Computer just give up in war

New Yorker · January 8, 2001, 23:01

Yo i been playin on impossible and i have this really bad civ. and i am in last place at everything. Than one day the most powerful, which is up against my borders attacks me w/o warning & there is full-scale. i fight a defensive war & it was fun until the computer just stopped sending in troops & i made my move. i am on my way to the capital.
My question is why do the computer do this, they were ahead in everything but it doesn't make sense, can anyone explain.

Dale · January 9, 2001, 02:47

Read about three quarters of the threads in these forums and you'll get your answer. The AI is crap at attacking, along with a few other major problems.

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Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

Matthew Hayden · January 13, 2001, 20:43

Hey, the AI hasn't been so crap for me!

I am up against two weakish civs and they are pulling some neat tactics to try and regain the ground they have lost, but they aren't producing enough to support their units, and why won't they team up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dale, don't insult the Desert Fox in that way!
He didn't get that monicker for nothing you know!!!!!!

TacticalGrace · January 16, 2001, 10:51

The AI hasn't got two things that were characteristic of the AI in civ2:
(1) GANGING UP. By mid game in Civ2 when you were leading, the computer opponents would all gang up into one big alliance, swapping technologies etc. Some people considered this to be cheating a bit. CTP2 demonstrates the result of removing that behaviour.

(2) RABID AGGRESSION. When the AI in Civ2 went to war, it really went to war. It would build units and send them mercilessly to pound your nearest city. Of course it didn't concern itself with timing so the attacks were never concentrated enough to get through and hence it would waste its efforts (except when making a sneak attack after a cease fire. this was the AI's BEST tactic in civ2). In CTP2 we see the result of trying to remove this behaviour. of course in CTP2 it is essential to make big stacks.

I think that if you leave the AI to do it's own thing it will eventually build up an army capable of attacking effectively. But as experienced players, when we wage war in CTP2 we run rings around the AI by instinctively harrassing troops on the march, sinking lone ships, and blocking supply lines. If you fail to use these tactics things can be quite different. I leant the hard way that bombarding a city with artillery will fail if you don't send some troops round the other side the city to stop reiforcements coming in. I've stood my troops down when I've reached my max city limit and tried conducting a limited war only to find that the AI WILL attack my bomber fleet with fighters - often successfully.

So, to conclude, I don't think the computer is COMPLETELY useless, it's just that we play in such a way as to cripple its otherwise promising efforts.

still miss those Russian and Mongolian hordes though...

Don't think he meant to insult Rommel. The point was more about the Australian army. They were hard bastards.

Tassadar · January 16, 2001, 11:32

Hmm,
I'm a bit jealous since I never got a bomber shot down by an AI figther, in fact, I have only seen one AI Interceptor flying around aimlessly doin' no harm in my first game. Maybe things get different when I switch to Impossible, I'm just going to start up my Gaia controller in my current Hard game.

Regards Tassadar

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"Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere" - Anonymous

Dale · January 16, 2001, 17:30

With BlueO's frenzy AI mod I've had stacks come at me with two or three fighters in them. Actually, they've been pretty balanced. 4 or 5 arty, 3 or 4 grunts, a few fighters and a spy/corporate. Got a hellova shock the first time I got attack by a stack like that. Let me just say it wasn't pretty.

No, it's not a dig at the Desert Fox. He would've easily won North Africa if his reinforcements weren't redirected to the Russian front. It's like TacticalGrace said. We're hard bastards.

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Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

TacticalGrace · January 17, 2001, 10:55

quote:

Originally posted by Tassadar on 01-16-2001 10:32 AM
>I'm a bit jealous since I never got a bomber shot down by an AI figther

well all you have to do is follow these simple steps:
* go to war with everyone
* take lots of cities but halt at a critical point because of the empire city limit
* drop down to peace-time
* get complacent 'cos hey it's only the AI
* leave your bombers precariously next to the AI cities after a bombing run

and you might get lucky and the AI will send out a fighter or two.

after it's initial success it gave up on its airforce and has now got a huge navy on what looks like an inland sea. Hmmm... if only it had used that strategy earlier when I was ferrying troops across from my home continent history would have been different.