The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of your AI opponents

[Ision]

We all want a competitive game for as long as possible. Yes I know that no matter what the human will always have the upper hand over the AI. Nevertheless, there are always things we can do to help create more competitive games. Going up in difficulty level is the obvious answer. But even that has its limitations. Besides, for many players the style changes and severe micro-management required to play well at Deity or above are not always welcome For those players that play the mid level difficulties of regent, monarch, or emperor (which is the overwhelming majority of players), good AI opponents are hard to come by. The choice of AI opponents can be a significant factor in having a longer and more exciting CIV game.

All CIV traits and UUs are not created equal, and this certainly affects the competitiveness and lasting power of the specific AI civs. My years of playing CIV have brought me to assess the value, or lack of, my AI opponents. Certain trends have become apparent, and these trends in my opinion are trait related. Some Civs start slow, but if they last are very strong, or they start fast and level out well (THE GOOD). Others are fast starters but usually lack sufficient infrastructure to be mid/late game challenges (THE BAD). Some consistently do neither (THE UGLY).

In essence I contend that the Industrious (even now after the tone down), Scientific, and Commercial traits make an average to strong AI. In combination these traits make the strongest AIs. The other traits make weaker AIs on average. The strongly map dependant traits like, expansionist and seafaring, are either a boon or bust. Lastly, Militarist will continue to be dead last, but joined now by the Agricultural. Every player has his own experiences that have determined his view of a good or bad AI, so feel free to debate or disagree with my rankings and reasons. No doubt some will jump on me and say, “the new traits can not be judged so soon”, - I respectfully disagree. In fact, the C3C games I have played so far already indicate that the AI does not utilize the Seafaring trait well at all, and that the Agricultural trait will be good for a small early game AI boost - but no more than that. One last point, even the CIVs with good AI traits get trashed if they have a high shield early age UU (notice Carthage), they also get a boost with a low shield offensive early UUs. So there are always exceptions.

Here is a sampling (take note of the trait combos and/or UU impact)

The Good: America, France, Russia, China, Greece, Korea, Persia and Mayans

The Bad: Mongols, Arabs, Japan, Egypt, and Babylon

The Ugly: Germany, Netherlands, Carthage, Hittites, and Portugal

PS: Portugal is the biggest ‘boon or bust’ AI Civ.

[CerberusIV]

Carthage not a strong civ! You must be joking. They just got trampled in my C3C game but it took my Dutch with knights, the Vikings with SoZ and berserks and the Chinese to do it and I had to do most of the work at that.

All the AI civs are very map and neighbour dependent and I doubt if it is really possible to generalise.

I would agree that the AI can't really use seafaring or expansionist though.

[vmxa1]

I would agree that Exp and Sea are poorly used by the AI. I am not sure that the traits have the primary impact. I would say it is the map that determines which civs do well.
What do they have to work with and most of all who is their neighbor.
If China is the humans nearest civ, it is not going to do well in that game.

[Ision]

Obviously any CIV will be played well by the AI given a sufficiently advantagous map start. My point is that all things being roughly approximate there are certain outcomes that consistently bear themselves out.

Of course I am generalizing, thats the whole point. General observations validated as an average, but not as an absolute.

Given a sufficient number of games, each and every one of us will eventually see CIV x, y or z do exceptionally well or exceptionally poorly. One could point to a 1-15 footabll team, and dwell solely on that 1 victory. That single victory however, does not invalidate the generaliztion of the statement that, "on average they do not play well". Naturally the converse is true as well.

For example: I mainatin that no matter the map settings, no matter world size, or difficulty level. if you play 20 straight games on Continents and puposefully place 'Germany and Persia on that other contient', upon your discovery of that continent and the revealing of the map - you will consistantly (not absolutly) find a much stronger Persia. This is a clear example of how traits and UUs are a valid method of making accurate generalizations.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Ision
For example: I mainatin that no matter the map settings, no matter world size, or difficulty level. if you play 20 straight games on Continents and puposefully place 'Germany and Persia on that other contient', upon your discovery of that continent and the revealing of the map - you will consistantly (not absolutly) find a much stronger Persia. This is a clear example of how traits and UUs are a valid method of making accurate generalizations.

