AI War policies

psumbody · February 6, 2004, 10:50

I am fairly new to CIVIII experience and I have a question about the AI. I am playing C3C Patch 1.15 and after six games at Cheiften - Regent levels I noticed that AI never engages in war with other AI civs. Seems they reserve that honor only for me in which they all gang up on me. Is this what I should expect in all my games?

CerberusIV · February 6, 2004, 10:53

At those levels and if you are ahead on score then yes.

From regent or monarch upwards and with some of the AI civs either cramped for land or just a lot stronger than others there will be plenty of wars.

psumbody · February 6, 2004, 12:15

Thank you for your reply. Hmmm looks like I am going to try the tougher levels.

vmxa1 · February 6, 2004, 13:44

They will go after each other if the conditions are right. Namely they need to expand or want a resource and their neighbor has it and won't give it.

This may not occur at the lowest levels as the AI is handicapped a bit and does a poor job of expanding.

Look at the replay and you can see if they ever actually went to war.

Purple · February 6, 2004, 16:59

You can also tell from the score histogram which civs have been eliminated, even if you have never encountered them.

Rhothaerill · February 6, 2004, 17:09

Just wait until the discovery and distribution of nationalism. Once the AI civs start signing mutual protection pacts then the world wars will start. In my current game (AU501 see my sig for the link) the fortunes of war have been changing on and off so fast that I can't even keep up with who is at war with each other on a given turn.

BulMaster · February 7, 2004, 09:13

Yeah with MPP they will enter a never ending war. It will be one war that will sparkle the whole world and this will last until someone wins the game. No peace for the AI before that. From time to time the AI will come to ask and alliance or MPP you can go for the alliance but be aware that in the next 5 turns someone else will be trown at you. Don't enter MPP really you will end up entangled in to a magic circle out of which you will have troubles to leave.

lethe · February 7, 2004, 13:51

No! BulMaster, you are wrong. As soon as you get Nationalism you should sign a MPP with Bismarck. This is certain to keep the rest of the game exciting.

But even before then you can run the show more actively. Trade techs to everyone as soon as you get them, if they don't have anything of value to you get them to enter a military alliance against a civ that is their neighbour but not yours. "Off course you can get Free Artistry free, all you have to do is attack Scandinavia."

BulMaster · February 7, 2004, 18:40

Dunno lethe I play with 31 civs and can tell that entering in alliance against their neigbours, usualy brings my neighbours against me + many others that aren't my neighbours that usualy ?I treade with or the pay me huge amounts of money for having sold a tech. I tend to created an interdependant world, which might be wrong as most of the time my economy relies on the hundreds of gp/t that I receive for selling a resources.

psumbody · February 9, 2004, 10:54

Well after a weekend session at regent I am happy to report that all the AI's went to war. Definately increases my enjoyment of the game. I agree the MPP is the source of many wars. I found out that lesson the hard way. I wanted to keep all the AI's at war with the Indians ( the tech leader at the time ). Some of the AIs started making trade embargoes against me so I offered a MPP thinking that they would continue to war with the Indians. Well one turn later half my Allies became my enemies as my MPP partner decided to attack other civs. I had to scramble my defenses fast to avoid being outflanked by a previous ally. Ah the Joys of CIV!!

Russian_King · February 12, 2004, 17:07

I found out that the gangups actually happen on civs that are the weakest!

when i try to play monarch or emperor, due to the extremely unfair starting areas (starting area being my whole possible city spread area) filled with jungles or desert, and having no important resources such as IRON! (

) which causes me to be hopeless at wars and overall power, all the other civs gang up on me no matter how far away i am and how useless my territory is to them!
i also found once playing on regent, with 3 AI civs on a large map, me and the carthagenians both picked on the greeks while they still havent got to musketeers and cavalry, and apparently destroyed them with iron units. greeks were always the weakest civ, and they got killed, so i think its either the civ easyest to kill or the civ that stands out (racism) that gets all the cr*p

Rogerdude · February 13, 2004, 04:06

I think you need to have an embassy with one of the 2 nations that would go to war in order to get the message that "X declared war on Y".
So they might have actually gone to war, without you having known it !

