No! I don't want to build a galleon!

[Blisterz]

I try and keep a few swordsmen in my capital. So every few turns I can pretend I am having a changing of the guards

[Kc7mxo]

Hah. Hah hah. ho ho. hee hee.

read my sig. har har har. i hate that damn govenor.

[Zanzin]

And this is why I don't use the govenors!!

[War4ever]

i dont' know of any game that has good governors....nothing can give you "intelligent" decisions.....as it is all on a individual basis...

they suck!

[Skanky Burns]

The biggest problem is that the enemy AI is using the same governors to control its production. When they keep sending in hordes of majorly obsolete units to the front, despite the fact that they have the technology, resources, and production capacity to build modern units, you've just got to wonder about that AI.

In all honesty, though, the AI is much better than any other civ-style game.

[dexters]

Actually, Soren has answered this question before.

I was complaining about the dumb Governor not being able to recognize I want to build riflemen, not archers.

Here's an excerpt from his response

The AI defines "offensive" units as

Warriors
Archers
Swordsmen
Longbowmen
Chariots
Horsemen
Knights
Cavalry
Marines
Paratroopers
Tanks
Modern Armor

Thus, if you allow the AI to suggest offensive units, it will always try to find the best unit from the above group to build whenever it determines that you need more offense. And if you don't have the right assortment of resources, this might mean that it suggest build Longbowmen because that is the "best" offensive unit, even if Riflemen are available.

So his point was basically that the AI governors appear to be stupid because of the way they organize things. If you look at the above example, and assuming I don't have a horse as a resource (which is what happened in my game), the AI governors will continue to build Longbowmen as my offensive unit until I get Marines. Even if I have units like Riflemen or Infantry with far better attack power. Why? This is Because Riflemen is classified as a defensive unit, it won't build it.

The AI governors need to be fed input from time to time. I think the people here have a point. We weren't told which is offensive and which is defensive, so we sort of have to guess, and sometimes, what you think is an obvious thing (like changing production from Longbowmen to infantry) wont happen because, well... the AI works from a list of offensive/defensive units we weren't given. We have to find it out ourselves.

[Moraelin]

And my question is, from a programming point of view, why DOES the AI even need a list of offensive and defensive units. I mean, really, there are only 3 stats for a unit, not some really detailed model that would bog down the CPU in complex maths. It can just take the raw list of units it can build, and see which unit has the highest offense or defense value, depending on which role it has in mind.

[dexters]

Originally posted by Moraelin
And my question is, from a programming point of view, why DOES the AI even need a list of offensive and defensive units. I mean, really, there are only 3 stats for a unit, not some really detailed model that would bog down the CPU in complex maths. It can just take the raw list of units it can build, and see which unit has the highest offense or defense value, depending on which role it has in mind.

That is what I had assumed. I was surprised the model used was far less complex, with the use of a predefined list instead of a routine to determine units with the highest attack power / defense power.

[PGM]

Originally posted by dexters
Actually, Soren has answered this question before.
I was complaining about the dumb Governor not being able to recognize I want to build riflemen, not archers.
Here's an excerpt from his response
(...)

I can understand this, but the other day I was building M.Armors and S.Bombers, and the Governors were always suggesting Immortals. I had already used my Golden Age, why build Immortals? And I was at war with the whole world, why build Privateers instead of Battleships???
Govs:

[Auren]

I guess I have had little better luck tunign governors than others.

My only real problem is coast cities which want to build privateers all the time.

Land cities work ok, altough they want to make bombers occasionally. Luckily I like to have few bombers so it doesn't matter if I miss some of them. Altough ti really makes me wonder how governors make any kind of ounits when I have denied them to make any....

[Kolyana]

Dexters: That's an interesting list, but the following posts after it were all valid.

We're talking about a programming environment here ... it shouldn't be hardcoded, it should be part of a decision making algorithm.

Not blowing my own horn or anything, but I'm the head of a small software company and the first thing we tell new recruits is to *NOT* hardcode this sort of stuff. Very sloppy work.

More importantly, if they have to hardcode it - why can't we edit it? All could be forgiven if I could create my own Offensive, Defensive lists.

[rid102]

More importantly, if they have to hardcode it - why can't we edit it? All could be forgiven if I could create my own Offensive, Defensive lists.

Yeah but that'd be simple and easy and would work.

What you don't understand is that Firaxis know much better than anyone here and that their really annoying "learning AI" governers are far superior than allowing the user to actually do what they want!

[Moraelin]

Originally posted by Kolyana More importantly, if they have to hardcode it - why can't we edit it? All could be forgiven if I could create my own Offensive, Defensive lists.

Because if it can be edited it's not really hardcoded?

I mean, really, if someone could be bothered to read that list from a resource instead of hardcoding it... they might as well have done the Right Thing (TM) instead. I.e., could have used the horribly advanced programming technique known as a for loop, and got all the needed info directly from the units' defensive and offensive values.

Or for extra brownie points they could have kept two sorted lists of all units one can build, one by offense and one by defense, with cost as a second key, so they can quickly locate the hardest hitting or defending unit AND which is the cheapest for that offense/defense value. And since you only need to update that list when a new unit becomes available, even bubble sort would do.

Both of which would have had the advantage of automatically addapting to whatever modding is done to the game's units.

[Akka]

Originally posted by Kolyana
Dexters: That's an interesting list, but the following posts after it were all valid.

We're talking about a programming environment here ... it shouldn't be hardcoded, it should be part of a decision making algorithm.

Not blowing my own horn or anything, but I'm the head of a small software company and the first thing we tell new recruits is to *NOT* hardcode this sort of stuff. Very sloppy work.

More importantly, if they have to hardcode it - why can't we edit it? All could be forgiven if I could create my own Offensive, Defensive lists.

Am I the only one here that look at the game editor ? I know it does not allow to do any scenario, but you CAN choose for EACH UNIT if it will be a "defense" or an "offense" unit. Just open the editor, go for the "unit" panel, and look at the little boxes...

Now, it's true that except for expansion, the AI sucks. It looks good only because of the multiple restraints that are put on each civ to give to the weaker more chances to take back their late, and to the more powerful more caps to make sure that they won't go too far.
Cheesy.

[rid102]

Am I the only one here that look at the game editor ? I know it does not allow to do any scenario, but you CAN choose for EACH UNIT if it will be a "defense" or an "offense" unit. Just open the editor, go for the "unit" panel, and look at the little boxes...

I'm still looking for the "Don't be ****" checkbox in the editor - anyone found it yet?