AI still spam roads?

[Willem]

Originally posted by rah
Once it's in your culture border, I don't think you can pillage them.

Sure you can.

[JeebusGreen]

Originally posted by Willem
Of course, why shouldn't it? Having roads everywhere makes it easy to move your troops around in case of an attack. I do the same thing.

Agreed.

Although in my current game I've deliberately done all the road building myself to avoid the AI building roads in clear tiles adjacent to forests that I'm trying to cultivate trees in, as I've heard that decreases the chance of a forest popping up on the blank tile.

I seem to be getting a fair bit of vegetation growth actually.

[Sabre2th]

Originally posted by Willem


Sure you can.

I don't believe you're able to, actually. I'm second guessing myself now, but I believe he's right.

Edit: Just checked and no, you can't.

[eris]

Re: Re: Re: AI still spam roads?

Originally posted by Nohbody8


I got this argument a lot the first time I asked about this. The thing is, why do I need to defend anything but my BFCs, the roads that connect my BFCs, or the resources outside of my BFCs that are connected by roads? I don't need roads on every square of my empire because the only squares I need to defend already have roads on them.

If an opponent crosses the border with a big stack, especially after just declaring war, you might want go out and encounter that stack before it gets to tiles where it can do pillaging damage as it travels. You might even weaken it enough that it has to retreat. That may give you time to get your units back to your cities and heal before the next wave arrives.

There are three different reasons. I know I am not the best strategist on these boards, so there have to be other reasons I have not heard or thought up.

If the strategic implications are not enough to overcome your aesthetic objections to roads everywhere, then you will have to leave your workers non-automated to accomodate your aesthetic desires. Those with greater skills than I posesss have already recommended not automating workers, so I have no better advice.

I cannot see what else can be done for you other than redesign the game to fit your aesthetics. For that, you would need some worker AI re-programming. Unless you have the programming skills or can persuade someone with those skills to help you, you're stuck. Otherwise, you can publish your "Clean Roads" mod and see how many people clamor for it. Good luck!

[Nohbody8]

I rarely, if ever, have found myself in a situation where an enemy crosses my border into a square without a road already connected to my empire. Speaking of rare occurrences, I think I may have automated my workers once to see if they could do a better job than me. I was not impressed. I enjoy using workers to improve the terrain. I guess that's why it bothers me that when I invade another civilization, all their willy-nilly road building seems careless rather than strategic

[rah]

If I want to war with a civ that has had time to build a killer SOD, I will usually declare war and wait for them to send it into my territory where I can take advantage of all those useless roads (and of course take advantage of my seige engines) to help control WW and lose less units. That's better than getting all my seige engines flanked while I'm marching up to their cities. If they come into your territory they usually come in with those flanking units to pillage and they can easily be handled, and they will have few left when you take the offensive.

[Yaga]

The larger the Civ, the more the 'extra' roads help. To echo rah's strategy, I like to send my most mobile troops into the fray, have them attack, then run them back to the nearest city where my medics and barracks can heal them up quickly. Similarly, I'll run my archers up onto the nearest hills to help funnel the SODs towards wherever I'd like them to go.

Having roads spammed all over the place really does help on the defense, much like having forts here and there along the coast to run damaged ships to, and, later, to have fighters to provide int/recon.

“Amateurs think about tactics, but professionals think about logistics.” -- General Robert H. Barrow, USMC (Commandant of the Marine Corps) noted in 1980 (a paraphrase of Alexander, whose quote I can't seem to find)

"Logistics comprises the means and arrangements which work out the plans of strategy and tactics. Strategy decides where to act; logistics brings the troops to this point."
-- General Antoine Henri Jomini, Precis de l' Art de la Guerre. (1838)

[Nohbody8]

I'm slowly beginning to see the benefit. I suppose my inability to play successfully on any difficulty level higher than noble severely limits my experience with large SoDs.

[rah]

Are you using agressive AI? That's what usually delivers the larger SODs.

[Nohbody8]

I don't mess around with the custom game settings. I generally create my maps with the very broad settings. I don't know for sure if aggressive AI is thrown in under the hood with these settings but it doesn't sound like it.

[rah]

It's not. You should try it. Even if i wasn't playing custom game settings, I'd do custom just to turn this feature on. Without it the AI is a bit too easy to beat at a lot of levels.

[Nohbody8]

I'll give that a shot once I start winning consistently on those higher levels. I'm just now starting to evaluate some of my game decisions and integrate what I've been learning about on these forums.