AI "Tech Whoring"

[Arrian]

Cato,

There is a brief (several turns) surge of happiness if you are attacked (and you're a republic or democracy... I don't think this applies to the other governments, but I could be wrong). It is, like I said, brief.

War weariness is harsher if you are the aggressor, and it's worse if your units are operating in enemy territory (in other words, it's not just a defensive war). Unfortunately, you need to go on the offensive to force the enemy to give up, so that's a catch22. That's why I've taken to being a mean-as-hell ancient warmonger (no war weariness under despotism or monarchy). If anyone messes with me later on, I can crush them quickly.

The best way to force the enemy to peace is to quickly capture a few of their cities. If you have fought them before, though, they may fight to the bitter end. It does suck when that happens, because they can wreak havoc on your empire while losing the war.

-Arrian

[dawidge]

Originally posted by Cato
Your population gets gung-ho when the AI declares war on you? I have not experienced this.

TFM p.116 and p.125 "Having a rival declare war on you actually decreases war weariness, perhaps because it relieves the prewar uncertainty and tension."

This effect will eventually be oversome by the other factors that influence war weariness (being at war for a long time, engaging in combat, enemy troops in your territory, etc.). I've found that some civs actually get happier when you win battles, but that may be because I've ousted troops from my territory, or captured an enemy city where I had a lot of troops stationed nearby, alleviating those factors).

I don't know if it is factored in for cities previously captured from the rival civ.

[planetfall]

Soren
Thank you for finally a rational explanation of the mechanics behind tech trading. It is nice to know the AI is not always cheating but why techs are traded more rapidly as difficulty level increases.

war weariness
Has anyone dared to play a defensive position? Defending current territory, and recapturing any lost cities, but not entering AI territory. Will the AI eventually give up and sue for peace? I am still playing at a lower level than you guys, but sometimes it is fun to have a wide spread empire, and all focus in resources and production capability with just a limited number of actual military units. Advantage is the AI gets easily suckered into attacking and I have less war weariness. Disadvantage is it usually takes about 5 turns to slow AI advance, about 10 to stop AI advance, about 15 to begin regaining land, and about 20 before ready to return the invasion factor. I had thought WW just naturally starts occurring about turn 20, but it also could be because that is when I start moving from defensive mode to offensive. I have not tried staying defensive after 20 turns and seeing what effect WW would have on the attacking AI civ. Would that strategy have any value, or would it expose me to too many liabilities?

[chiefpaco]

Originally posted by Soren Johnson FiraxisThere is an AI function which estimates how much each tech is worth to each player. So Civ A calculates how much the tech is worth to Civ B. (The exact same function is used on the Diplomacy Window when you ask a civ how much they would need to trade you a tech...)

I hope I undertand more about it now. If I read between the lines here, I get the impression that the buyer does not pay the value of the tech, but pays only how much it is worth to itself.

The main factors on an AI tech deal (there are others, like techs becoming useless, but...):
- Tech cost * Tech rate for world.
- "Allowed to bend" by a factor of the AI-AI tech rate percentage.
- Multiplied by the value to the civ. Here, I am not so clear. Research costs are also affected by difficulty. I am assuming the AI's reduced research cost is used in the calculation to the value of the tech. So, on Emporer, the value to an AI civ is 80%. On Warlord, the value to an AI civ would be 120%.
- Multiplied by tech devaluation of known civs that have it.
- Minus a factor of how many beakers a civ has put into a tech already (i.e. techs are cheaper after researching them some already).

Example: AI1 selling a tech to AI2 who hasn't invested any beakers into the tech yet on Emporer. The buyer gets an 80% discount because of their research bonus.

Minimum price the seller will go, if the buyer has only some of the money, is less because of the rate %. At emporer, the value is 150%, which results in a further discount of 66% (1/1.5). Minumum selling price is then 66% * 80% = 53% of the full value.

All other arguments aside, sticking to the AI "whoring" question, I think the "trade bending" is a hefty handicap on the higher levels. I know it provides a greater challenge, but perhaps some players might like to take it out to make it a bit more fair, or haven't mastered Emporer yet.

I'd be interested to see the effects of making the AI-AI tech rate less than 100% (not possible with the editor), so they absolutely can not trade techs at all, or is very costly. Of course that would not be fair, but if the human did not trade either, it could be interesting.

Note, I also assume the AI would refuse to pay full price from the Human as well, because of their research bonus (say, 80% on Emporer). That could be another reason why they don't often pay fairly for tech. Given the AI-AI trade bonus, it is smarter for AIs to buy their tech from each other & sell to the human.

[LaRusso]

theoretically...
in practice, however, AI trade like mad. i decreased rate to 115 on monarch and i am just squeaking through, got a one-tech lead in the modern times, but i cannot pull anything more than that. someone posted a savegame edit revelation that AI cheats massively and that is my impression too. I mean, i devastated a modern civ through pillage and attrition (i had only arty and infantry and they were on a same tech level, so i could charge only after a massive bombardment) and there was not a single city that went into rioting. i mean, their capital was cut off from all the roads, no luxuries network, they were in war with almost all other civs, still no rioting, still massive military,and, i suspect, a huge deficit. as much as i like the game, i reckon soren hasn't told us all. soren, please...

[dawidge]

Originally posted by planetfall
war weariness
Has anyone dared to play a defensive position? Defending current territory, and recapturing any lost cities, but not entering AI territory. Will the AI eventually give up and sue for peace? I am still playing at a lower level than you guys, but sometimes it is fun to have a wide spread empire, and all focus in resources and production capability with just a limited number of actual military units.

This is how most of my early- and mid-game goes (except I don't lose anything, so I don't have to retake it).

The answer is "it depends". The biggest factor is whether or not they have signed a alliance vs. you with anybody. If they have, then you will have at least a 20 turn war. They won't even talk to you. If they haven't AND you've blunted their attack, crippling their offense, AND you've built up your defensive forces enough to sway them into thinking that you aren't the soft target they thought you were, then "maybe".

In 1.17, I was in a very short defensive war which seemed to be triggered by the Russia losing a city to me through culture. Unfortunately for Russia, he had to cross either Persia (deeply involved in luxury and resource trade with me (overlapping so I could always keep one of them active)) or Zulu (with whom I was Allied vs. Aztec (which neither of us could reach since this was pre-Navigation and only England could cross the gaps between continents) because it was a cheap way to keep him as a border buffer). When Russia tried crossing Persia, Persia got mad and they went to war (I don't know who declared). Russia quickly weakened and was ready to sue for peace after 10 turns or so.