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rezaf

Join Date 03/2006

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How does the AI manage to skyrocket it's research so fast?

I'm still pretty new to the game, so please bear with me.
But how the heck does the AI manage to get so far ahead in tech so quickly?
In my last game, I encountered the first AI player when I had just finished my 2nd colony ship (3rd if you count the starting one), and I had built nothing in between. Had built a factory, 2 research labs, another factory and then two other structures on the homeworld in this time.
The AI player had about fifteen techs I didn't have, including Lasers IV and one other "far out" tech, and I didn't have ANYTHING to trade.
None of my colonies did even finish it's first building by then.
So, how does the AI do that? I remember reading they do not cheat, so .... how?
Thanks in advance
_____
rezaf

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Well the buildings can be bought. I usually buy my first 2 factories which really helps kick off social production. Also, races start with (and research) different techs. The more militaristic ones will start right up the laser or missile chain before anything else. I'm not sure how many turns had gone by that point as 15 techs seem a few too many, but the lowest level of many of the techs are only a few turns to discover.

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My problem is that the AI gets way ahead in many techs but never seems to research larger hulls. They stop at heavy fighters or frigates with awesome weapons but never go larger. As a result I send in big ships with tons of weaker weapons but good defenses and wipe them out.

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But how the heck does the AI manage to get so far ahead in tech so quickly?
In my last game, I encountered the first AI player when I had just finished my 2nd colony ship (3rd if you count the starting one), and I had built nothing in between. Had built a factory, 2 research labs, another factory and then two other structures on the homeworld in this time.

Are you building your initial colony ships instead of buying them? If so, you could be giving the rival civs an advantage in that you're allowing them to colonize faster. (The AI tends to simply buy it's ships/techs/improvements if it can afford them.) If you're not colonizing at all within the first few turns, your rival civs may gain a considerable lead with regard to its population growth. The more population you have, the more citizens you have to tax. The more money you have from taxing, the more money you have for research. Hence, the more techs you have.

Also, make sure you trade techs with other civs in the early-game. This will keep you up to speed in the research race--even make you pull ahead in some cases--so that when the mid-to-late game arrives, you won't be at a disadvantage .. usually.

Also make sure that your colonies are constantly growing. Keep your farming techs upgraded so that your population has room to grow on the planets that can support the additional people.

Lastly, some races have inherent population growth bonuses. This gives them a slight advantage when it comes to influence and gaining money from taxing.

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Along the lines of the original posters question, how do they get planetary invasion so fast?? They seem to have it about 20 turns into the game. While when I try to rush to that tech (tech slider 100%, full spending, etc) when it finally becomes available its 80+ turns to research it. Another friend of mine who got the game before me noticed the same thing and neither of us can figure out how they do it. Whats worse the AI NEVER trades it so I have to research it at some point if I want to fight a war where I dont have to give peace to the other race or have them surrender to someone else.

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Along the lines of the original posters question, how do they get planetary invasion so fast?? They seem to have it about 20 turns into the game. While when I try to rush to that tech (tech slider 100%, full spending, etc) when it finally becomes available its 80+ turns to research it. Another friend of mine who got the game before me noticed the same thing and neither of us can figure out how they do it. Whats worse the AI NEVER trades it so I have to research it at some point if I want to fight a war where I dont have to give peace to the other race or have them surrender to someone else.

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The AI in all liklihood is probably NOT out researching you that badly, but they are out TRADE-ing you. The AI opponents prolifically trade amonst themselves, so in some sense, youre competing in research against all of them.

You too, however, can choose to trade tech prolifically. Diplomacy is a viable option in this game, and some might say mandatory.

However, the AI traditionally eshews reseacrhing some very powerful techs that take a bit of commitment to discover, but pay out huge bonuses over time. Researching improved forms of governemt, Xeno ethics (which allow you to choose an alignment and get the big bonuses associated), and larger ship hulls can set you back temporarily in overall techs knows, but pay off bigtime when you have them far before the AI would be willing to research them. In fact, the AI would be very interested in trading for any of these techs, should you learn them.

