Epic 48- The Absent-Minded Professor - Reports and Discussion

[Griselda]

I was sure that I asked one of my Graduate Teaching Assistants to open the reporting thread for me. I wonder why that didn't get done?

Oh well, back to the lab. Please put your reports in the box (or, post them in reply to this message).

[Kylearan]

Hi,

After I had completed my "real" Epic 48 game (see my next report), which didn't take long and turned out to be very easy despite the variant restrictions, I decided to play this Epic a second time with more self-restrictions, to make a study on the game's AI. This absent-minded brain doesn't want to be idle, you know!

I know nearly nothing about the AI: When and why it decides what, and how it affects the game flow. I confess I've never paid attention to it in all the years I've played this fine game, so it's about time, don't you think? After all the work the programmers had put into designing the AI, it deserves to be investigated!

Er...what? I'm out of my mind, you say? How I'm able to beat variant Deity games without knowing anything about the AI? Well, easy: I've never tried it out. Or, to be more precise: I can beat Deity variant games because I don't waste thoughts about the AI.

Huh? You still think I'm talking garbage? Okay, maybe we should do what all researchers should do first: Define what we are talking about...

The AI I'm talking about is the governor AI: When you don't want to micromanage things and give control over your cities to the game. When you only roughly set what the governor AI should emphasize building in your empire, and only take control over unit movement and diplomatic actions. Or, in this game, only unit movement.

No, I'm not talking about the AIs of our opponents. These I know inside out by now.


So, the governor was designed to reduce tedium and help you focus on other aspects of the game, and yet it's never used by anybody - for good reasons. But while I'm sure the opponent AIs use other algorithms to tell them what to build in their cities, I suspect these routines are similar to the governor AI. So, before Civilization IV comes out, I wanted to play one full game with all cities under governor control, just out of curiousity and masochism. And to increase the level of masochism even more, I decided to switch on automation for all workers, too. Together with the variant restrictions given by Sirian, this left me with military unit movement and city placement as the only points of influence I had on this game. Perfect for the absent-minded professor, isn't it? Not much to distract me from my studies... Let's see how easy Monarch level will be! (And how high my frustration tolernce will be, too... )

I expected fewer granaries and fewer barracks as I normally would have built, so building the Pyramids and/or Sun Tzu's Art of War would be very helpful. Alas, the only thing I could do to influence that would be to get masonry (and feudalism) before other wonder-enabling techs and hope that the governor AI would start to build these wonders in a core city. Also, the (probably fewer than usual) workers would have to improve that city, and the governor AI would have to ignore wonders like the Oracle.

Hm...thinking about it, I guess I shouldn't count on getting any useful wonder at all.

After loading the initial save, I replicated my opening of my "real" game and moved the settler, then founded Hattusas. The governor was contacted, and set as follows:



These options remained the same until the end of the game.

Research was set to ceremonial burial, to give the AI more chances of starting a temple (needed with the few luxuries I knew I would get), and to get more expensive techs from huts. Then, masonry was researched next for the pyramids, then the philosophy gambit was tried.

I got several techs from huts this time: Bronze working, warrior code, mysticism (damn!), the wheel, iron working and horseback riding. The AI built lots of settlers, which I had expected; however, what I hadn't expected was the low number of military units I got. I knew the barbs were raging. The AI did not, and so finding an escort for a settler was tricky sometimes, and I was able to send out fewer scouts (as in: warrior scouts, as the AI didn't grant me a single scout...) than I normally would have preferred.

In 2150BC, I had my first "Argh!" moment, when the AI decided to start a settler and a worker in two towns that wouldn't have enough population for them once enough shields would be accumulated. But: At least a worker had been started, earlier than I had hoped for!

Research was slower than in my real game, too, due to lack of micromanagement. But I managed to get philosophy first nonetheless, got republic with it, and revolted.



Three settlers, two workers and three spearmen under production: Not too shabby, eh? No granary, barracks or pyramids, but who am I to complain? (Something's missing in the production orders of the AIs as well, but I didn't notice that until later...)

In 1050AD, my workers still hadn't connected any one of my two luxuries, but Hattusas now started to build the Great Library: A second "Argh!" moment was celebrated. The library? On monarch?!? Even with slowed growth and no contacts, I didn't feel I needed that one...

