What now????

[Jochen Schmidt]

Hi all,

after reading with surprise how many folks here, think in the same way like me, i haver say something to this discussion:

I never did an Ai coding - this must be very hard to do - yes - but, it can done!!

Well, my baseline is MoO2 - the diplomacy, the characters of the enemies/allies, the strategic AI - really well done!! O.k., now in SE4, there is much more implementet, things a always wanted to have - but, the essential thing, the AI is to weak, much to weak. Btw, i like to play against the computer, cause in a such long-time game like SE4, i don´t know how it should work to play by E-mail. It is even now excuse, to say: "If you don´t like the Ai, play against a human". Also doing my own AI could be a funny thing, but as i said, i don´t know how, and when i should do this - this is the job of the programmers.

Don´t get me wrong (again), i know, that the AI is never as good as a human, but if the Ai here would have only a little more "intelligence", the game would still be my favourite. THIS, i mean the tweaking of the AI, should be the first job to do at the moment. Give it the possibility to use all the compenents, wich are implented in the game, give it the right behavior in strategy... and, this game would rock!!!!

(One of the most famous things for me, was the decision of BTS, to code an (nearly perfect) AI for their Combat Mission game - this is the best AI i´ve ever seen - so, their success as an "independent label" was born by doing it so - not 3D-Graphics, not warsimulation - the AI is the secret of their success.)

I hope MM will work on this. I won´t - ´cause i´m "only" a customer with all good wishes for them and their/my game.

Greetings to all

Jochen