AI Starbases

I've seen the same thing time and time again in games i've played... normally i see two defensive modules and one or two mining/production on AI starbases. I don't mind that much that they don't use them effectively, but if they did I would get sweet starbases in the deals I make... I really like starbases LOL

~SDC~

At what A.I. difficuly level? Anything less than 'intelligent' is considered a crippled A.I.

Lifewish: I'm in the middle of a maso game right now and I can easily see at least five unimproved AI starbases that have been that way for years.

Some of these can be justified for scouting purposes, but some of them cannot.

It sounds like you are playing at sub-normal difficulty level or at least that is what I recollect the AI doing with starbases at that level. I think they put 3 or defensive modules and multiple improvements at "normal' level.

As the difficulty rises, the AI usage of starbases gets smarter and more comprehensive.

Umh. At fool the AI seems to put no defensive modules and no improvements at all. (Entirely appropriate for the level though).

It looks like intelligent is the magic level for really wanting to utilize starbase modules. I see a lot of fairly useless pure defense bases at lower levels, but at intelligent, a resource base will get decked out in time.

The interesting thing is: why do they need two or more bases in a sector when the bases are likely going to be underutilized? Having two relatively defenseless bases in a sector is worse than having one well defended base I would think. Especially when dreads start coming around. I totally see the purpose in the AI wanting a base presence in one of your sectors, I just don't see where three bases, all practically useless, are required.

The AI certainly can use Starbases effectively. In one of my last games at Crippling there was an Influence resource in one of my sectors which the Arceans beat me to. They built that Starbase up to the max - all Mil improvements & mining stuff - the column of 12+ Constructors streaming through my sectors was surprising to see ....
Admittedly they did then sell it to me for a very good price ....

The doom of the AI: you can make them an offer they can't refuse

On intelligent and above the computer knows how to use resource starbases pretty well. On all levels the AI has no idea how to use non-resource starbases.

I was saying this 2 months ago. None of the developers felt that it was a big deal I guess. The computer also does a very poor job of defending star bases. This works greatly to my advantage since I generally will park a constructor next to every resource in the game. Eventually the computer will lose it and the resource will be mine.

I've played a lot of games and I've never seen the computer try to pull of a starbase culture rush either. As this is one of my favorite ways to win (no messy wars to deal with), it would seem that the computer should be better at it..

Oh well, as I said, the developers must know about this since people have talked about it before. I just don't think they believe it to be important.

Thanks for all the info. I had the AI's on Bright this game (I'm bumping up the difficulty each time). The next game it'll be Intelligent so I'll see if that does make a difference.

Update: The last game was all intelligent AIs and they seemed to do a little bit better with starbase management. Still not great, but I didn't see sectors completly covered with weak ones. I'll try again and see what happens since this particular game went a little fast.

Interesting . . . I have a query, do our alien friends build Terror Stars? I haven't seen them do that yet, although I haven't survived long enough on levels past intellegent to find out . . .

I have never seen any, Cotal but I do recall Staffa mentioning that he has seen one. Many others reported seeing them in construction.

Personally, I havn't seen one, but most of the time I've had them banned.

Thanks, its good to hear they're not very commonly built by the AI (sigh of relief) . . .

Another update: I decided to play a game through to Beyond Human victory to see how the AI would build up its starbases on the higher level (Genius). Looks like the same thing came up. The 2 sectors that had AI planets had over a dozen starbases in them with only 1 or two with modules. It appears that the AI needs tweaked a bit when it comes to starbase building.

it seems the devs tend to avoid any tactics that allow the ai to cripple you in only a few turns. probably a good idea. it would be greatly annoying if the ai saved up constructors and pulled the 50 culture bombs trick while you were going for an alliance or tech victory and couldn't counter in time. i remeber they said that the ai at first used antimatter missiles too efficiently and used them to smash the player in one turn.

I would have loved to see the too efficient AMM bit on maybe masochistic level. Now, the AI is at the other extreme of using AMMs too inefficiently.

Is there a good middle ground we can introduce into the game?

I'd much rather have that than insane production bonuses on maso.

Makes you wonder why they decided to go for massive AI bonuses on Maso when they could teach the AI to do such neat things, LDiCesare.

That's true. I think at least the AI could be limited to a certain amount of modules per difficulty level (like unlimited for maso). Right now, the AI isn't making much sense making many many starbases without modules.

On the other hand, it is still a pretty good AI.