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The AI in all liklihood is probably NOT out researching you that badly, but they are out TRADE-ing you. The AI opponents prolifically trade amonst themselves, so in some sense, youre competing in research against all of them.

You too, however, can choose to trade tech prolifically. Diplomacy is a viable option in this game, and some might say mandatory.

However, the AI traditionally eshews reseacrhing some very powerful techs that take a bit of commitment to discover, but pay out huge bonuses over time. Researching improved forms of governemt, Xeno ethics (which allow you to choose an alignment and get the big bonuses associated), and larger ship hulls can set you back temporarily in overall techs known, but pay off bigtime when you have them far before the AI would be willing to research them. In fact, the AI would be very interested in trading for any of these techs, should you learn them.

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oops, sorry for double post. I got a time out error and thought it didnt send. Now I look bad

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While when I try to rush to that tech (tech slider 100%, full spending, etc) when it finally becomes available its 80+ turns to research it.

How many research labs have you? Are they research labs or xeno labs? It could also possible that the AI got some nice research tiles

Do you know their research bonus? Have they rings around their planets?

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The AI in all liklihood is probably NOT out researching you that badly, but they are out TRADE-ing you. The AI opponents prolifically trade amonst themselves, so in some sense, youre competing in research against all of them.

You too, however, can choose to trade tech prolifically. Diplomacy is a viable option in this game, and some might say mandatory.

Bingjack, I don't want to contradict you here, but can you give us some details on what level of diplomacy you're at that other races will trade weapons/defense techs with you? I've played several games -- some I'm in the lead overall and some I'm pretty far behind, but I have NEVER seen a race -- major or minor -- that is wiiling to trade an offensive tech. Last night I just finished up a game on which I was WAY ahead in the technology race. I had some 30+ more techs than the next closest race. Anyway, even if I offered every one of the additional techs I had that the other races didn't, none of them were willing to trade an offensive tech (even though I was offering not only defensive techs that counter it, but also more powerful offensive techs). I even offered quite a bit of cash and all of my trade goods. Regardless, the answer was always "My defense advisors say no...". I was way up there in the diplomacy tree, too (far above the next closest race, anyway).

Maybe in higher difficulty levels, the races are willing to trade offensive techs. Is that it?

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they usually say the same thing to me , but on occasion I have been able to trade military techs with them. hell they have even suggested the trades themselves. it might have to do with alignment, as they have only traded with me when I was playing good^2.
then again, I wouldnt easily trade techs such as planetary invasion with anyone, AI or otherwise

unless I had some proper defenses in place on all my planets so that might have to do with it...

DS

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I've noticed I tend to get more military trade offers when I'm good. Silly people, they think me being good won't keep me from attacking them? Being good, it's my DUTY to bring the other races under my rule. Anything else would be unfair to all those people suffering under the yoke of a neutral power...

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I usually build a scout first while exploring with the flagship. Once the flagship discovers a valuable planet, I immediately send my starting colony ship there and (the scout is usually finished by then and I have started building a second colony ship) I rush the colony ship and start a third one. I repeat that until I run out of planets worth colonizing and once that happens I switch to constructors.

I'll try to adjust the starting money so it allows rushing a single item, and no more. Maybe that'll force the AI to invest in economy to SOME degree, cause I usually fall behind hopelessly in tech, but even with my worse buildings and stuff, I tend to get FAR ahead in all other respects.

Initially I was under the impression the AI just build lots and lots and lots of research buildings, but in my last game I had my first major war and invaded some enemy planets, which turned out to have a pretty balanced set of buildings on them.

Until I'm PROVEN otherwise, I'll just assume the AI cheats.

Edit: Btw, I was offered offensive tech by the AI on some occasions (also playing good), though said occasions were rare.
_____
rezaf

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Once you discover a race use your STATS page of the race you have found and click on the MISC tab, this will tell you what they are researching and how long to complete it. It will also tell you how many research points they are using. I've found this very useful for trading with the AI, when they are 1 or 2 turns away from completion and I have the tech I will trade with them for something (usually influence points, but, in the early game credits).

