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Getting Busted
I recently started a SMAC/X game after a rather long hiatus and something unusual happened: the AI did a good job keeping up with me for population, tech, and diplomacy. I set the world at large size (to suit a builder), large land (helps AI spread), average native (high native punishes the AI, since it never sets colonies due to all the fungus and generates lots of MWs; low native is too boring), average erosion, and high rainfall (helps AI, since it is terrible at terraforming, resulting in slow growth). My tech was set permanently on blind/explore (default for the Gaians). Blind research gives the game some spice - directed research makes the game way too easy.
By year 2220 or so all of the factions (me as Gaians, UoP, Spartans, Usurpers, Caretakers, Cyborgs, and Morgan) had gotten a decent start. UoP started fast, then stopped expanding (Zak met Santiago - bad for him). Santiago expanded over a large continent with lots of smallish bases. Morgan was in the Jungle on a smallish island and got big, for him at least. Aki had a medium continent to herself and build about 15 well developed bases, some of which got to size 10. The aliens were huge, with 25 to 35 bases each. They shared a huge continent and when it was filled they started building sea bases - lot of them. Strangely there wasn't much warfare between them. I had a medium sized continent to myself and built 14 bases, which I then started polishing (after they got to size 16 I started cranking out sea bases for energy and as sentinels against marauders - another one of Vel's magnificent observations).
Aki and H'mnee weren't too far behind me for tech and pop before my third pop boom to 16 (after which I left them in the dust), and they had a tech rate of about 1 per 5 years. In particular the Caretakers were just behind me. I was generous with the human AI factions and sold or gifted inoffensive techs, since all of them but Santiago are relatively friendly (Morgan was and remains my ally after over 100 years - amazing! Especially since I am the Gaians and green most of the time). I was in Vendetta with both aliens from almost the start of the game (Morgan asked me to declare war on H'mnee, and I honored our Pact, getting brownie points in the process). The Bugs were at war with almost all the human AIs (except Aki, who was truce, and Santiago, who didn't have their comm link frequencies) - so we were all in common cause against the big, nasty Bugs.
I should have known it wouldn't last. My guess is that my entire gifted tech found its way to the Aliens through Aki. Around 2240 the Caretakers discovered Suborbital Flight, about 10 years after I had, and they promptly started building fusion planetbusters. Shortly thereafter Aki, who had always been friendly and Solicitous, declared Vendetta on me. Then Santiago declared vendetta (I was surprised she waited that long). Planet suddenly was not the friendly place it once was.
This got me to thinking: how do you protect yourself against Planetbusters before you get Orbital Defense Pods? There is, potentially, a long time before you get the necessary tech, especially since my tech is permanently set on blind/explore. Flechette defense system is pretty useless since it comes so late. So, how do you defend yourself? Against a real human you are out of luck, since they will be sneaky and know how to inflict maximum damage. However, over the last few years I have noticed a few AI traits that might be of interest:
Trait 1: Personal hatred. I've had many games where the AI had PBs but never used them, even when they were at war with me, and losing. I am always careful to keep my reputation noble, and I NEVER commit atrocities (against human AI, that is - the Bugs don't count, and they have RAID nerve gas pods and genetic warfare probe canisters with their name on them. I guess that makes me a xenophobe…). I also make sure the Charter is not revoked, which lets the floodgates open for some very nasty warfare if it ever goes down. The AI algorithm must weigh this before using PBs. So, to reduce the chance that an AI will use a PB don't give them cause - play nice.
Trait 2: Troop concentrations. I've been PBed by the AI 3 times (Yang, Miriam, and Lal), and each time they targeted cities with large concentrations of troops that were proximate to their territory. In one memorable game long ago Miriam essentially destroyed her own territory with her own PBs to stop my invading armies, which is a very Miriam-like type of thing to do (I can hear her saying, "The fires of Hell take you, heathen!"). Likewise, Lal bombed his own Peacekeeping Headquarters that I had captured with a large invasion force. Conclusion: if the AI does have cause to use a PB, they are likely to bomb threatening forces in preference to an enemy city in a non-combat area. Tactics: If an enemy has a PB, try placing a lot of troops in or near his territory, or in one of his captured cities. Your objective is to tempt the AI into destroying a useless, small city and the replaceable military units within it. This does two things: uses up the PB (yeh!), and makes the rest of the AIs declare war on him if the Charter is still in effect (double yeh!). You can then put on the mantle of a martyr and lead the rest of the AIs in a jihad. This might take with wind out of your military juggernaught for a while, but oh well - at least the threat of the PB is gone.
