Computer Not Building Factories

I saw all that too, but assumed it was due to me playing mostly the "Normal" difficulty. Maybe they're just buying ships when they want them? A large population without having to pay much in colony upkeep probably means a healthy treasury.

Ehhh... hard to say what they AI is thinking. I play on Painful at the moment and I have come across similar issues with the computer not building factories. What's more is that the AI will put 2 or 3 capitals on the same planet. In several cases the AI has put the Manufacturing capital on Class 8 - 10 planets and still only building 1, 2, or 3 factories.

The AI appears to take 3 to 10 turns for smaller ships and sometimes over 100 turns for larger ones, yet they seem to pump out the ships really fast even though they shouldn't be able to given their low production capacity and they also lack the economy to buy that many ships at once. Heh, anyone else love how the AI gets a mob of Colony ships right away and you have no idea how it got so many so fast...

if there are enough planets the computor will do what most people are doing (well better players) which is planet specialization.
The computor is only building 2 factories cause thats all you need on a planet that is mostly being used for its ablility to reasearch/farm people for money (taxation).
this isnt rare to see and i usualy keep the planets as they are.
I bet the comp has 1/3 of its planets dedicated to military

The AI also loves the buy now, pay later thing. So yeah they buy a lot of ships too.

Take a look at the end game stats and look at the computers Total on the Interest Paid Out, or something like that, tab.

Sometimes its a huge amount. But also don't forget:

1) Initial Colony makes Manufacturing pts.
2) They use a lot of econ starbases which are *like* adding factories.
3) They adjust the sliders like every turn. So while you are sitting at say 40%, theirs are 100% which means over TWICE the output from their factories as yours. in order to get the max use out of it.
IE: Wow if i put 100% I can get 10 ships I need now in 2 turns but I I wait 2 turns and THEN go to 100% I only get 5.\
Something like that anyhow.

So if you can do just as well (having a computer brain) with a third or even a fifth less in the long run then maybe they DO know what they are doing. But then again, why do i keep beating them???

I agree that the AI should strive to have specialized high-output planets, both for production and research. I suppose that it is a difficult thing to tell the AI, but a nice goal and a good enhancement by all means.

I agree that the AI should strive to have specialized high-output planets, both for production and research. I suppose that it is a difficult thing to tell the AI, but a nice goal and a good enhancement by all means.

They do actualy.
Thats what i ment in my orginal post.
I see them computor doing it all the time.
Please dont complain about AI if your playing with them under inteligence.
The computor isnt perfect every time.

If the case is for specialization, I have never seen a computer planet dedicated to Industrial Capacity (Aside from some Dread Lords planets in the Campaign) It is always much better to build ships than to buy them, and I've gotten a number of planets that can crank out a ship a turn once they stop producing domestic improvements.

The AI is pathetically easy on 'Painful' and below, because they do not make factories and often mass produce ship designs without weapons. On higher difficulty I can win despite their production bonuses by tech trading, which also needs to be fixed although it's hard to say how it should be done.