AI "bug"

from GalCiv2 Forums
It's not a bug in the common sense, but for me nevertheless a bug.
I'm playing a game at Painful level, medium map, 6 opponents.
Atm I'm at war with the Iconian Refugee and while I have seen already some things from the AIs that make me go "umm", that was really the most extreme I had seen so far and only makes me shake my head:

So the Iconians had discovered one absolute dreamplanet: with a 700% manu bonus tile AND a 300% manu bonus tile.
Holy sh** thats quite some production power there. Right? no...The AI actually did build an Extreme stadium and a Banking center there. sure.....
That it built an Anti-Matter Powerplant on this planet without a single Factory on the planet is already harmless compared to that...



And another one, not fully in the same league as the above but still stupid nevertheless:
Their homeplanet. They build the Economic Capital AND the Tech Capital AND the Manu Capital there. I wouldn't do that, but ok. But they dont have a single other econ building there and just a single factory which truly wastes the Manu capital.



All in all this is as poor as it gets. Not sure if the AI acts also the same way at the higher levels, but imo at Painful it has all abilities available and truly shoudln't act like that.

I mean com'on....700%-manu-bonus-tile = a factory tile. The AI shouldn't even have to think about that and in all honesty I cannot imagine that this could be in any way hard to code.



6,447 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
From the lack of replies I take that this is considered "normal AI behaviour"?

But apparently it truly is, now that I watch at that kind of "oddities" more closely I've seen also the AI build morale improvements on 300% research-tiles or on another planet the AI built farms on the morale-bonus-tile and an morale-improvement-building on another tile.

If not I'd sometimes see the AI build the "correct" type of buildings on those tiles I'd say it completely ignores those bonuse-tiles. But maybe it really does and only sometimes builds it by chance in the right way.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
DA or DL? I find they're better at developing planets in DA. Also, if they think they need a building to survive in the short-term, they'll build it on a bonus even when it doesn't match. And I've build all 3 capitols on my homeworld, when playing as Thalans and knowing I wouldn't get a second planet except by conquest. Sometimes you just need those capitol bonuses as soon as you can get them!

I haven't seen anything this egregious in DA yet, though I suspect others have.
Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm not an AI expert but I am a programmer. Making an AI use bonus tiles correctly and building factories before power plants should be a rather easy task I think.

I haven't noticed any wastes bonus tiles yet, but I've seen way to many tech/manu/eco capitals on totally unsuited planets. Fixing this problem will likely increase AI strengh a fair amout.
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
DA or DL? I find they're better at developing planets in DA. Also, if they think they need a building to survive in the short-term, they'll build it on a bonus even when it doesn't match. And I've build all 3 capitols on my homeworld, when playing as Thalans and knowing I wouldn't get a second planet except by conquest. Sometimes you just need those capitol bonuses as soon as you can get them!

I haven't seen anything this egregious in DA yet, though I suspect others have.


Well, it was a DA Metaverse game.
as I wrote above, Painful level and with abundant "everything" settings on a medium galaxy map, so there was no shortage of planets or whatever.
Also, the Iconians were at the time of the war-start the civilisation with the most colonies and the "biggest share of the map" and were in all timelines doing rather well. (except on military and population: military was at this time dominated by the drengin and population by me).
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
The AI is supposed to take advantage of bonus tiles in all cases except where it really doesn't make sense to do so (food bonus on crappy planet, for example), AFAIK. But of course with something where it gets to make the choices, it can always do something stupid that it wasn't intended to (this is something Frogboy is always working on improving)
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Time to bump this.

In my most current finished game (ToA, Obscene difficulty) I foud the Torians to hold the 700% research tile....with a bank on it.
The only especially odd thing was that they had crammed their planets with research buildings....but right on the 700%-research-tile they had built something else?

Even if they had seen the necessity to not build a research building on it when they got the planet (financial strain or something)...there was some event which incrased tax-income massively. So every player had tons of cash at a point. Latest by then, they should have switched it to a research building I think.

I can provide Screenshots if necessary, but there wouldn't be much to see beside a planet which has a bank on the 700%-research-tile ;P

The AAR of the game