I noticed this too. Except a couple of planets, most planets I invade mid-game only have half of their improvements built (while I've already terraformed and used all the space i had). They also tend to build improvements on random spaces, instead of using the +100/300% tiles effectively. I once stumbled on a planet that had an embassy on a +300% manufacturing tile, and a factory on a +100% influence tile...

This makes perfect sense! The AI is manufacturing influence (i.e. political lobby groups) and influencing manufacturers (i.e. unionized labor). Proof positive of the AI's incredible sophistication!

*snicker*

Anyway the AI does this very frequently. Planet managment is not the AI's strongest ability.

ive seen factories on influence spots and i play on tough (not that tough is anything crazy)

I wonder if the AI is based on option evaluation levels with purpose-influencers. I think if done this way it would produce a better-optimized planet.

E.g.: There would be a standard evaluation level for each class of building (manufacturing, research, influence, et. al.) which would have modifiers applied base on what already existed on the planet, how close it was to the edge of the race's incluence boundary, how close it was to an enemy or a race of opposite alignment, what specialization had been assigned to the planet, and so on. The points would be summed and a "roll" from 1 to the sum would decide what would be placed. If a free special was available, and the building rolled for was of that type, it would go there.

This is vastly oversimplified, but of all the AI types I've worked with it seems the best for this kind of decision making, where many fast evaluations must be made in a short time.

Does it work this way devs? Or have you found something better?

I agree that the AI seems to undervalue factories, e.g. I've never seen a planet with very high manufacturing output like the player would do it: A couple of factories, using special tiles if possible, the manufacturing capital and maximized economic starbases for production bonuses. Such a planet can build almost any ship in one turn, the AI doesn't seem to take advantage of that.

I dunno, on crippling the AI did a pretty good job here in 1.2 the Drengi managed to field (in two seperate games now) exactly the same tile builds I had.

As I said in another post, no matter what thats just plain freaking scary.

W/R
Suralle Straykat
Kat Lord @ Large

Wihtout someone mentioning WHICH player is doing this it's relatively useless info.

Each player has its own colony management AI.

I second the "everyone does it!" remark. It just doesn't seem to matter who it is, they all mismanage.

I do however have a suspicion that some races do it more often than others (the Arceans for example).