Where did the AI leave it's I

[Late]

I have high AI skill(I think, how can I check it) and no bonus. Almost every turn enemy attacks with few battleships, mostly one at a time. And it can't even fight well. It has been a long time since it destroyed anything of mine.

My defending forces consist of 13 destroyers and one cruiser. My ships are defending a warp point in my system. (Cluster quadrant -> the only way to may area) Most of my destroyers have capital ships missiles and maximium range strategy. Some have depledet uranium cannons and optimal firing range. All the destroyers have pointdefence cannons.
The ships are not as a fleet. One of them has been there long enough to have experience: legendary(50). That ship is
beginign to have really old technology in it but it's still alive. The cruiser has a space yard so it can repair other ships when(if) they get hurt. The enemy would just have to wait 5-10 turns without attacking, make one large fleet and it would probaply be able to take many of my systems by suprise.

Why is the enemy so stupid? Is the AI going have the I in a patch anytime soon?

[Spyder]

Funny thing about AI....they never seem to amass before attacking. MOO II was much better about this than other games. But, it has been my experience that the AI is never given the code to analyze the existing resistance and adjust their force accordingly...its like they build their forces according to a pre-arranged plan no matter what the circumstances before them.


------------------
Spyder, Chairman of the Arachnid Consortium

[Jason2]

Do you have the 1.27 patch and the mod-pack??

I am playing a cluster universe as well (High/High/Med bonus) and the AI has attacked with fleets of 8-15 ships pretty consistently. They are always outfitted with the AI's latest tech. Even though the Darloks are 8th (out of 15) and I am 4th, I have had to mine and keep a large active fleet - which has Shields V, DUC 5, and stealth armor.

I am enjoying the game and it is by no means a push over... although I am starting to get the edge on the two races nearest me (both of which are in the lower half of the score spectrum).

Jason2

[Talenn]

Jason:

From what I understand, 'Medium Bonus' is giving the AI 3x Research and Production. That is a helluva bonus! Late's game has no bonus so I'm sure it simply doesnt have the resources to amass ships as quickly. So it sends them one at a time and they die. I've seen it incessantly too with No Bonus.

The way I have the AI tweaked in my set, even a Low bonus results in the players being wiped out unless they resort to 'cheese' tactics like the missile dance. My solution so far has been to give the AI 5000 RPs while the players take 2000. This seems to give them enough of a boost without giving them a huge resource and tech edge...ie not even playing by the same rules anymore.

Late: Try the 5000 to 2000 RPs and see how it goes. Also, make sure and grab the AI mod pack. It adds some really tough customers to galaxy!

Talenn

[Taqwus]

The AI isn't adapting very well, if at all, to what players do; for instance, I don't think one would shift from all missiles to having at least some beams if you show up with dedicated point-defense BBs in a combined-arms fleet. Nor, for that matter, does it have a notion of a good fleet design; I don't recall ever seeing a fleet that included a good mix between combat and non-combat ships. Even if one could define fleet compositions in .txt files, it'd still need to deduce when and how to use them, since a proper fleet composition depends on how much you know about your opponents' preferences, as well. Actually, it should take just about everything into account...

For that matter, it's research and build strategies aren't affected that much by quadrant parameters. Try a mid-life; clusters are far easier than mid-lifes, I suspect, because the AI isn't good at using SM and espionage to foil warp-point defenses and w/ a ML you usually have a far longer border. Especially with a low ship count limit, that can present more problems.

------------------
-- The thing that goes bump in the night

[raynor]

quote:

---

From what I understand, 'Medium Bonus' is giving the AI 3x Research and Production.

---

According to my tests, the bonus only applies to research and intel production.

I *wish* the AI was getting a 3x resource bonus at med bonus but I don't think it is.

[Talenn]

raynor:

Yeah, thats what I thought at first too when I would take over AI players and see what they were doing. The Research was approx 2x (with Low Bonus) and the Production seemed flat. But game experience demonstrates otherwise. I constantly see larger fleets and far faster expansion when it has a higher bonus.

Early in the game, there is nothing that can augment production to the degree that it appears to have. So, I concluded that it is indeed gaining some kind of economic bonus as well. I just cant quantify it. Maybe I'm just imagining things, but I dont think so.

Anyone else have any input on this?

Thanx,
Talenn

[raynor]

Talenn,

I agree with you one hundred percent. But my mind won't accept it until I quantify it.

Here is the Last test I ran. Start a high dif/high bonus game with yourself and just one AI. Now, hit end turn ten times in a row before you take control of the AI player. Take a look at what he has produced. I tried this a couple of times. When I compared the cost of the ships and units to his production capacity and his resources, it seemed to balance out.

I gotta, gotta be able to demonstrate the higher production before I'll believe it. So, I have two theories for the AI's seeming abundance of ships. First, maybe there is something hard coded in the game engine that makes the AI play better? Second, maybe the increased research at the beginning of the game is playing a role somehow?

Do ya suppose I should offer a reward for the first person who quantifies this?

Thanks for your comments. I hope we can draw some other bright folks into this discussion.

[Daynarr]

Talenn, this was true in 1.19 Version (I had confirmed it), but in this Version it seems that there is no bonus resource production for AI. I have both Sergetti and Xi'Chung on the edge of their maintenance capacity and as soon as they have more maintenance then resource income, they start losing resources from their reserves. I am 100% positive on this one. It has been fixed, whatever the problem was.

[This message has been edited by Daynarr (edited 03 March 2001).]

[Marty Ward]

Maybe the ship building routine is effected by the difficulty level not the bonus level. I usually play medium difficulty and find that some races build fleets of a reasonable size and others don't seem to. Don't know why, just an observation.