AI Improvement Mod (1.05 Extended Release)
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
Icemania I just want to say thank you to you and all the modders for doing such a great job. I am going to take the plunge and download your AI mod as part of BlackStork's tomorrow. I know I'm gonna get killed! [:D]
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
Ok here is a screenie. Not amazing to look at but what is really cool is three things. I found one of those super high tech derelict ships which I usually mop the map with. But three firsts are happening for me that Ive never seen before. The pirates are beating me with their designs against my super tech ship and also using fighters against me! Im having to run! This after they raided the planet in the pic with 20,000 raiders against my 20,000 troops. I may lose the planet to pirates as well!
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RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
Another first for me! Galactic World War! Everybody and I mean everybody is at war with another because of all of the mutual defense treaties. Very WWW1 like! Fantastic! This mod makes the whole universe come alive!
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RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
Thanks for the screenshots Tanaka, really appreciated!ORIGINAL: Tanaka
Ok here is a screenie. Not amazing to look at but what is really cool is three things. I found one of those super high tech derelict ships which I usually mop the map with. But three firsts are happening for me that Ive never seen before. The pirates are beating me with their designs against my super tech ship and also using fighters against me! Im having to run! This after they raided the planet in the pic with 20,000 raiders against my 20,000 troops. I may lose the planet to pirates as well!
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
For those struggling with Extreme Difficulty with the AI Improvement Mod I'll post some screenshots from a current game that might help.
The settings are:
• Normal Empire Age of Shadows
• Irregular, 1000 Stars, 10 x 10 Sectors
• Pre Warp Start, Extreme Difficulty, Difficulty Scales Near Victory
• Restless Aggression
• Very Many Strong Pirates, Nearby Distance, No Respawn allowed
• Many Space Creatures
• Expensive Research
• Normal Colonies and Normal Independent Life
• No Colonisation Range Limit
• Excellent Homeworld, Starting, Pre-Warp, Normal Corruption, Centre
• 19 Empires, Excellent Homeworld, Pre-Warp
• Victory Threshold 80%, conditions increased to 50% for Territory, Population and Economy
The house rules are:
• No Homeworld Invasions are permitted until the 30 year mark and no use of sneaky fast troop transports
• Diplomacy may not be used to farm cash in any way (i.e. technology trading, selling stations/bases or sanctions/war)
• Intelligence Agents must remain on Counter Intelligence duties
• Recovered ships must be retired
• Debris field ships may not be recovered until they are within my territorial influence
• Ship and Base Design is on Automatic almost always
• Exploration ships must be on Automatic, no micro
• Research is on Automatic (although there is a trick if anyone can pick it)
• Cannot attack the Eruktah Refugees until they reveal themselves as the Shakturi
The settings are:
• Normal Empire Age of Shadows
• Irregular, 1000 Stars, 10 x 10 Sectors
• Pre Warp Start, Extreme Difficulty, Difficulty Scales Near Victory
• Restless Aggression
• Very Many Strong Pirates, Nearby Distance, No Respawn allowed
• Many Space Creatures
• Expensive Research
• Normal Colonies and Normal Independent Life
• No Colonisation Range Limit
• Excellent Homeworld, Starting, Pre-Warp, Normal Corruption, Centre
• 19 Empires, Excellent Homeworld, Pre-Warp
• Victory Threshold 80%, conditions increased to 50% for Territory, Population and Economy
The house rules are:
• No Homeworld Invasions are permitted until the 30 year mark and no use of sneaky fast troop transports
• Diplomacy may not be used to farm cash in any way (i.e. technology trading, selling stations/bases or sanctions/war)
• Intelligence Agents must remain on Counter Intelligence duties
• Recovered ships must be retired
• Debris field ships may not be recovered until they are within my territorial influence
• Ship and Base Design is on Automatic almost always
• Exploration ships must be on Automatic, no micro
• Research is on Automatic (although there is a trick if anyone can pick it)
• Cannot attack the Eruktah Refugees until they reveal themselves as the Shakturi
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
I've played a couple games using the mod, mostly as the Ikkuro.
One of the big things I've noticed is that the AI has a terrible habit of spamming new colonies everywhere when it does not have the capacity to defend or support all of its new turf. This tends to give the pirates an absolute field day, letting them become very strong, while kneecapping the AI economically.
On a better note, in a different game I faced down a Securan carrier for the first time, and it was an utter pain to kill. Fighter swarms were pretty effective against my Velocity Shard-toting fleet that time, although I crushed their homeworld bases through sheer force of numbers. I've also had a few fairly expansive wars break out, but little ever seems to come of them. I've yet to see the AI take a colony from another AI, even if its some 30M pop backwater.
