City Governor AI!

[dennis580]

Another reason somebody might use AI governors is to make the game more challenging as it will handicap you from fully implementing your strategies.

[Patriqvium]

If this means saying goodbye to those brainless SMAC governors who built another transport after another, I'll be happy

[Inverse Icarus]

Build queues for provinces is the only way to go.

[Sabre2th]

Originally posted by UberKruX
Build queues for provinces is the only way to go.

What provinces will those be?

[DATarbell]

I'm finding this thread intriguingly interesting.

I recently got in "hot water" over at the MoO3 site for suggesting that micromanagement was--for many of us TBS gamers--not only necessary, but fun. I was just about boo'ed out of the forum! (Over there you will find staunch advocates of this new IFP--Imperial Focus Points--system that imposes a very close limit on how much micromanagement you can exert. The advocates argue that this will speed up each turn, improving gameplay and increasing the suspension of disbelief. I suspect that it will be a tremendous success or a tremendous failure, with very little 'in-between ground.')

But what I'm hearing here is very much along the lines of what I--and it sounds like many of you--enjoy most about this genre: much of the joy of the game is the personal involvement in the details of the Civ! And I believe that the "just one more turn" addiction that has become synonymous with Sid's games is inextricably linked to that detailed involvement.

For myself, I'm anxious to see how good a job any of the 'automated' options will be in Civ3. Will I be able to trust a unit to find the best way from its current location to a select destination? Will a worker make the best use of time and resources with little or no supervision? Or, if given supervision, will that same worker carry it out with a high degree of efficiency? Will local governors properly compensate for the "age" of a city (its 'maturity', if you will)? Taking into account my current diplomatic state (stable peace, wary peace, preparing for war, war away from home, war at home)? Taking into account my current economic state (loads of cash reserves, running on a shoestring budget)? Taking into account my current priorities (research/happiness/production, or whatever)? Taking into account my current technological sophistication? And so on, and so forth...

I can hardly wait!

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Sabre2th


What provinces will those be?

there was a province thread, whereas you could create groups of cities and give them special build queues or universal commands.

example, make a set of "Production Cities" that build factories etc, and "Science Cities" that build libraries etc.

[Ozymandous]

Just felt I had to comment on this idea...

Originally posted by DATarbell
I'm finding this thread intriguingly interesting.

I recently got in "hot water" over at the MoO3 site for suggesting that micromanagement was--for many of us TBS gamers--not only necessary, but fun. I was just about boo'ed out of the forum! (Over there you will find staunch advocates of this new IFP--Imperial Focus Points--system that imposes a very close limit on how much micromanagement you can exert. The advocates argue that this will speed up each turn, improving gameplay and increasing the suspension of disbelief. I suspect that it will be a tremendous success or a tremendous failure, with very little 'in-between ground.')

Having been over at MOO3.com myself I can tell you why you were "chased away". In Civ3 at most you may have 200 cities to rule and manage (maybe less than this, is there a limit on cities?), but in MOO3 you may have 2,000 colonies to manage. See the difference?

Micromanaging 200 is tough but micromanaging 2,000 would be beyond most gamers, much less the 20,000 or so you *could* end up ruling. Civ3 is small enough (in comparison) to do everything yourself, MOO3 will not be that small.

See the difference? I hope so, tis' a very simple concept.

But what I'm hearing here is very much along the lines of what I--and it sounds like many of you--enjoy most about this genre: much of the joy of the game is the personal involvement in the details of the Civ! And I believe that the "just one more turn" addiction that has become synonymous with Sid's games is inextricably linked to that detailed involvement.

For myself, I'm anxious to see how good a job any of the 'automated' options will be in Civ3. Will I be able to trust a unit to find the best way from its current location to a select destination? Will a worker make the best use of time and resources with little or no supervision? Or, if given supervision, will that same worker carry it out with a high degree of efficiency? Will local governors properly compensate for the "age" of a city (its 'maturity', if you will)? Taking into account my current diplomatic state (stable peace, wary peace, preparing for war, war away from home, war at home)? Taking into account my current economic state (loads of cash reserves, running on a shoestring budget)? Taking into account my current priorities (research/happiness/production, or whatever)? Taking into account my current technological sophistication? And so on, and so forth...

I can hardly wait!

I am anxious on what the automated "helpers" can and cannot do myself, but I doubt Civ3 will be as dependant on these as MOO3, but then again this is why Quicksilver has had someone working on the game AI for over a year, long bewfore anything else in the game was started.

I think that Firaxis will improve these items but to what degree only they know (we'll have to wait a month ), but I do know that the last of what you described probably is beyond what will be in this game. Heh, I know real people who'd have trouble micromanaging to that degree.

I guess we'll see in a few weeks how good or bad they are.

[Rasbelin]

Originally posted by Anunikoba
Micromanagement and sleepless nights is the ONLY way to play CIV!

But what do you think about this?

In an interview (should be soon available on Ape) Sid
told that he didn't want to have micromanaging in Civ I.

Sid doesn't like micromanaging?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Bleyn
Why? Its simple. I always hate the amount of micromangement that is required to get a city settled late in the game or one captured from a much less advanced rival up to snuff with the rest of my civ.

Eons ago I have suggested the use of a "master build queue" to solve this problem. It would have been quite easy to implement.

[Sarxis]

Originally posted by Rasbelin


But what do you think about this?

In an interview (should be soon available on Ape) Sid
told that he didn't want to have micromanaging in Civ I.

Sid doesn't like micromanaging?

It would be amazing to have city governors that actually work. I know that some people do use them in SMAX, but a lot of the best players won't touch them becuase of the lack of skill of the AI.

It will be interesting to see just what the CGs have to offer though.

[Skanky Burns]

Im not too keen on the governors idea - even if they do a good job. Initially, ill build everything by hand just to familiarise myself with different buildings (probably just the first game, there shouldnt be too many surprises). Then ill use build queue templates, so for a new city, just load up the 'new city queue', after that lot is done, load the next build queue, until the newer cities are on par with my core cities. Just like in SMAC.

[Blake]

Personally I would prefer the CTP2 national manager, this was one thing in CTP2 which was actually done right, made empire-wide building a cinch (It was powerfull enough that I could, for example, insert a factory into the build queue of every city producing more than 100 production, this required only a couple more mouse clicks than inserting a factory into one cities queue).

A national manager gives the player just as much control as micromanaging every city, without the micromanagment . It's like the veterans version of govoners (which are so newbie ).

If Civ3 has a sufficentely powerfull National manager / queue manager then I wont touch govoners.
If they decide to deprive me of a national manager then I guess I'll reluctantly let govoners take control of my cities.

[Mike Breitkreutz FIRAXIS]

There are a variety of options for customizing governors. Not only can you set preferences for which types of units and improvements you want to build but you can also have the governor control basic city functions such as managing your citizens. In addition, you can have different settings for each city you control and each city can be configured individually to use the governor or not, as you desire. When not using the automated governor, the AI learns from the units and improvements you select for production and suggests similar items to build. You can also save a set of "default" settings for the governor that it will use for each new city you build. Alternately, you can have each new city governor mimic the settings of your capital city.

I use the governors extensively when I play and I think they do a great job. I rarely change what they are producing unless I have a sudden, unexpected war or something (I probably shouldn't be demanding tribute from powerful AI players.... ).

[The diplomat]

Sounds excellent!

The more I hear about the game, the more I want to play it.

[mactbone]

News Item!!!! News Item!!!! Wow, lots of stuff being told today

OK, so this means we have, what, 4 or 5 different ways to use the City Governor? Plus the old fashioned way? Dzang! Got Options? This is gonna be soooo cooool!!!