Not cheating, huh?

from GalCiv2 Forums
The AI doesn't cheat eh? Then explain this please.

I went on in this post about how the Dread Lord AI becomes psychotically obsessed with starbases, to the point that they redeploy every single warship they have in the galaxy towards that base. https://forums.galciv2.com/?ForumID=162&AID=111194

Now.... I was playing a new game tonight, Dread Lords on parade. I had only Earth and Mars and my economy was in the crapper, so I had no choice but to build a starbase for the trade revenue modules.

Early in the game, four sectors away, the Dread Lords had popped my survey vessel and the sensor bug was in effect right there. The one where you keep sensor coverage of an area where one of your units was lost. In the middle of that area a Dread Lord fleet had been sitting for like the last 50 turns, just doing nothing.

By this point, they had been leaving me alone for most of the game. I was off in a corner by myself and they were busy with everybody else. The instant I built that new starbase, an armada of Dread Lord fleets showed up. The fleet sitting in that sensor coverage area moved towards me right after I clicked the TURN button.

There were no Dread Lord ships within three sectors of that base. I had scouts forming a picket line out to the limit of their range. There is no possibility that they detected that base on any sensors. There is no possibility that they could have known the new base was there.

So the AI doesn't cheat. Then please give a rational explanation for how they knew I had built a new starbase. I will sit patiently for the answer.
16,118 views 24 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Dammit. Fix the edit function.

Four sectors away was where they killed the survey ship, not two.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Perhaps the AI saw your economy jump and thought to investigate?

No, seriously though, the AI does have some intuition rutines. Perhaps it just got lucky.
Multiplicity - Control multiple PCs using one keyboard and mouse
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
It's not really a cheat, more of a bug. Since it's campaign I guess the AI is allowed some cheats/bonuses that are not normally in 'skirmish' mode? Maybe?

Anyways sounds like something is wrong with the dread lord AI target_nearest_starbase function, like it targets the nearest enemy starbase regardless of it has seen it...or something like that.

I've seen enough weirdness like this to have given up on the campaign, very strange gameplay in the campaign.
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I remember reading somewehere in the dev journals that there was a problem with the found tags not loading right sometimes. Did you save/reload at any point before this?
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I think the AI knows all the resouces as does your servey vessel. Frogboy was not sure about it as the code was taken from GC1.

Did you put the starbase on a resource or was it on an empty space?

If the AI can see the resources, maybe they can also see when it is mined by a constructor.
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
What difficulty where you playing at? If it was the highest level, then they saw it because at the highest level the AI see all.

Otherwise my guess would be espionage. They saw your income for the planet rise and decided you where now a threat.
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sounds like a bug, not a cheat. I was expecting another post to the effect of "OMG I got pwned!!!11 AI is teh cheetz0ring". While your attitude sucks (and attacking the honesty of Stardock is completely unjustified), at least you're not one of those idiots.
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
@Empyrean - I do not understand how you came to think that the OP's attitude "sucks" or that he has "attacked the honesty of Stardock" I read his post and found it to be well constructed, with actual examples that illustrate the posters concerns, and would like to read an explanation as to how the events unfolded the way that they did, which might be reflective of the difficulty level the game was played at. - as mentioned.

Still at least you are not one of those fanboys Empyrean that seem to see it as a vocation to attack anyone who is even suggestively critical of Stardock, now that would be wrong wouldn't it..?
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
The AI doesn't cheat eh? Then explain this please.

Simple : a bug.
A cheat is something intentionnal, planned and programmed that way. A bug is a behavior that wasn't planned and go against the intent of the programmers.

For reminder: when Stardock says that the AI doesn't cheat, it means that they haven't programmed the AI to have godly abilities. But they acknowledge the fact that there may be some unspotted bugs that give the AI godly abilities.
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
I do not understand how you came to think that the OP's attitude "sucks" or that he has "attacked the honesty of Stardock"

Well, he is telling that the AI is cheating while Stardock always says that the AI doesn't cheat.
Reply #11 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
well thats what his eyes tell him.. Now IMO its up to SD to say if its a bug or cheating.
Reply #12 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Was it a mining starbase? If it was then espionage would let them know the second you built it.

Seeing as you can't set the AI levels in the campaign, only the overall difficulty, then there's no reason the Dread Lords couldn't be cheating since they are a very special enemy. Stardock haven't said the AI doesn't cheat, they've said it doesn't cheat until Gifted and that on lower levels there are ZERO cheats, not even a "no fog of war" cheat, which is so common in AI.
Reply #13 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
If SD would come out each time someone says something about them on this planet, they'd need to put a part of their team just for that. And guess what? This is exactly the team which is in formation right now.
Reply #14 from Stardock Forums Top
well thats what his eyes tell him.. Now IMO its up to SD to say if its a bug or cheating.

Well, he saw a strange behavior, labelled it as cheating and posted in the general forum. I find it strange that the first thing people are thinking is : "AI cheats" and not "AI displays strange behavior" or "bug spotted, uncanny Dreadlords abilities". In any case, a software has always bug. Why considers the problem to be the result of a cheat instead of a bug?

The OP makes me feel as he is trying to prove that Stardock is lying. Sure, one must not disrespect things that people experience. But one must not also forget that Stardock developpers feel that they have done their jobs honestly. Why post aggressive threads implying that Stardock is lying? How would you react if you stated continously one thing and still have people coming and posting things in way that implies your are lying?