I also noticed the AI having some tunnel-vision issues with its research order on expensive-level research. My closest non-insect neighbour in one game, the Kiadians, had worked very hard on getting to Plasma Thunderbolt II - but they neglected to bother researching anything better than fission reactors. I have no clue how the AI could support such a power-hog weapon with basic reactor tech. They also seem to have never bothered with any shields beyond the initial Corvidian I's (also, this game is in 2156 due to the colony spam deflating my territory score - they originally didn't even have Fission when I attacked them a while back).
I've highlighted the final tech in the torp tree that I have in red, the second level fission in green, second level shield in purple, and the second-level speedy-engine in yellow/orange. I understand if this was a part of the Kiadian plan, but their ships are fairly gimpy, despite having size 600 construction (not listed since we are at parity there) - their capships only had 1000 shields, while mine ran almost 3000 using Deucalios IIs, fed by Hyperfusion I reactors.
One of the big things I've noticed is that the AI has a terrible habit of spamming new colonies everywhere when it does not have the capacity to defend or support all of its new turf. This tends to give the pirates an absolute field day, letting them become very strong, while kneecapping the AI economically.
On a better note, in a different game I faced down a Securan carrier for the first time, and it was an utter pain to kill. Fighter swarms were pretty effective against my Velocity Shard-toting fleet that time, although I crushed their homeworld bases through sheer force of numbers. I've also had a few fairly expansive wars break out, but little ever seems to come of them. I've yet to see the AI take a colony from another AI, even if its some 30M pop backwater.
I also noticed the AI having some tunnel-vision issues with its research order on expensive-level research. My closest non-insect neighbour in one game, the Kiadians, had worked very hard on getting to Plasma Thunderbolt II - but they neglected to bother researching anything better than fission reactors. I have no clue how the AI could support such a power-hog weapon with basic reactor tech. They also seem to have never bothered with any shields beyond the initial Corvidian I's (also, this game is in 2156 due to the colony spam deflating my territory score - they originally didn't even have Fission when I attacked them a while back).
I've highlighted the final tech in the torp tree that I have in red, the second level fission in green, second level shield in purple, and the second-level speedy-engine in yellow/orange. I understand if this was a part of the Kiadian plan, but their ships are fairly gimpy, despite having size 600 construction (not listed since we are at parity there) - their capships only had 1000 shields, while mine ran almost 3000 using Deucalios IIs, fed by Hyperfusion I reactors.
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RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
I checked a few other AI empires in that game, and most of them have gone a fair distance into their preferred weapon trees, but almost none of them bothered with decent reactors or shield tech. Only the Quameno seem to have gone some distance into critical branches, but they're the Quameno (and pretty weak due to a flatlined economy here). Some AIs have chosen to research the third upgrade to their chosen hyperdrive, which doesn't seem to be helping them much by consuming needless Energy research when there's more pressing tech to get such as better reactors.
On the other hand, I found the Ackdarians with the Haakonish fuel cell tech. Someone's been busy!
I also saw that another Ikkuro empire researched both Swift Repairs and Damage Control, which is redundant given how the repair bot smokes damage control in every way.
The pirates seem to also have spent their time researching Colonization techs. I have no idea why. Overall, their tech is better in some ways than the empires, but worse in others.
Anyways, I hope all this helps with smoothing the mod out some more. It's been a big step up from vanilla, where the AI preferred to roll over and play dead in most situations.
On the other hand, I found the Ackdarians with the Haakonish fuel cell tech. Someone's been busy!
I also saw that another Ikkuro empire researched both Swift Repairs and Damage Control, which is redundant given how the repair bot smokes damage control in every way.
The pirates seem to also have spent their time researching Colonization techs. I have no idea why. Overall, their tech is better in some ways than the empires, but worse in others.
Anyways, I hope all this helps with smoothing the mod out some more. It's been a big step up from vanilla, where the AI preferred to roll over and play dead in most situations.
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
I appreciate the point. I could reduce colonisation priority. However, what difficulty are you playing on? On higher difficulties they have no shortage of cash.ORIGINAL: Unbroken
One of the big things I've noticed is that the AI has a terrible habit of spamming new colonies everywhere when it does not have the capacity to defend or support all of its new turf. This tends to give the pirates an absolute field day, letting them become very strong, while kneecapping the AI economically.
I've seen the AI take other colonies plenty of times, but yes they are not particularly focused with it. Not much I can mod here.ORIGINAL: Unbroken
On a better note, in a different game I faced down a Securan carrier for the first time, and it was an utter pain to kill. Fighter swarms were pretty effective against my Velocity Shard-toting fleet that time, although I crushed their homeworld bases through sheer force of numbers. I've also had a few fairly expansive wars break out, but little ever seems to come of them. I've yet to see the AI take a colony from another AI, even if its some 30M pop backwater.