MrWhereItsAt · February 13, 2004, 04:22

Quote:

Originally posted by Rogerdude
I think you need to have an embassy with one of the 2 nations that would go to war in order to get the message that "X declared war on Y".
So they might have actually gone to war, without you having known it !

This is correct, and also you will not see the red line connecting the two (or more) warring civs in the F4 screen without an embassy with one or the other either.

Sovereign · February 13, 2004, 12:54

I love when the AI goes to war.

I remember one game... I got over 3 MPP offers in one turn, then 2 MPP offers the next turn.

I kept out of the wars, then once I built over 500 tanks, I invaded.

Nuff said.

vmxa1 · February 13, 2004, 13:42

That is a good point. It is so easy to forget that you should not know about wars off in the distance without an embassy.

Illyrien · February 16, 2004, 06:34

A Civilization that seems weak will be attacked by everybody who wants their share of the loot. Early when i played the game I had a weak military and then I would get declared on my 1 enemy civ and everybody would say "hey, he is weak, lets kill him" and I would end in wars with everybody!

On the other hand, if you are at war with somebody and manage to get others to join the war, then there is a good chance that all the other civs will say "hey, he is weak" and mass declare war on him.... I love when this happens

Sovereign · February 16, 2004, 16:53

Interesting, Illyrien.

I also had games when I was the "Giant" and everybody wanted a piece of me, so they all declared war on me. Even the puny 5 city civ's that were supposed to be the "weakest" civ's.

Needless to say, David vs Goliath didn't come true. I mass produced tons of battleships and tanks and nukes. Nuff said.

dexters · February 16, 2004, 17:11

I've been saying this for a while now, but I'd really like to see the AI pursue its aims more coherently.

Basically, the AI has been hardcoded to pursue a list of generic policies that the programmers think is to its best interest.

1) Basic threat assesment. [city proximity and border mesh is taken into account]
2) Pick on the weakest and or the Civ others are picking on
3) Expansion assesment. If it runs out of room to expand too soon, it will go to war to get it.

This is good and fine as a macro level strategy, but the AI has no micro level strategy. It should be able to keep a list of variables for each civ it has contact with that it can use.

An example of micro level strategy would be -appeasement or convesely passive agressive peace.

If it is appeasement, the AI will be more agreeable to trades, offer lower prices, and be more willing to provide assistance. A passive agressive foreign policy would basically see the human player as an enemy, but instead of going to war, the AI would go out of its way to not help the player.

This provides some variety and elemt of chance. Not everyone you call up for a military alliance will want to go with you, even if you offer them an arm and a leg, even if your reputation is squeaky clean. Some AI should quite rightly think this kind of deal is fishy and does not advance their interests.

But alas, I think we'll never see this happen.

Sovereign · February 19, 2004, 17:15

You can hope for it to happen in Civ4. Then again, maybe not.

Mr. President · February 20, 2004, 00:00

Y'know, until recently the AI was never very aggressive towards me. But in my current game, the Iroquois violated a right-of-passage agreement to attack me. Then the Persians allied with them, so I got the Babylonians to ally against the Iroquois . . . but then they also made an alliance with the Iroquois against me. Then the Zulu got dragged in. I think they were still mad at me for taking Zimbabwe a couple centuries ago.

Bottom line, I torched Ulundi twice and I have a new idea for a fan fiction story.

Sovereign · February 20, 2004, 12:18

Heh. This makes me wonder...

What are the priorities of the AI in regards of MPP / ROP?

Say... AI "A" is allied to you and AI "B".

You are at war with AI "B".

Who will AI "A" declare war on and cancel MPP with?

Will AI "A" declare war and cancel MPP with you?

Or cancel it with AI "B"?

This has got me baffled for a long time.

Boracks · February 20, 2004, 14:08

Well, a Mutual War Pact only triggers when you have units in the other guy's territory or they have units in yours. This will have a bearing on which way the AI declares. The actual turn order may have something to do with it as well.

Hmm, actually, I know attacking enemy units in your own territory doesn't trigger an MPP but I can't recall if attacking them in neutral territory counts or not.