Trait 3: Supercity. The infinite range bug for AI missiles and PBs means your supercities are all vulnerable. While I have never had my homeland bombed it is always a threat when the AI gets a PB and has reason to use it. Conclusion: if the AI does have cause, and there are no other suitable targets, your supercity(s) is toast.
Trait 4: Preemptive Strike. As noted by Vel and others, the AI will convert existing production when all defenders are eliminated. So, if an AI is building a PB you should send conventional missiles or bombers (suicide or otherwise) to take out the defenders and the AI will switch production. Note that the next turn they are likely to switch back to the PB with no penalty (an AI cheat), so if they have a lot of minerals build up all you are doing is delaying production by the cost of the new defender. Conclusion: you can delay production of an AI PB almost indefinitely by judicious long-range elimination of the PB production city's defenders, or by a probe team sabotage (this is harder to do). Eventually the AI will give up when all the minerals are used up. If the PB does get built, destroy it in the same way - long range (suicide, if necessary) bombardment.
Trait 5: Make Friends. You can use diplomacy to suck up to your enemy. I've found that this typically isn't very successful, but if all else fails it is worth a try to give them a small base or energy, or tech if you are desperate, in exchange for peace. After all, it might buy you time to get your act together and mound a serious offensive against the nasty faction which has a PB just waiting to obliterate your capitol with VW, HGA, and WP.
Trait 6: Spread Out. After an enemy hits your capitol with a PB and turns your VW, HGA, and WP into superheated stratospheric ash you might belatedly realize that spreading out some, and perhaps all, of your SPs into multiple cities might have been a very good idea. I consider this pre-damage control, and it is very easy especially after the advent of crawler production transfer to SPs. After mag tubes the crawler mineral transfer to SPs is trivial.
Epilog: After Aki and Santiago declared war I stopped polishing my cities and cranked up the war machine (I had recently pop boomed to 16, so I had a huge production and tech advantage). Aki was my first target, and by about 2260 she was down to one base. She refused to surrender (being pacted with the huge H'mnee, her Bug Sister), and so I regretfully sent her to her own private punishment sphere. Santiago capitulated after I took one of her bases (she had no friends or allies, and probably felt pretty lonely). I asked/bribed her and my other human AI friends who were not already at war with the Bugs to do so (this was not a problem). Now all I have to do is work on capturing 60+ Bug Bases, and make sure H'mnee's PB never gets produced. And I have some newly refitted veteran X-chaos-fusion bombers fresh from the Cyborg war for that…
I recently started a SMAC/X game after a rather long hiatus and something unusual happened: the AI did a good job keeping up with me for population, tech, and diplomacy. I set the world at large size (to suit a builder), large land (helps AI spread), average native (high native punishes the AI, since it never sets colonies due to all the fungus and generates lots of MWs; low native is too boring), average erosion, and high rainfall (helps AI, since it is terrible at terraforming, resulting in slow growth). My tech was set permanently on blind/explore (default for the Gaians). Blind research gives the game some spice - directed research makes the game way too easy.
By year 2220 or so all of the factions (me as Gaians, UoP, Spartans, Usurpers, Caretakers, Cyborgs, and Morgan) had gotten a decent start. UoP started fast, then stopped expanding (Zak met Santiago - bad for him). Santiago expanded over a large continent with lots of smallish bases. Morgan was in the Jungle on a smallish island and got big, for him at least. Aki had a medium continent to herself and build about 15 well developed bases, some of which got to size 10. The aliens were huge, with 25 to 35 bases each. They shared a huge continent and when it was filled they started building sea bases - lot of them. Strangely there wasn't much warfare between them. I had a medium sized continent to myself and built 14 bases, which I then started polishing (after they got to size 16 I started cranking out sea bases for energy and as sentinels against marauders - another one of Vel's magnificent observations).
Aki and H'mnee weren't too far behind me for tech and pop before my third pop boom to 16 (after which I left them in the dust), and they had a tech rate of about 1 per 5 years. In particular the Caretakers were just behind me. I was generous with the human AI factions and sold or gifted inoffensive techs, since all of them but Santiago are relatively friendly (Morgan was and remains my ally after over 100 years - amazing! Especially since I am the Gaians and green most of the time). I was in Vendetta with both aliens from almost the start of the game (Morgan asked me to declare war on H'mnee, and I honored our Pact, getting brownie points in the process). The Bugs were at war with almost all the human AIs (except Aki, who was truce, and Santiago, who didn't have their comm link frequencies) - so we were all in common cause against the big, nasty Bugs.
I should have known it wouldn't last. My guess is that my entire gifted tech found its way to the Aliens through Aki. Around 2240 the Caretakers discovered Suborbital Flight, about 10 years after I had, and they promptly started building fusion planetbusters. Shortly thereafter Aki, who had always been friendly and Solicitous, declared Vendetta on me. Then Santiago declared vendetta (I was surprised she waited that long). Planet suddenly was not the friendly place it once was.