I don't understand why it is so hard to post things in a constructive way. And telling that the AI cheats isn't a very constructive way to introduce findings about a strange behavior.
Reply #15 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I haven't encountered the Dread Lords in the campaign yet (I just started that mission.)

Is it possible that they have very long range sensors in addition to their other souped up abilities?
Reply #16 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Is it possible that they have very long range sensors in addition to their other souped up abilities?


They do. They start he game with every technology other than logistics. (Makes them easier to defeat if you can gang up on them, since they can't build fleets until they research logistics.)
Reply #17 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

We never say the AI never cheats. We simply say that the AI at "intelligent" isn't cheating.

But come on, we're talking about the Dread Lords here.  They have EVERY TECH. They start out with every tech. Why? They're the Dread Lords. Do you know what their sensor range is? Basically the entire screen at that point.

The Dread Lords are so nerfed.  Do you really think a player could beat another player who starts out with all the techs? Dread Lord ships are artificially limited in how many weapons they're allowed to put on their ships. They're artificially limited in how many units they can put together into a fleet.  They're limited in how many engines they can put onto a ship.  In other words, the Dread Lords are a very artificial "AI" that is played by its own unique set of rules in order to make the game playable.

From the Dread Lords point of view, it's the player who's cheating.

But fine, from now on, anyone who wants to say the game is "cheating" fine. It's cheating. You lost because the game's not fair. It cheats. It's doing some dastardly thing that you can't do. 

Sheesh, here we're talking about a race that can kill 5 billion soldiers with 2 guys and no one makes a stink about that but that the Dread Lords can see what's going on 3 sectors away and that -- THAT is an issue?

Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

owned
Reply #19 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Oh, more than owned. I'd say this merits the full "P\/\/Nz0|23|)!" tag.

You go, Brad.
Reply #20 from Stardock Forums Top

Oh, more than owned. I'd say this merits the full "P\/\/Nz0|23|)!" tag.


Okay..I don't speak leet..what does that say???
Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sorry. I really shouldn't pretend to be 'leet.
The characters "\/\/" mean "W".
The characters "|2" mean "R".
The characters "|)" mean "D".

So "P\/\/Nz0|23|)!" means "PWNZORED!"

The suffix "or" or "zor" or "xor" is applied at random to denote... something. I'm not entirely clear on what.
The initial letter "o" in "ownzored" is sometimes replaced with the next letter in the alphabet to denote a high degree of ownzoredness, hence, "pwnzored".

This lesson in leet speak brought to you by someone who is not leet.
Reply #22 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I didn't say it was cheating. All the devs say it's not cheating and are so proud of it, so I'll believe it. I wanted to know how an enemy did something that doesn't seem possible. What's the explanation for the behavior?

Sensor coverage has a hard limit of 15 squares. The enemy was well beyond that range, yet they instantly knew that a new target was there. In the very next turn, they started moving towards it.

I'm sorry it's made Frogboy indignant, especially since he posted that instead of answering the question. Is it a bug? Then consider this a bug report. Does the Dread Lord AI have galactic sensors that ignore the rules I play by? If so, say so. I can quit trying to sneak up on them - and why do they need to scout in the beginning if they do?

To clear up some of the questions...

It wasn't a campaign mission. It was "New Game" > "Dread Lords On Parade" setting. I haven't started on the campaign missions yet.

It was at "Normal" difficulty, which causes the Dread Lords to become insanely obsessed with starbases. It seems not to do that at the "Tough" setting, but I usually can't play that level. You can see this for yourself by starting that scenario, cheating to get all the techs so you can fight them off, turn off the fog and then build a base. Every DL warship in the galaxy instantly redeploys.

I understand it's playing with a small mental handicap below the "Tough" setting, but that still seems like an exploitable bug. Just build bases out in the middle of nowhere and set up an ambush.

It was an economy starbase with nothing but the trade modules, not a mining base.

I wasn't pwn3d and mad about it and want to gripe. I won that game, mainly because they kept letting themselves get ambushed while heading for that base.

Again, I'm not saying it is cheating. I'm saying it's doing something that seems to be impossible and want to know what's going on. A big part of my strategy against them is to build up my sensor and engine techs so I can sneak up on them. If they don't have to obey their own sensor range limits, then obviously I'm going with the wrong tactics.
Reply #23 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sensor range doesn't have a hard limit of 15... if you built Eyes of the Universe, and pack your ships with a ton of sensors, you will still be able to "SENSE" things, that is, they will appear on the minimap and you will see permanent objects like Starbases in the FOW way beyond the 15 parsec that you have clear vision of. The 15 parsec is just a live update range, used for ships, and stuff that move around. This is put into place really only because it started causing performance problems for some people.

If you don't believe me, try it out for yourself. Build Eyes of the Universe and check the minimap. Hell, sometimes I see fleets in it from way across a large galaxy. Starbases? that's even easier, they'll always be there. So if I wanted to blow up your starbases, I could do it too.
Reply #24 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
@Mikeswi
He did answer your question - He told you the Dread Lords can see everything.

He should know.

He coded the AI.

He wrote the game.

He owns the company.

He is the Big Cheese.

He is THE MAN at Stardock.

Frogboy is Brad Wardell.