In an earlier version of the Mod the Energy Research Orders looked pretty similar between the races. It was becoming bland as every race used pretty much the same technologies in the Energy Research Tree.ORIGINAL: Unbroken
I also noticed the AI having some tunnel-vision issues with its research order on expensive-level research. My closest non-insect neighbour in one game, the Kiadians, had worked very hard on getting to Plasma Thunderbolt II - but they neglected to bother researching anything better than fission reactors. I have no clue how the AI could support such a power-hog weapon with basic reactor tech. They also seem to have never bothered with any shields beyond the initial Corvidian I's (also, this game is in 2156 due to the colony spam deflating my territory score - they originally didn't even have Fission when I attacked them a while back).
As you probably know in this Mod there is a wider variety of weapon types in use i.e. it's not as dominated by beams and torpedoes there is a pretty balanced mix. There was also quite a lot of variety in HighTech, due to the different wonder and colonisation focuses. I felt similar variety was needed with Energy.
What I noticed is that Elliot has set different focuses for the races e.g. have a look in the race files. Specifically Speed/Agility, Power, Balanced or Efficiency. So I designed Energy Research Order to reflects those preferences with variations thereof for special technologies.
So if you look across some of the races using Torpedoes:
The Kiadian Energy focus is on Speed/Agility. While they will need more reactors to power their ships, you should find them relatively fast, and better able to standoff. If you play with short-range weapons and say with a power focus, they can be quite annoying.
The Zenox Energy focus is on Efficiency. This is a variation of a Balanced approach but the efficient technologies are used. The Research Order is modified to ensure they get their special technology shields quickly though.
The Boskarans Energy focus on Power which includes a focus on Shields.
Other races are Balanced. Some mix Torpedoes with Fighter/Bombers. And so on.
As a result, when a race comes at you with Torpedoes, there is variety.
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
I was playing on Hard. I can see how on Extreme it wouldn't run into a cash shortage, but I felt like seeing an Ackdarian empire with 20+ colonies and only 24B total population being spread a little thinly. Some empires didn't go colony-happy, but I think it was because they didn't get to build their colony ships quickly enough due to a lack of cash.
The different approaches to a weapon tree are nice, but I was under the impression that feeding a bank of PTbolts and thirsty engines with insufficient reactor energy would force a ship to either move or fire, not both simultaneously, or have other problems such as no shield regen. I did note the Securans using a torpedo bomber setup, which was nice to see - I mainly wondered about the effects of insufficient energy on a combat vessel in the manner the AI seemed to be forcing itself to do.
The different approaches to a weapon tree are nice, but I was under the impression that feeding a bank of PTbolts and thirsty engines with insufficient reactor energy would force a ship to either move or fire, not both simultaneously, or have other problems such as no shield regen. I did note the Securans using a torpedo bomber setup, which was nice to see - I mainly wondered about the effects of insufficient energy on a combat vessel in the manner the AI seemed to be forcing itself to do.
RE: AI Improvement Mod (1.01 Release)
This will depend on the races you happened to look at.ORIGINAL: Unbroken
I checked a few other AI empires in that game, and most of them have gone a fair distance into their preferred weapon trees, but almost none of them bothered with decent reactors or shield tech. Only the Quameno seem to have gone some distance into critical branches, but they're the Quameno (and pretty weak due to a flatlined economy here). Some AIs have chosen to research the third upgrade to their chosen hyperdrive, which doesn't seem to be helping them much by consuming needless Energy research when there's more pressing tech to get such as better reactors.
All races have a fairly similar early focus through to Rapid Assembly and Robotic Repairs because it's essential for the AI to be competitive.
Beyond that, races that have a Power focus will do a lot with Reactors/Shields before they do anything else. Races with a Balanced/Efficient focus will do Shields/Reactors next but mix it up. Speed/Agility races will do a lot with Engines/Thrusters/Drives before they do anything else.
Have a look at "AI Improvement Mod.xls" or "Extended AI Improvement Mod.xls".
The Ikkuro do not have Damage Control in their Research Build Orders. Damage Control may have been a result of a retired ship or some of the limited AI trading from an Alliance partner.ORIGINAL: Unbroken
I also saw that another Ikkuro empire researched both Swift Repairs and Damage Control, which is redundant given how the repair bot smokes damage control in every way.
The race files are common for Pirates and Empires. Modders have no way to set a different research path using the Research Build Order approach this Mod is based on. Otherwise, I can assure you, I would have!ORIGINAL: Unbroken
The pirates seem to also have spent their time researching Colonization techs. I have no idea why. Overall, their tech is better in some ways than the empires, but worse in others.
Cheers!ORIGINAL: Unbroken
Anyways, I hope all this helps with smoothing the mod out some more. It's been a big step up from vanilla, where the AI preferred to roll over and play dead in most situations.