This got me to thinking: how do you protect yourself against Planetbusters before you get Orbital Defense Pods? There is, potentially, a long time before you get the necessary tech, especially since my tech is permanently set on blind/explore. Flechette defense system is pretty useless since it comes so late. So, how do you defend yourself? Against a real human you are out of luck, since they will be sneaky and know how to inflict maximum damage. However, over the last few years I have noticed a few AI traits that might be of interest:
Trait 1: Personal hatred. I've had many games where the AI had PBs but never used them, even when they were at war with me, and losing. I am always careful to keep my reputation noble, and I NEVER commit atrocities (against human AI, that is - the Bugs don't count, and they have RAID nerve gas pods and genetic warfare probe canisters with their name on them. I guess that makes me a xenophobe…). I also make sure the Charter is not revoked, which lets the floodgates open for some very nasty warfare if it ever goes down. The AI algorithm must weigh this before using PBs. So, to reduce the chance that an AI will use a PB don't give them cause - play nice.
Trait 2: Troop concentrations. I've been PBed by the AI 3 times (Yang, Miriam, and Lal), and each time they targeted cities with large concentrations of troops that were proximate to their territory. In one memorable game long ago Miriam essentially destroyed her own territory with her own PBs to stop my invading armies, which is a very Miriam-like type of thing to do (I can hear her saying, "The fires of Hell take you, heathen!"). Likewise, Lal bombed his own Peacekeeping Headquarters that I had captured with a large invasion force. Conclusion: if the AI does have cause to use a PB, they are likely to bomb threatening forces in preference to an enemy city in a non-combat area. Tactics: If an enemy has a PB, try placing a lot of troops in or near his territory, or in one of his captured cities. Your objective is to tempt the AI into destroying a useless, small city and the replaceable military units within it. This does two things: uses up the PB (yeh!), and makes the rest of the AIs declare war on him if the Charter is still in effect (double yeh!). You can then put on the mantle of a martyr and lead the rest of the AIs in a jihad. This might take with wind out of your military juggernaught for a while, but oh well - at least the threat of the PB is gone.
Trait 3: Supercity. The infinite range bug for AI missiles and PBs means your supercities are all vulnerable. While I have never had my homeland bombed it is always a threat when the AI gets a PB and has reason to use it. Conclusion: if the AI does have cause, and there are no other suitable targets, your supercity(s) is toast.
Trait 4: Preemptive Strike. As noted by Vel and others, the AI will convert existing production when all defenders are eliminated. So, if an AI is building a PB you should send conventional missiles or bombers (suicide or otherwise) to take out the defenders and the AI will switch production. Note that the next turn they are likely to switch back to the PB with no penalty (an AI cheat), so if they have a lot of minerals build up all you are doing is delaying production by the cost of the new defender. Conclusion: you can delay production of an AI PB almost indefinitely by judicious long-range elimination of the PB production city's defenders, or by a probe team sabotage (this is harder to do). Eventually the AI will give up when all the minerals are used up. If the PB does get built, destroy it in the same way - long range (suicide, if necessary) bombardment.
Trait 5: Make Friends. You can use diplomacy to suck up to your enemy. I've found that this typically isn't very successful, but if all else fails it is worth a try to give them a small base or energy, or tech if you are desperate, in exchange for peace. After all, it might buy you time to get your act together and mound a serious offensive against the nasty faction which has a PB just waiting to obliterate your capitol with VW, HGA, and WP.
Trait 6: Spread Out. After an enemy hits your capitol with a PB and turns your VW, HGA, and WP into superheated stratospheric ash you might belatedly realize that spreading out some, and perhaps all, of your SPs into multiple cities might have been a very good idea. I consider this pre-damage control, and it is very easy especially after the advent of crawler production transfer to SPs. After mag tubes the crawler mineral transfer to SPs is trivial.
Epilog: After Aki and Santiago declared war I stopped polishing my cities and cranked up the war machine (I had recently pop boomed to 16, so I had a huge production and tech advantage). Aki was my first target, and by about 2260 she was down to one base. She refused to surrender (being pacted with the huge H'mnee, her Bug Sister), and so I regretfully sent her to her own private punishment sphere. Santiago capitulated after I took one of her bases (she had no friends or allies, and probably felt pretty lonely). I asked/bribed her and my other human AI friends who were not already at war with the Bugs to do so (this was not a problem). Now all I have to do is work on capturing 60+ Bug Bases, and make sure H'mnee's PB never gets produced. And I have some newly refitted veteran X-chaos-fusion bombers fresh from the Cyborg war for that…
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