Civ AI Survivor: Season Five

[Wyatan]

My actual predictions for game 6 :

OK, I'll go into less details this time, but here's my read on the game.

First, I consider Huyna Capac to be the best AI. Better than Mansa, better than Julius Caesar, better than Justinian. Watch as he gets one tech era, then two, ahead of the rest of the field, while building every wonder, founding every religion, and fielding a decent army.
So he's the ipso facto favourite for any game he features in.

In this game, we have three groups of AIs :
- The Eastern AIs : Gilgamesh and Huyna. They'll most likely fight, and the winner will dominate the game (they're better AIs, and should win their wars faster, thus start the snowball earlier).
- The Western AIs : Augustus, Mao and Boudica. They'll also fight, and the winner will probably end up as the runner-up.
- The Central AIs : Lincoln and Monty. They'll die. Lincoln first, most likely (but less likely than people expect I'd wager).

I believe that Huyna Capac will come on top of his opposition with Gilgamesh more often than not : let's call it 60/40.
Gilgamesh has more room, so he'll be bigger, but he's also on a tight timer (and obviously, should they not fight, through shared religion + common enemy, that would be a win for Huyna).
But I also believe that Gilgamesh is nevertheless slightly more likely to win the game : the one weakness of Huyna Capac is that he may "pull the slider" too soon, and thus throw a game that was 100% his to win.

So all in all, three scenarios :
40% : Gilgamesh win, Mao++/Boudica+ second, domination++/spaceship+, turn 330-400
35% : Huyna Capac Win, Boudica++/Mao+ second, cultural, turn 300ish
25% : Mao/Boudica win, Gilgamesh(?) second, spaceship++/domination+, turn 350-400
(that last scenario regroups Huyna's "throws" and the occurences where the West actually ends up dominant)

Note : Boudica has Universal Suffrage as her favourite civic, which the AIs are likely to be running end game, so that may be a factor in foiling her domination attempts.
Note 2 : This is a game where diplo victory is in play IMO. But it happens so rarely that it's hard to bet on it.

So something like Gilgamesh First, Mao Second, Spaceship or Domination, turn 350-360 would probably yield the most points on average.
But betting on Huyna would offer the best shot at a "grand slam" score (victory type and date seem more certain in that case, although yes, Huyna Capac has been known to stumble into a dominaton win).

Regarding Bismarck’s bad early tech choices, it indeed seems that military flavor of 10  can lead to it, and a bad early game hits you hard in the relatively cramped maps of AI Survivor (especially this round, where Cold climate decreases the land available). Other AIs with a military flavor like that are Genghis, Ragnar, and Shaka. Only the latter performed well on occasion.

I checked it, and indeed :

Code:

            <Type>TECH_THE_WHEEL</Type>
                       (...)
            <Flavors>
                <Flavor>
                    <FlavorType>FLAVOR_MILITARY</FlavorType>
                    <iFlavor>2</iFlavor>
                </Flavor>
                <Flavor>
                    <FlavorType>FLAVOR_PRODUCTION</FlavorType>
                    <iFlavor>6</iFlavor>
                </Flavor>
                <Flavor>
                    <FlavorType>FLAVOR_GOLD</FlavorType>
                    <iFlavor>4</iFlavor>
                </Flavor>
                <Flavor>
                    <FlavorType>FLAVOR_SCIENCE</FlavorType>
                    <iFlavor>8</iFlavor>
                </Flavor>
                <Flavor>
                    <FlavorType>FLAVOR_GROWTH</FlavorType>
                    <iFlavor>3</iFlavor>
                </Flavor>
            </Flavors>

The tech that unlocks a key ancient military unit is the least likely to be prioritized by AIs with a military flavour !  

That said, it was mainly his perfectly bad gems city spot that undid him : one tile south or east and he'd have been able to work the gems instead of getting the tiles stolen, and he'd have been able to squeeze another city between this one and the stone city.
Had he been able to work the gems, poor tech priorization wouldn't have mattered as much since he'd have turbo-researched them all !