Since I wasn't allowed to change any orders anyway, I didn't pay much attention what my cities were building exactly. I knew several cities would waste turns starting settlers/workers too early, but I didn't thought about that:



See how angry the domestic advisor looks. Now guess how angry I looked back! I had two choices now: Wait a millennium or two and hope for the miracle of my workers somehow bringing irrigation to Hattusha, or violate Sirian's variant rules and change project there. I opted for the latter and hope you will forgive me.

Another "Argh!" moment can be had by looking closely at the screenshot. My cities lack improvements, I only have very few workers, and what is that worker west of Hattusha (and north of my unconnected luxuries...) doing?!?

Finally, my first luxury goes online in 430BC, followed by the second one in 210BC. There IS hope after all! And I got a great wonder, too: The Great Library. And even better, the AI starts to build the forbidden palace! In Aleppo, a shield-poor coastal city which is stuck at size two for along time... :wallbash:

I found the orders of what to build very strange. Lots of settlers and some workers, but not many military units. Lots of libraries, but no temples. No granaries, no barracks. And when a massive uprising occured in 90BC, I noticed what was missing as well: Offensive units! I only had warriors and spearmen, and not a single unit with an attack rating greater than 1. Weird! That made the founding of more cities quite a difficult task, and I hoped nobody would decide to attack me. France seemed to sense my weakness and demanded code of laws, and of course I caved. (On monarch, no less!)

Many shields got lost when cities formerly building the Temple of Artemis, the Great Lighthouse or the Hanging Gardens auto-switched to other projects like colisseums in size 3 cities... (Again, Sirian's variant rules got violated. But I couldn't be persuaded to leave my research lab to correct the AI mistake and clear the shield box before the switch...)

In 110AD, when I was already medieval, my first offensive unit got produced: An archer! Celebrations everywhere! The massive uprising was good for one thing, though: With careful baiting, I was able to promote several spears from regular (ugh...) to elite.

In 300AD, Hattusas even began to build Sun Tzu's, the one wonder (apart from the Pyramids) I really wanted to have! But of course it was way too late then, and my workers had done a bad work improving its tiles, as it was making only 13spt at size 12, so I didn't get it.

Other landmarks were my first three-man chariot in 380AD(!), and completion of the FP in 440AD. Quite a feat for a size two Aleppa to build, won't you agree?



Time to say something about my economy. Of course I had no marketplace anywhere, and I already begun to question the wisdom of becoming a republic. At 0% science, I only had an income of 4gpt - after completing the FP! Uh oh. I settled a bit more dense than in my first game, to make use of all the settlers the governor produced, and to help with the upkeep costs.

520AD saw the training of my first knight, regular of course, and 530AD gave me my first catapult. Wow, I was really impressed.

580AD was the year somebody else finished Sun Tzu's. And what does my run for it got switched to? The Knight's Templar, which I completed the next turn. AAARGH. Yes, more troops, that's what I really needed right now. Sistine's would have been much better, but that one was already under construction in one of my size two jungle cities... Can you tell I had loads of fun?

Education came out of the library in 620AD, and I started (slow) research on astronomy. I also began to disband some units to save money, and merged some settlers back into cities. In 670AD, my first longbowman got produced - wow, haven't had any one of those in quite a while.

I also slightly regretted setting "science" to "often" in the governor production screen. All my tundra cities stuck at size two started to build libraries instead of harbors! (In fact, they never built a harbor during the whole game!)

I got lucky and got Bach's - my first useful wonder. But a real milestone was reached in 960AD, when my FIRST BARRACKS completed! Unbelievable! I'm choking on units, but now at least I can choke on veteran units, yay! Now that all lands are settled, no more settlers got produced, thankfully. Still no temples, markets or granaries, though.

First courthouse came in 1060AD, first temple and first marketplace get started in 1100AD. Granaries? Not in this game. None would ever be built.

In 1130AD, French workers look industrial while I still lack three medieval techs. I become industrial myself in 1290AD.



