Brain Dead AI Nations

[Gandalf Parker]

Initial responses:
Someone is always at top and bottom but you are only looking at provinces. Arcos does tend to run low there, but not on the bottom (not in my tests). But other "broken" nations would be Mictlan for always benig low dominion, and Pangaea or Abysia for being low gem income (not enough searching).

The map you use is on the small side for showing some nations best features. Its a nice map. Im just saying that always using it will affect the outcomes.

Indept str of 9 is hard on the AIs. Especially in expansion. But Im not sure if setting it lower would help Arcos.

How does Arcos look on the other scores? Research in particular.

[iceboy]

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

Initial responses:
Someone is always at top and bottom but you are only looking at provinces. Arcos does tend to run low there, but not on the bottom (not in my tests). But other "broken" nations would be Mictlan for always benig low dominion, and Pangaea or Abysia for being low gem income (not enough searching).

The map you use is on the small side for showing some nations best features. Its a nice map. Im just saying that always using it will affect the outcomes.

Indept str of 9 is hard on the AIs. Especially in expansion. But Im not sure if setting it lower would help Arcos.

How does Arcos look on the other scores? Research in particular.

On the small side!? Its a 1500 province map!

Well I guess the Indep str of 9 could be lowered... But there is nothing more boring than plowing through weak provinces!

Here is the research screen:

[Gandalf Parker]

Later responses:
Hmmm in a test I just ran, Arcos did not do as well as I expected in research. It was above average but not enough to offset the lack of attention elsewhere. It might have been the god and scale choices. Yomi wasnt in the initial tests and seems to be a factor in research. I need to do some more tests. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.

By the way, if you run your games with the --scoredump switch then it will output an html page each turn which gives hard numbers in each of those areas. It doesnt provide a history view of the ups and downs like the graphs in the game but it can be helpful.

I should setup many continually hosting games and gather the data. I might need to get some programming help in that from lch or Ballbarian or DrPratorious

[vfb]

You can use something like:

dom321 --allai --superhost --scoredump --postexec /home/dom/dominions3/savescores.sh mygame

Where savescores.sh just copies the scores.html to a unique filename,

#!/bin/bash

cp /home/dom/dominions3/savedgames/mygame/scores.html /home/dom/dominions3/savedgames/mygame/scores.$(date +%s).html

Try it with the Dawn of Dominions map.

[Gandalf Parker]

Thanks.
But then Id like to read the data into a cvs file and make historical graphs with something like ghost or imagemagick. Or a nice running tally of highest and lowest in each score category.

[MaxWilson]

That's what children and grad students are for!

-Max

[Zeldor]

lch:

I am not really sure if it's true. I found AI doing really great against 9 independents sometimes.

The realy change comes when you use Better Independents mod though. Normal AI turns to be as strong as Impossible one before the mod.

[iceboy]

Originally Posted by Zeldor

lch:

I am not really sure if it's true. I found AI doing really great against 9 independents sometimes.

The realy change comes when you use Better Independents mod though. Normal AI turns to be as strong as Impossible one before the mod.

Which version of this mod is the best to use? They seem to all have their faults...

Also...Besides the BI mod has anyone found that the CBM mod helps the AI?

[Zeldor]

Better Independents 2.0 works just fine [but don't enslave or charm indie troops]. That makes AI recruit only national troops.

Some other hints:
- use normal research as at some point AI cannot effectively increase research rate
- use supplies at 300, AI loves to starve troops
- avoid lots of water and water nations [AI cannot deal with attacking water]
- set AI to aggressive

[iceboy]

Originally Posted by Zeldor

Better Independents 2.0 works just fine [but don't enslave or charm indie troops]. That makes AI recruit only national troops.

Some other hints:
- use normal research as at some point AI cannot effectively increase research rate
- use supplies at 300, AI loves to starve troops
- avoid lots of water and water nations [AI cannot deal with attacking water]
- set AI to aggressive

By which BI version I mean resources, gold, or both?

A few things here:

You cannot change the AI settings when using a modded AI. I do use very difficult research settings and gold at 50. I also use resources and supplies at 300. The main reasons for this is playing on such a big map you need to scale things back so they dont get out of control. I used to play with half or normal resouces but I maxed that to see if it would help the AI. I am getting about the same results. As you can see on the map I do use water and all water nations but that is not really the problem. The only thing I am trying to improve on is early expansion...whatever happens later is fine with me!