, and had a DoF with Assyria for most of the game. Despite the fact they could easily take me out we remain friends(because they have 4 cargo ships trading with me?), they even leave the CSs I pledged to protect alone(while conquering every other CS they meet unless Khan gets to it first) I know they know they exist as they sent a great prophet to a few of them(hey those no longer only target capitals!)

Even more surprising, I eliminated the Songhai from the game and only Sweden seems to care. It seems that they have fixed the warmongering penalty so that the AIs take into account the warmongering of the other players as well as their own attitude on it. The WC was just founded and it's mid-Ren era, this is what the map looks like ATM:

Spoiler :

Songhai's previous capital the left-most of my cities(red color). My capital the right most.

So, it seems the AI behavior is more situational. A welcome change IMO as it means you can't plan out your game before you play it. Anything that makes the AI more unpredictable(as long as they act rationally) is an improvement IMO. In the first map I played we all had very profitable trade routes with one another, going to war would cost you 30g+ a turn. In the second the Civs are fighting as you'd expect but still maintaining good enough relations to keep their economies alive.

 

[JohnBlack]

Hm... Maybe they simply need to create more incentives for early warfare - incentives that typically disappear later in game because the behaviour they help inducing will be increasingly shunned and frowned upon by the international community.

These incentives could include:

- highly lucrative looting (gold, works of art etc) that inflicts destruction and death, destroying improvements, buildings, wonders, and killing citizens

- subjugation and enslavement to improve victor's production

- more creative peace settlements where the losing civ could be forced to give up significantly more than what is generally the case today

- tech theft

- payment of tribute that, while devastating to the tributary civ's economy and development, can be stopped with the obvious risk of having to fight for independence against a superior neighbour...

I dunno... Kings and emperors really had few inhibitions back in the day. Today's international relations literature is full of theories about why wars were much more lucrative back in earlier times.

 

[RedFuneral]

I like those ideas. I think it would be great if looting was a suitable replacement for trade early game.(though it already might be, I know you get 8g for a fishing boat, not sure about other tiles). Between that and being able to capture population(capturing tech may be a bit too OP) I think that could help balance things out a bit more.

The whole tribute thing does work to a degree too if you beat a civ down enough but not so much they go broke. You can demand their gold every 30 turns or so, though again I don't think the AI knows enough to use this strategy.

 

[Buccaneer]

I like the idea that if an AI has early UU and a sufficient force, they should be able to dominate weak neighbors, including the human player if they only have token defenses. If they need to up the reward of gold to kick in their incentive, that would make sense.

 

[Karmah]

Yet another one of those thread by the same guy , this is really an obsession of him not just a simple delusion...
THERE IS NO PROBLEM WITH EARLY GAME AGGRESSION, THIS IA IS JUST SMARTER AND MORE PICKY WHEN IT COMES TO EARLY WARS...

 

[luko18]

standard earth map
12 civs
20 CS

accidentally had 2 zulu civilizations in the game. within on turn 29 both declared war on me, and by turn 35 overran me with their troops.

 

[IdiotsOpposite]

I like the idea that if an AI has early UU and a sufficient force, they should be able to dominate weak neighbors, including the human player if they only have token defenses. If they need to up the reward of gold to kick in their incentive, that would make sense.

Why not do what Civ IV did, and give a powerful gold bonus for taking cities? Perhaps increase the gold bonus for pillaging as well. Especially if you got the AI to realize "hey, if I win this war, I'll get X gold out of it", that would likely solve the problem while still leaving peaceful civs to be peaceful, as they should be.

I'm perfectly all right with Shaka, Attila, and the like being warlike. What I don't want is:

Every civ declaring early war
A Civ I've built up a friendship and trade partnership (a strong one) with suddenly deciding I have to go
People like Morocco or Venice warmongering on everyone around them

 

[kingofsealand]

The AI's aggression has definitely changed in my opinion but not necessarily in a bad way. The AI now makes Logical judgements when picking a target for war. How many trade routes do I share with this person? do we share religions? do we share ideologies? Were their world congress proposals/votes in my favor? How much tourism are they outputting compared to my own culture? In the games i have played so far the only AI which did not seem to care about these things were the aztecs. Nearly all their trade routes were with me and declaring war made them go broke and destroyed their science bonus i was giving out. I did experience one game on tiny islands where the resource distribution was so bad that as others have commented the AI had no gold to buy up units until very late in the game. I think now more than ever getting a "good map" is important. However the description of a massive military force not declaring war on a pangea seems strange. you mentioned boudicca and i have played a few games where she seems broken as in wont do a darn thing for herself(G&K version). It just makes me wonder if she, like a few other civs is not flawed in some way as an AI opponent

 

[Zednaught]

so what I got from your post is you think firaxis changing war to be detrimental to success AS NOT A FLAW.


can you read your own statements? I'll quote that particular part again and you tell me if you are defending your case or supporting mines.

