Why does AI only build high?

[planetfall]

Whether it's vanilla, R&F, or GS, the AI is the same plan. It builds about 6 to 8 cities quickly and then stops. Perhaps late in the game they will add 1 or 2 more cities but that's normally it.

What ever happened to AI building 14+ cities? Is it just a soft coded decision by developers, or is it hard coded to avoid out of range errors?

I've tried playing with just 2 or 3 AI and not city states, just to test if AI would ever build more cities if there was no competition and lots of free space. Nope, same process, they build out quickly and then just go high and not wide. I miss having 4+ AI's with one expanding wide and competing for strat resources.

 

[pokiehl]

This isn’t my experience at all. The AI always expands even at the expense of other important considerations.

 

[Disgustipated]

My last game they filled in every available space, including snow cities. I think loyalty is one reason they stop. Once the barbs are cleared from the seas (by me), they expand more.

 

[MrRadar]

AI does not build neither “high” nor “low”. From my earlier multiple AI-only games observations, as long as AI don’t have a settler, they will build one and then the settler will try to navigate to whatever place the mysterious algorithm finds suitable. Sometimes it’s a quick journey, but there may also be many perils on the way that will throw the settler off the way for many many turns. I’ve seen AI settlers wander for dozens of turns, literally, going to a place, turning back, then looping around to almost the same place, veering off again, wasting ten, twenty, thirty turns before finally settling somewhere. As long as AI has a settler on the way, it will not build another one.

If a settler gets captured by a barb, AI may then build another one. The captured settler may be paraded unescorted by the barbs around the territory of the original AI, into their face, the original AI does not care in the least. It may recapture their settler by sheer luck, it seems, if their unit happens to move on the same tile. There’s no concerted effort whatsoever in recapturing settlers lost to barbs. If recaptured, and AI having two settlers at a time, it does not mean they will settle them both, no. One of them may wander around for centuries and even millennia before settling. One after another only.

AI has no plan, no direction, nothing. They all play the same way, they only have different buffs, so they get different yields to use. AI in Civ VI is probably the most devoid of any actual personality in the whole series.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

My last game they filled in every available space, including snow cities. I think loyalty is one reason they stop. Once the barbs are cleared from the seas (by me), they expand more.

This will define player's expansion strategy when it comes to barbarian occupied zones.

 

[SemiLazyGamer]

Here's some ancedotle rules I've seen of AI settling from playing continents and islands maps:

*The AI will forward settle earlier met civs first.
*The AI hate settling desert, tundra, or snow cities.
*The AI will attempt to settle nearby avaliable land if it's avaliable, even if something is stopping them from settling it.
*The AI will not settle across the sea until their nearby avaliable land is used up.

 

[Vandlys]

Whether it's vanilla, R&F, or GS, the AI is the same plan. It builds about 6 to 8 cities quickly and then stops. Perhaps late in the game they will add 1 or 2 more cities but that's normally it.

What ever happened to AI building 14+ cities? Is it just a soft coded decision by developers, or is it hard coded to avoid out of range errors?

I've tried playing with just 2 or 3 AI and not city states, just to test if AI would ever build more cities if there was no competition and lots of free space. Nope, same process, they build out quickly and then just go high and not wide. I miss having 4+ AI's with one expanding wide and competing for strat resources.

AI does not build neither “high” nor “low”. From my earlier multiple AI-only games observations, as long as AI don’t have a settler, they will build one and then the settler will try to navigate to whatever place the mysterious algorithm finds suitable. Sometimes it’s a quick journey, but there may also be many perils on the way that will throw the settler off the way for many many turns. I’ve seen AI settlers wander for dozens of turns, literally, going to a place, turning back, then looping around to almost the same place, veering off again, wasting ten, twenty, thirty turns before finally settling somewhere. As long as AI has a settler on the way, it will not build another one.

If a settler gets captured by a barb, AI may then build another one. The captured settler may be paraded unescorted by the barbs around the territory of the original AI, into their face, the original AI does not care in the least. It may recapture their settler by sheer luck, it seems, if their unit happens to move on the same tile. There’s no concerted effort whatsoever in recapturing settlers lost to barbs. If recaptured, and AI having two settlers at a time, it does not mean they will settle them both, no. One of them may wander around for centuries and even millennia before settling. One after another only.

AI has no plan, no direction, nothing. They all play the same way, they only have different buffs, so they get different yields to use. AI in Civ VI is probably the most devoid of any actual personality in the whole series.

I always thought the accepted vernacular was "tall" and "wide".

This isn’t my experience at all. The AI always expands even at the expense of other important considerations.

This is my experience as well. There are even mods out there that limit the number of cities one can build (incl. AI) or the way settlers are trained. I've not had a single game where the AI didn't spam settlers until the whole map was full.

Since the micromanagement clicking is the thing I like least about Civ, I've often started playing on tiny maps with 8 civs just to counter the endless city spam, as I myself am content with max 7 cities.

 

[Dedrytus]

Here's some ancedotle rules I've seen of AI settling from playing continents and islands maps:

*The AI will forward settle earlier met civs first.
*The AI hate settling desert, tundra, or snow cities.
*The AI will attempt to settle nearby avaliable land if it's avaliable, even if something is stopping them from settling it.
*The AI will not settle across the sea until their nearby avaliable land is used up.

* The AI will settle near natural wonder even if it is next to enemy capital, half the way across continent.
* The AI knows where strategic resources are from the beginning. So crappy city in the middle of nowhere may be good spot after all.

 

[planetfall]

Agreed, crappy city in middle of nowhere means there's a strat resource.

Yes, I should have used tall/wide instead of high/low, but isn't that potato or spud type of discussion?

I wonder if difficulty level effects the number of cities the AI will build. I'll have to raise difficulty level and see if any difference.

 

[pokiehl]

Difficulty level doesn’t affect AI behavior directly. It only grants unit and yield bonuses.

 

[kaspergm]

* The AI knows where strategic resources are from the beginning. So crappy city in the middle of nowhere may be good spot after all.

Is that actually true? I seem to recall it was a thing in Civ5, and I know many people assumed it was carried over in Civ6, but haven't the developers actually said that this isn't the case?

From my own experience in Civ6, the AI will often fails to settle strategic resources that they don't have the tech for, but whether that is actually because they can't see them or just because of poor settling logic, I can't say for certain. In a similar manner, when AI settles more or less randomly obviously sometimes it will land near strategic resources they haven't unveiled.

 

[pokiehl]

Is that actually true? I seem to recall it was a thing in Civ5, and I know many people assumed it was carried over in Civ6, but haven't the developers actually said that this isn't the case?

I don’t think it’s ever been confirmed one way or the other. I agree with you—My guess is that it is NOT in fact true, based on my own observations like yours.

 

[bbbt]

Difficulty level doesn’t affect AI behavior directly. It only grants unit and yield bonuses.

While accurate, those increased unit and yield bonuses definitely lead to more AI cities, at least on Immortal and Deity, in my experience.