Culture and AI

Akaoz · October 19, 2001, 02:37

Will the AI understand what is happening when your culture is eating away at his Empire?

I hated the MoO2 AI for not realizing that giving away all the small colonies to me as he made them would doom him real fast.

The argument can also be made, that a high/dominant culture can cause other to dislike you. Look at French attitudes to English/American influence on their culture. They don't like it, and have gone to the point of pasing laws to prevent what they see as 'bad-influences' on their language and way of life.

Because the effect of culture is so important in this game it is IMHO _very_ important that the AI knows how to handle a situation where you are 'peacefully' eating up his Empire piece by piece (no pun intended). And I'm not convinced having a 'high' culture is a blessing in diplomatic negotiations in reality, but that is another subject...

-Alech

Sarxis · October 19, 2001, 03:36

At this point, the feature of CivIII that has the least substantial coverage thus far is the AI. All that has been said is that the AI will be better, and will be able 'shaft' you.

So we can only hope that the AI has some understanding of culture.

albiedamned · October 19, 2001, 08:53

I agree that if the AI is not good at the new culture strategy, then it will be significantly handicapped. However I'm optimistic, because I don't think it should be too hard to make the AI good at culture. What more is there to the strategy besides building cultural improvements as early as possible? Presumably the AI can get that right.

I suspect, however, that different civs will approach culture differently. The more militaristic civs will tend to ignore culture in favor of war. But this is as it should be. I'm sure there are plenty of militaristic human players who will do the same thing.

JayKay · October 19, 2001, 09:16

I've known that no one on Firaxis (or Civ 3 team - not sure), have yet beaten the AI in the Deity level!

I think this means that we don't have much to worry about the AI being good, aldo i'm sure everyone will eventually win in Deity level! Humans are superior to Machines!

However this could also mean that the AI will cheat even more, than it did in Civ 2!

I'll just see it, when i'm confortable at home clicking the first time on the Civ 3 icon and play it all night and day until the Electrical Company shuts down my energy, for not paying the Electrical bill (maybe because i got fired for not showing at work)!

_________________________________________________

Portugal
Nation of: Magellan's (from Magellan's Expedition);
Vasco da Gama (Discoverer of the Maritime path to India);
and Pedro Álvares Cabral (Discoverer of Brazil in 1500)

Grumbold · October 19, 2001, 10:34

I expect the AI will be quietly competent at supporting culture in its own cities so the situation should only really arise when you create a Wonder in a city close enough to influence theirs. Objects like luxuries and Wonders are identifiable as potential targets to be attacked should the AI detect a losing situation.

I'm intrigued how culture swap will work. For instance:

A--B--C

A and C are high culture cities of differing nations. Nation A founds City B with zero culture. It's close enough that city C is having a big influence on it. Will it convert or is City A's high culture capable of protecting it? If it does convert, won't city A exert a similarly high influence to pull it back again? Looking forward to finding out....

hexagonian · October 19, 2001, 10:39

Quote:

Originally posted by JayKay
I've known that no one on Firaxis (or Civ 3 team - not sure), have yet beaten the AI in the Deity level!

However this could also mean that the AI will cheat even more, than it did in Civ 2!

This is probably the reason why Deity will be hard...

Grumbold · October 19, 2001, 10:44

Quote:

Originally posted by hexagonian

This is probably the reason why Deity will be hard...

I certainly don't expect it to be because the computer plays more competently than it does at Prince level. That's only possible if you spend years working on improving AI like they have done with traditional boardgames.

hexagonian · October 19, 2001, 10:53

Quote:

Originally posted by Grumbold
I certainly don't expect it to be because the computer plays more competently than it does at Prince level. That's only possible if you spend years working on improving AI like they have done with traditional boardgames.

Let's put it this way...

If good players have trouble consistantly beating the game on 'Prince' (on a totally level playing field) then Firaxis has succeeded in creating a good AI.

If not, then it will be the cheats that have made the game tough on Deity.

Deathwalker · October 19, 2001, 10:57

I hope that the AI does not need to cheat to much,

After all there have been great advances in AI in the last few years, so I hope they did not have to resort the anything that desperate

Grumbold · October 19, 2001, 11:13

Absolutely, hexagonian. Or even just knowing that they have to be careful and assess situations, not just play by rote using the same tactics every game.