I've only played the beta (haven't had time to play the full version, with what is supposed to be much enhanced AI, due to time constraints), but I can say that the AI is much better in these areas.

Some of the AIs aren't building their planets the same way that I would (for instance, I played a game where the Iconians COMPLETELY dedicated their homeworld to research and a nearby planet COMPLETELY to manufacturing), but they aren't generally making retarded decisions in planet building!

Tactically, it really varies between AIs. They certainly do carry out their wars better, and I've been ripped apart on occasion. For example, when I was relying on a pair of military starbases for my defense, those were the first things they went for. Meanwhile, the Yor were piling fleet upon fleet on my border with them. They eventually moved them all right into the heart of my starbases and proceded to declare war.

They aren't going to be able to match a human in their ship management anytime soon, but they aren't slouches, either. Apparently, the Arceans are better at their fleet management than other races, and combined with their first strike ability... well, it'll be interesting to see the results!

As for starbases, I haven't kept track. Keep in mind, though, that not all of that starbase spam is as idiotic as it looks. For instance, the AIs will use unupgraded economic starbases to increase their range (economic so as to not peeve anyone off, and unupgraded because... well, why bother?)

The AI does seem a little better. The opponents are still very docile, and I haven't had any try to attack me yet, but they are building up quicker and are making better choices on their planets. They are also building better ships and are at least putting up a fight when I attack them. If you set the opposition to "crippling" they can almost keep up with you in technology, economy, and production, although they still fall behind. I've only played 3 games with the new AI, so I'll try the next difficulty level and let you know how they react.

Lot better than the competition but...

Maso level:

Colony rush it's still pretty awful. Speed 2 colony ships and small pop colony ships.

In my last game the torians had researched industrial sector before building many factories on there worlds which meant there production was non existant.

Poor choice of what to research is a big problem imo.

I always choose drengin and korath in my games there the most aggressive AI's they at least give the illusion of a potential threat.

What techs they research is partially determined by what value each tech is given in the xml file(s), so don't blame the AI entirely, its just doing what it's been told to do.

AI is OK in my books but still I do not find it to be light years ahead of GC2, then again I havent played many DA games yet.

In the first release I noticed that AI did not create any trading routes. There was update the very next day and in my current game the AI trades more actively. Bug solved I guess or just a quirk.

Second nasty thing I noticed was that AI can destroy your mining bases without declaring war. In my last game I gave AI couple ships and he just rushed them through my asteroid fields destroying everything in their path I did send a bug report to SD about this one.

I did get my ass handed to me in my last game, difficulty was set on painful, the nasty Pirates Mega Event did ofcourse do its part on my empires downfall. So some improvement is definetly there, I just cannot put my finger on what it is. Better planetary management is one for sure. I still find the Colony Rush stage annoying, there really should be more serious maintanance cost for colonies in my mind, making it absolutely idiotic to expand too quickly.

AI seems a lot better but one of the weakness which was in GC2 is still here.At the beginning AI doesn't build any military it is too focused on expansion.AI also doesn't know how to defend from Spore Ships so if you play as Korath it's a cakewalk

I agree that it's hard to develop a good AI for a game like GC2. I don't quite agree about the lack of resources though. GC2 has had a *lot* of development time for the AI because the guy who does the AI is also the guy who controls the purse strings. He also has a lot of experience working on the AI for these sorts of game which I think is more valuable for this than Expert Systems or having a graduate-level CS degree (and I have one).

In comparison to most strategy games, I don't think Stardock is under-resourced in the AI department. In comparison to the difficulty of the problem, that may be true.

Really, the AI is pretty good on the economics and not too bad at the land-grab. Overall, the diplomacy is decent. Where I find the AI to be most disappointing is the prosecution of wars. Basically in moving it's fleets it seems to get out-manuevered and I've never seen it attack in the kind of coordinated operation that people use.

I think a lot of this comes down to Sensors. The AI can seem sort of sneaky if you don't have Eyes of Universe or a good sensor network. With good sensor coverage, they just seem to flounder (as they don't have good sensor coverage themselves). The AI would probably appear tougher if battle fleets were accompanied by fast cargo hulls loaded with sensors. The sensor hulls would start each turn on the same square as a combat fleet, use about half it's movement to move around and eat up obscured space. Then the main fleets move, based on what the sensor has uncovered. Then the sensor ship tries to end its turn on a strong combat fleet square or maximally distant from detected enemy combatants or unexplored space.

You know, I think I'll quit building Eyes of the Universe in my games, just to make fleet manuevers more interesting.

I disagree with this reasoning. You can't have the same guy doing management and also the AI, and expect either to get a good degree of attention.

Not at Intelligent.

That's exactly what happened to me yesterday. I thought I had a research win in the bag but the Drengin and Yor got together and my game was over very quickly.

My allies are winning with me, on the way to a diplomatic victory!

I probably could have won that game if it weren't for a midgame event. I was practically best friends with the Alterians until a disgruntled worker killed their leader and they flipped out and blamed me. They apologized but it was too late, we were both drained from the war.

I've had some nasty military strategies pulled on me. For example, the Yor marching dozens of incredibly advanced fleets right into the middle of my defensive starbases prior to declaring war.

It would be excellent, however, if they would coordinate their fleets better. Moving multiple fleets close to each other is a good way to concentrate force, the aforementioned cargo-hulled scout is an excellent investment in any situation, and careful positioning of transports can allow for some brutally efficient attack patterns. For instance: place the transports as far away from the target planet as possible while still keeping them close enough to invade. Send in attack ships. The moment the planet is undefended, it goes down. Also, if the prerequisite techs are had, and enough constructors, building a military starbase near the next few targets is an awesome, if rarely applicable, way of unevening the odds.

In general, it would be nice to see the AI have a few unconventional tricks, just like players do. They really are a bit boring and generic in their fleet management.

One really cheap way to increase their effectiveness is to change how they're moving their ships. It appears that they have a turn delay before their ships will move, as if they're setting a waypoint instead of giving it a move order. Force all of the AI's ships to use up all available moves if they haven't reached their destination, and they'll be much more responsive.