Also, when a race or yourself wants to tech up faster put all your planets focusing on research and move your research slider to 98% on the research bar (this is what I do when I'm racing for something I don't want the AI to get). My 2nd or 3rd planet is completely a research center usually one with at least one research special square in it if I can get it. I tend to focus a single planet on a single type of thing I want. Like my 2nd planet is usually my income planet, nothing but, income bearing projects with at least (2-3) factories, once again hoping one of the factory squares is a special. Both of these main special planets are a must to be 9+ level planets, I'll bypass low class planets when early colonizing to find those huge ones first.

But, Lazer V in 20 turns?? Nah I find that very unusual, I'm not sure what setting you are playing on, but, the only thing that would give them Laser V in 20 turns would be an anomalie. About planet invasion? I can't recall, but, when you are picking your techs at the start of the game you can go right down one line of tech and be pretty close to planet invasion from the very start. Myself I go the ion drive line, so, I can build speed 5 colony ships early.

And also you start with 5000 credits for a reason. This is for buying your first buildings and colony ships "use it". In the early game don't worry about getting combat ships out, so BUILD factories and BUY research and income buildings and one food producing tile. Also get to 59% taxes and don't worry about approval unless it gets to 45, run that production slider to 100% as soon as possible as well while still keeping at least 1bc income. Run your military slider up high in the beginning as well once you've spent all your credits and keep churning out those colony ships. Building scouting ships is a waste. And don't build long distance colony ships first, having a long distance ability and a slow moving colony ship will just put you that much futher behind the AI. Use the colonize to expand method, try to get large planets first, but, colonize anything to continue to go futher into other sectors as well. A 1.7 to 1.9 sct distance colony ship early is decent. That's why it's a good idea to research life support early as well.

Once again though that STATS page on the races is very helpful throughout the game, in fact I think it's a little bit of cheating by the player since it does give so much information at no cost to espionage. It will tell you how many ships they have, how many colonies, what they are researching, how much income they have, how much they are spending, etc. etc. The game would be much harder if everything on that page required espionage to find out.

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Bingjack, I don't want to contradict you here, but can you give us some details on what level of diplomacy you're at that other races will trade weapons/defense techs with you? I've played several games -- some I'm in the lead overall and some I'm pretty far behind, but I have NEVER seen a race -- major or minor -- that is wiiling to trade an offensive tech. Last night I just finished up a game on which I was WAY ahead in the technology race. I had some 30+ more techs than the next closest race. Anyway, even if I offered every one of the additional techs I had that the other races didn't, none of them were willing to trade an offensive tech (even though I was offering not only defensive techs that counter it, but also more powerful offensive techs). I even offered quite a bit of cash and all of my trade goods. Regardless, the answer was always "My defense advisors say no...". I was way up there in the diplomacy tree, too (far above the next closest race, anyway).

Maybe in higher difficulty levels, the races are willing to trade offensive techs. Is that it?

MY point was that they AIs are trading techs prolifically with Each other. Since the last patch Brad has said he tweaked it so they are much more discerning about trading military techs, but they trade general techs like crazy. It can seem that theyre outresearching you, when really, theyre just researching primarily military, and sharing all the non military techs.

My point was, that you too could do the same thing...focus on military tech, and pick up the non military ones via trade or purchase.

My advice though, it to concentrate on the big techs that pay out incalcuable bonuses over time, and that the AI tends to ignore, or try to buy from you ( like republic, democracy ,federation, xeno ethics, larger hulls, minaturization). This will set you slightly "behind" in the beginning, but youll end up with a juggernaut of an infrastructure with which to push the AI around later on.

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I've played several games -- some I'm in the lead overall and some I'm pretty far behind, but I have NEVER seen a race -- major or minor -- that is wiiling to trade an offensive tech.

If you have the most powerful military, then the other races are not willing to trade military techs with you.

I have never had the problem of being behind technically from the other civs yet, so I am not sure what the complaints of cheating are. But then, I had been playing Gal Civ 1 for years before this game, so I am probably doing things to keep up that I can't think of right now.