"But why is less conflict (not no conflict) in the early game a bad thing? How can we resolve their lessened aggression with the fact that the mechanics of the game seem to make war a poor decision most of the time."

THe new mechanics of the game make war a poor decision BY YOUR OWN ADMISSION.


followed by a nothing is wrong approach. I win. My suggestion was to fix a flaw. Your rebuttal was the game is designed to make a particular part of the game to be flawed.

Thanks for proving my point.

May I ask that you tone the language down a bit? It's seeming to get a little heated. I really don't think anyone ever 'wins' a discussion on the internet.

I'm still unclear about your response-most of your post wasn't really addressing what I said.

To start, why can't you start the wars if you want them? Isn't it unfair to criticize the AI for not starting a war if you won't start them yourself?

I didn't mean to imply that war never happens-it does plenty, even if it may tend to start a little later, and I certainly didn't mean to say that it's never worth it, just that the costs of going to war are higher.

In my experience, war for the AI has usually ended up badly for them. Either they and another Civ batter each other senseless and waste gold and hammers, or they flood in to attack me and get clobbered, setting me up to take their cities. I play on Immortal-which is a big step below Deity, I know- but at least on that setting the AI rarely does well in war.

Many of the times that the AI goes to war seem irrational, and this was true before BNW.

My main point is that the AI seems to be making more rational choices now. Given my past experience, it seems more advantageous to be less aggressive, although I've experienced early aggression and seen it between the other AIs. Hardly pacifists.

To clarify: yes, I think that a less aggressive AI in the early game, especially combined with a much higher likelihood of forming friendships/alliance is a good thing.

Are we in agreement that things like the new trade requirements for everyone make war less likely? If that's the price for 'fixing' the AI, I wouldn't want it. Trade routes are much more dynamic, and requiring a DoF to do a lump sum trade closes some loopholes and makes my early game choice about policies tougher.


However...

War is still probably the strongest tactic in the game, in my opinion, for the player at least. It's always been that way. If I wanted to beat the game in the lowest amount of turns, I'd probably play as the Zulus or Assyria first. However, going to war just carries with it extra costs that make the decision tougher. It makes things more interesting to me.

War also seems to be just as common, if not more likely, by the time ideologies get going.

Even more interestingly, the AI on two occasions backed out of a war against me that had all the signs of going very badly for it when my allies attacked as well. After only a few turns, it asked for peace (it bluffed and asked for a city but settled for a white peace). This left it with its army intact with virtually no casualties. In the past, the AI would have continued sending its units into the meatgrinder for no gain.

This happened twice, so it might be part of a trend. The way I see it, an AI that wisely backs out of a war it won't win is more interesting than one that blindly charges in and doesn't stop until it's broken.

My last game had plenty of conflict in the late game, and all of them I could see coming and prepare alliances ahead of time. The declarations did not have the seemingly random qualities as before. All in all, I much prefer it, whatever the AI calculations that are going on under the hood.

 

[footslogger]

I agree the AI is more passive. I think that this whole issue arises because the AI has never learned to win a war against a human in the 1UPT format. That fact limits what the devs can do to make the AI competitive.

Before BNW, the AI would attack for an advantage, and wind up losing in the end in a manner that knocked them out of the game. Now, they do not attack and instead focus on beating you in a peaceful game. That is definetely a smarter STRATEGIC AI, but the reason that is happening is because the AI is still really bad TACTICALLY.

The end result of the new peacenik AI is a much more predictable game where the human might now in fact lose, but the path to the end will pretty much look the same each time. The AI's warmongering, while strategically bad since he tactically could not win, nonetheless made the game more interesting for the human.

It's all about the fact that the AI never learned to win a 1UPT war. If the AI had learned to win a 1UPT war against a human, then warmongering would have been a good strategic choice and the game as a whole would have been less predictable. Just because the AI is now acting smarter by playing peacefully does not mean that the AIs playstyle is the smartest way to play. It only means, assuming it is acting rationally, that the other strategic choices were worse. The reason that wormongering is worse is because it cannot do it.

I think you nail it here. The AI's inability to use 1upt effectively in combat is the key weakness in CivV, even though the game has made great strides since vanilla. Stacks of doom could be tedious in CivIV but at least when you saw one approaching you usually knew you had your work cut out. In CivV you can sit in your city with a few defensive units and know that even a much superior attacking force is going to come unstuck because of its tactical deficiencies with 1upt. As you rightly say, it's this problem which has led to the devs making the AI behave more peacefully in BNW - it makes sense but only because the combat system is so flawed. I'm sure the devs already have some good ideas for CivVI but I hope a completely reworked combat system is at the heart of it. It doesn't need to be the old stacks of doom, which many agree were tedious, but some modification of that system which the AI can handle more effectively than 1upt. Then a truly great civ game could emerge which properly balances the different playing styles.