Funny, I would pick the Germans as the favorite for a KAI in that matchup.

An pretty interesting analysis, Ision, although I think you've missed a major factor: the build preferences flags in the editor. A civ that has Naval Units as "Build Often" will simply not compete with a civ that prioritizes production instead.


Dominae

[Ision]

Very true Dominae,

and I played enough games of the AU mod to bear out the truth of your assertion. My post was intended as a very broad generaization only (and to get comments like the one you just made).

yet another factor that I left out of my intial thread, is aggression levels. Zulus and persia excepted, on average peaceful civs do a little bit better long term. Aggressive Civs with strong earlys UU are the consistant exception. however, I do not belive that this is as consistant an Indicator as the dynamics of a CIVs traits combined with UU AI usefullness.

Ision

[Ision]

KAI between Persia and Germany?........... my money is on Persia...and i will give you the 61/2 point spread........lol


Ision

[Kuciwalker]

Hasn't it been said that Agricultural is one of the strongest traits? Care to explain your reasoning in putting it at dead last?

[Ision]

My thread is about the AIs ability, not ours.

A strong human trait, does not add up to a trait the AI plays well. For example: Both expansionist and seafareing in the hands of a human can be deadly - for AI -average at best.

Agricultural is a great trait for humans, fairly wasted by AIs.

[vmxa1]

To tell you the truth, of all the games I have played (CivIII/PTW/C3C) in the last couple of years, I could not tell you what Civs did well or not compared to one another. So I can't really agrue Germany VS Persia, except to say that I have no great recollection of Persia as a KAI in any game.

[Myrddin]

The timing of the golden age is another factor that can make or break an AI civ;

It is also a 2 edged sword as several times I have seen Rome obviously expanding agressively through war in its golden age, but being brought down by a coalition of its neighbours and imploding

[Theseus]

Nice thinking.

I would take it further, and consider the synergistic effect of good land with certain of the AI civs' characteristics, e.g., rivers with COM and AGR, hills with IND, etc.

When a GOOD AI civ meets its naturally beneficial starting environment interesting things happen.

BTW, I'd add Germany to the GOOD list... I've faced off against a German KAI too many times not to be impressed.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Myrddin
The timing of the golden age is another factor that can make or break an AI civ;

It is also a 2 edged sword as several times I have seen Rome obviously expanding agressively through war in its golden age, but being brought down by a coalition of its neighbours and imploding

Yes it is often a civ that gets an early GA that takes over its nearest rival. The problem for them seems to be if they don't clear the land, they run into another good size AI and its GA comes at that time and they roll over them.

So as you say, it is good and bad for them. If they did not get an early GA they may have done worse.

[Dis]

most civs seem to go up and down. I really can't say which are great, which are bad. I haven't played enough full games to know.

And to tell you the truth, I don't pay that much attention to them. I only compare them to me. I don't compare them to each other as much.

But I agree the Carthagians uu is too expensive. so I doubt the ai will do much with them.

Koreans as the good? Their uu is crap.

I do notice certain civs seem to do good. Aztecs, Persians, greeks, french sometimes,

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

I'll throw in my ten cents at this time.

I've heard stories about the German KAI, but I've never witnessed it. I've had the Germans launch some pretty nasty invasions of my homeland, but never have I seen them build a well developed core. And never have I seen them conquer numerous AIs. Often have I seen them destroyed. They consistently seem near the bottom of the heap, although they do seem upgraded in C3C.

I also take issue with Carthage being poor/weak/not a good AI. Carthage often ends up in the lead, the world's dominant AI power, or at least a power to be reckoned with, in 50% of my epic games. Have I seen it crippled early on, or even destroyed? Yes. Have I learned that Carthage doesn't build that many NMs early on in the game, and that, with perseverence, Carthage can be taken down early? Yes. But nonetheless, time and time again, I've seen Carthage grow to mammoth size, keep up in tech, and build a variety of wonders and a sizeable army.

Carthage is, in fact, my #1 foe in Civ. This may change as I play more C3C.

The Koreans also seem to do very well for themselves, always. Not big REXers but often on top in terms of trade and tech.

I must say there's a better spread in C3C it seems. Still have yet to see a strong China, which makes me sad.