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There are ways of getting the AI to trade offensive techs with you. You have to be an ALLY or TEAM for them to consider trading offensive with you, but they will trade them with you. The races that have the same alignment with you have a much better chance of trading with you. You can and should find races to trade offensive weapons. Its also easy to see if they will trade offensive when you ask for ( lets say a laser ) and select 1 dollar without putting it on the table. If the text becomes green at 1 dollar then you know that they wont trade with you, because when you put this money (that turned green at 1 dollar )on the table it will turn back to red again. I dont know if this will help anyone, but I thought this might help.

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What gets me is that when a new race comes into existance halfway through the game and I try to trade with them they already have all the techs I have, how'd they do that???????

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In the current game I am in (huge map, all 9 civs, all on bright setting) I pushed diplomacy skills early on. I built both the diplomatic translators and the galactic showcase. I have advanced/expert diplomacy (forget which is higher.) Not only will the AI trade offensive techs with me, but I can get trades where I am getting 3-4 of their techs for 1 of mine. The diplomacy in this game is huge. It was probably 70 turns into the game before I even built a military ship. If someone was getting mad at me or threatening I just hire someone else to attack. High diplomacy is such an advantage, I almost feel like I am cheating.

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My point was, that you too could do the same thing...focus on military tech, and pick up the non military ones via trade or purchase.

A-ha! Excellent point... sorry I didn't get this the first time. This will come in handy as a plan of attack with reserach when I finally step up and start playing harder difficulty levels!

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They are tech trading constantly. This is a huge part of the game and you won't realize this till you lose your first game and wonder how the heck they outpaced you in tech so quickly.

Once you realize they are tech trading and you make a race with some diplomacy you can control the tech trade and profit greatly. You will have thousands of credits. I have 20,000 while everyone else has about 100 trying to keep up with paying for any new techs I have either bought off the humans or someone else and sold to everyone else before they had a chance.

So basically you have to buy any new tech that comes along and sell it to everyone else before the one who created the tech has a chance to do it themselves. You won't make that much off each sale but selling one tech for 400 a piece to each civ gets you about 3200 credits more or less per high level tech. Basically, this game is teaching you to become Microsoft.

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Some of the later techs can get expensive to buy off other races, especially the humans, which charge me about 3000 for some of the more powerful techs like phasors. So if you can't get a powerful tech it's probably because you don't have the funds to buy it, they get expensive. But like I said, if you play their game, you can easily beat them at it and have plenty of money to buy any new tech that comes along and sell it to recoup the loss in money. Pick one area of tech to keep for yourself as an advantage and never trade this area. I do this with missile tech to keep an edge. When you research mid game, only go for the techs that will give you an advantage and let everyone else research the other techs for you.

Right now in my medium galaxy, diplomatic race, my competitors are the humans. The humans are my biggest competitors since they alone have a higher diplomacy rating than me (I go for some research and military bonuses in my race) and sometimes create the tech and get a few sales if I become less diligent. They can do this because they created a pool of money in the early game with tech trading that they use now to fund their economy for research. I still have a major lead over them 20,000 to 5000.

Until this is fixed you "have" to tech trade to keep up with the tech.

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If you have the most powerful military, then the other races are not willing to trade military techs with you.

That was the assumption I was making, and I misunderstood Bingjack's point. I guess where MY question was unclear was that another race will not trade military techs with me when I'M the one to initiate the trade request (and yes, other races have offered me military techs, but they initiated the trade request).

Thanks for clarifying guys!

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If you have the most powerful military, then the other races are not willing to trade military techs with you.

That was the assumption I was working with while playing...

Anyway, I misunderstood Bingjack's point (which he clarified nicely, btw). I guess where MY question was unclear was that another race will not trade military techs with me when I'M the one to initiate the trade request (and yes, other races have offered me military techs, but they initiated the trade request).

Thanks for clarifying guys!

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Love the "double-post" after "time-out errors". Sorry all!

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I have a new tactic for the early game that helps me out-tech most of the races.

Turn off all social and military spending for the first few turns, put all your resources towards research. Set all of your colonies on research. Spend your credits on buying the buildings and colony ships. Tweak your industrialization spending so every tech takes 1-2 weeks to research. Sell some of the techs to your neighbors to keep this up as long as possible - once you cannot afford any more buildings or ships, it's time to set your spendings back to a reasonable balance.

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