AIs and Giga Maps: Is It Just Me Or ...

[Gatekeeper]

Everyone:

... is the AI stupider, for lack of a better word?

I generally play at the King or Emperor level, and the AI does a reasonable job of keeping up or even slightly ahead of me (it depends on the AI nation). But recently I played a game on the Northern Hemisphere map, and here I am with armored divisions in the late 1800s, and only two other AI powers have discovered *gunpowder*!

I've tweaked the map in the editor so there's not too much land (the AI apparently has problems with too much land, according to the editor). What else could be causing the stupidity problem? The map itself, since, technically, it's larger than what the AI is normally used to? I mean, it's *sad* when the AI figures out what monarchy is in the 1600s (AD)!

I never have this problem on the large Earth map that shipped with Civ II.

Anyway, just some observations.

Gatekeeper

[solo]

Research costs are higher on larger maps. This magnifies the already very slow pace of AI tech acquisition. Being farther apart at the start also delays their mutual contacts and early chances to trade for different techs. Many end up having to spend the time learning identical techs they might have traded for instead.

[Bloody Monk]

A suggestion...

Play that map again except at Deity. While you are dealing with happiness problems the AI will be moving along. Deity setting is the major handicap you can add at this time, I think.

On the other hand...sometimes that kind of depressed learning curve just happens with the AI. Playing again with your previous setting may give a better result for the (let's face it) pathetic AI.

Good luck and have fun!!

Monk

[Gatekeeper]

Originally posted by solo
Research costs are higher on larger maps. This magnifies the already very slow pace of AI tech acquisition. Being farther apart at the start also delays their mutual contacts and early chances to trade for different techs. Many end up having to spend the time learning identical techs they might have traded for instead.

Hmm. I wasn't aware of the research costs being higher on larger maps.

As for trading technologies, I disabled that option a few years ago after getting tired of the AI nations teaming up against me, with the ringleader(s) bringing third- and fifth-rate AI powers up to modern threats via trading and/or giving them knowledge. They still acquire technology via diplomats, spies and trading with me, though.

Gatekeeper

[Gatekeeper]

Originally posted by Bloody Monk
A suggestion...

Play that map again except at Deity. While you are dealing with happiness problems the AI will be moving along. Deity setting is the major handicap you can add at this time, I think.

Heh. I've played a fair share of deity-level games and wasn't too enamored with them. I'll stick with king- and emperor-level games. They're just about right in my book. (Besides, I play with self-imposed restraints as well.)

On the other hand...sometimes that kind of depressed learning curve just happens with the AI. Playing again with your previous setting may give a better result for the (let's face it) pathetic AI.

Good luck and have fun!!

Monk

To be fair, I've had some decent AI opponents, particularly if they're on a continent not immediately accessible to me. But, yeah, the AI can be sad at times. I, too, have noticed that the AI is good in some games, pathetic in others ... oftentimes on the same map. In one game, Russia was building Copernicus' Observatory in 1500 BC, and in another, they hadn't even discovered astronomy by 1 AD.

Gatekeeper

[rah]

Play real opponents. The AI can't compete.

[Gatekeeper]

**shrugs** It depends on *how* you play against the AI.

My impression is that a typical gamer will seek every advantage s/he can against an AI, even if the advantage (cheat, to be cruder) isn't intended to be exploitable by the game's creators (i.e. surrounding a city with airbases so it can't be hit by AI bombers). As silly as it may sound, I try to play w/i "real world" limitations (say, by limiting the number of offensive units per city to its population points) or, at the very least, the parameters allowed by the programmers.

Besides, I have neither the time nor patience for MPing, what with my work schedule (I'm stressed out enough at work w/o having to add to it by getting my buttocks kicked in at Civ II every night by RL fellow gamers ).

Gatekeeper

[duke o' york]

You need tech trading back on if you want the AI to keep up. Otherwise you'll just end up miles ahead with even half-decent terrain. The AI can't use caravans to boost its trade so you have to let them get even by allowing them to trade techs.
Also, by giving them techs in the early game then you can speed your own tech research because your own rate depends upon the number of techs your key civ has. Search for "key civ" on this forum and the strategy forum and you'll get a wealth of information.
Whatever you do, put tech trading back on!

[Gatekeeper]

Perhaps the Macintosh version of Civ II is a bit different from the PC version, then, for the AI, once it has trade, is constantly sending caravans to my cities. I've had times in the latter parts of the game where the AI will sometimes get two tech advances per turn, which put it ahead or level with me.

Gatekeeper

[-Jrabbit]

I play the Mac version (deity/7/raging) and have never experienced anything close to that.

My exerience is that the biggest difference in the Mac version is the uncooperative diplomacy of the AI -- alliances rare, tech trading rare after first meeting, earlier alliances and secret pacts against me.

The net effect is that OCC is much more difficult. Other than that, in a regular game, the AI is really just a bump in the road.

Of course, unless I'm playing for an AC landing, modern units seldom come into play...

[Gatekeeper]

You don't have AI caravans coming to your cities? Admittedly, it's not *all* the time, but quite regularly by the Middle Ages and constantly by modern times (by then they're freight units).

As for diplomacy, I don't play the gold version of Mac Civ II (there's some sort of unresolved issue that, short of removing the MP, causes the game to crash upon exit ... TPTB were never able to solve it, despite extensive efforts), but the "regular" version.

It's rare for me to have a game *not* go into the modern age. It's just the way I play the Earth maps.

Gatekeeper

[Bloody Monk]

Originally posted by Gatekeeper
It's rare for me to have a game *not* go into the modern age. It's just the way I play the Earth maps.

Gatekeeper

If the way you choose to play (with your self imposed limits and changes to the rules, IIRC) gives you pleasure and fun, then there is no problem, is there.

The strange things you report on happening are probably the result of those choices. It would be very hard for others to have those results because you have essentially changed the game. Over the years, many things have been discovered that led most of us to adopt certain tactics and strategies that you seem to eschew (and here I do NOT refer to cheats like the airbase exploit). This will also and necessarily lead to very different game conditions and experiences for you that nobody would, or even could, ever experience. For the most part, this makes answering your very intriguing questions a shot in the dark.

So when these things happen in your games, just remember that's what you have chosen. The cleric in me remids that if one plants many apple seeds, sooner or later, he will be dealing with bunches of apples.

Both ways you can not have.

Monk

[-Jrabbit]

Gate -- Seldom more than a couple AI trade routes in my games. Often none. (This may be in part because I tend to kill their first camel, to keep them from getting science bonuses. Maybe the AI is smart enough not to waste more shield by building camels to send my way.)

You're wearing the Mac icon, how can you not be playing the MGE version?

[-Jrabbit]

Gate -- Seldom more than a couple AI trade routes in my games. Often none. (This may be in part because I tend to kill their first camel, to keep them from getting science bonuses. Maybe the AI is smart enough not to waste more shield by building camels to send my way.)

You're wearing the Mac icon, how can you not be playing the MGE version?
Are you cheating on us with a PC game????????

[Scouse Gits]

Hi guys,

I'm trying to get back into Civ & Poly - but RL is not giving me much chance at the moment - nothing bad - just lots of it.

For my threehapenth - I seldom see any concerted effort to trade by the AI - my 'normal' game is Deity, Giga
and the AI's research seems to me to be 'about right' ...

Stu