The worker AI is a real genius, by the way: They road before chopping jungle, they don't chop forests at all, they improve far-away and corrupted cities before the core...I knew all that already, but it's still a pain to witness again and again.

Status of my empire in 1315AD: 46 cities, 35 workers, 17 spearmen, 18 pikemen, 14 musketmen, 12 knights, 3 cannons, 2 three-man chariots, and 15 crusaders. I disbanded some of these units, but not many. Normally, I would keep a much, much smaller army and rely upon optimized cities switching to military in emergencies. This time, with lousy cities, the no-switch rule and my governor AI rule, I was forced to keep a bigger army in case I would get attacked, which hurt my abilities to research badly.

In 1330AD, Joanie contacted me and offered me a deal I gladly accepted:



That deal got cancelled again by France in 1450AD, though. Several wars broke out which I stayed out of, of course. I lost more shields in useless attempts to build Universal Suffrage, but nearly have an orgasm when only one turn after discovering Scientific Methods, one of my first ring cities actually starts to build the Theory of Evolution! :D Shortly thereafter, I get offered world maps for the first time - but France wants to have Sci Meth for them, so I had to decline.

1555AD: Hattusas is now size 13, and, surpise surprise, starts to build a temple! But then, disaster struck: Lots my cities start to build settlers again, which I'm forced to merge back for more than a hundred years. Many size 13 cities built settlers too, which is incredibly stupid. I had no idea why, until I got offered maps again, this time for medicine, in 1575AD.



No, I don't want to settle at that rubble spot, thank you very much! Turn after turn, I prayed that anyone would found a new city there so that I would no longer drown in settlers. It nearly drove me mad, having to merge back 5 or more settlers each turn, but it only stopped when a cultural border expanded. :wallbash:

The governor AI really managed not to screw things up for once, and I became the proud owner of the Theory of Evolution in 1650AD. I took Atomic Theory and Electricity as my bonus techs, and I was really impressed when Hattusas(!) started to build the Hoover Dam. Way to go, governor!

In 1705AD, my only source of oil is exhausted. *sigh* Okay, has to go without...

In 1720AD, the French impress me by starting Hoover as well - wow, they had electronics already?!? Looks like the space race might actually be a race this time! But I completed Hoover in 1730AD.

In 1762AD, every single city of mine is building guerrillas. Er...how about granaries? Harbors? Banks? Stock exganged? ANYTHING else?

I became modern in 1772AD, and started to research rocketry next so that instead of guerrillas, TOW infantry could be built for the one war I still had to make, to acquire rubber. And what happened when I had the tech? My cities started to build mobile SAMs... So I began to upgrade guerrillas.

In 1794AD, one turn before I planned to attack France, suddenly most of my cities stopped building mobile SAMs and started to build banks and stock exchanges instead. *sigh* Anyway, I have no idea what military the French had, so this might get interesting.



10 TOWs and 5 mobile SAMs moved into French territory, the rest awaited the French counter - which never came. How lame. France buys Babylon and Zulus against us, but in the end, this war was extremely easy. I captured Toulouse with rubber and oil and spark my golden age. During the war, I notice I have a cruise missile - I actually had to look it up in the civilopedia to learn what exactly it does, as I never build those.

I'm glad the governor had given me 7 artillery at least, so infantry landing parties weren't so painful to kill. Since I had met my objectives to acquire rubber for the spaceship, I continued to fight defensively only and waited for peace offers. In the end, I had to give mass production for peace, which was fine with me. The war had been boring: Monarch AI production is sooo slow...

During my war with France, all my cities only built military, which was quite annoying - a lot of disbanding happened. But once I had made peace with France, things like research labs were produced, despite the war with the Zulus. It looks like the governor distinguishes between a war against a foe on the same continent, and a foe on another landmass. Is this difference made by the opponent's AI as well? If yes, starting an early war with the AIs just to slow them down, during Sid level games for example, wouldn't be so effective afer all?

Two leaders got spawned, and in 1888AD, the Heroic Epic got started - but not the Apollo program. Hooray. Only in 1896AD, finally Apollo gets started, followed by - the Manhattan Project and lots of ICBMs.

In 1953AD, I finally had all techs needed for a space victory, but had to learn that the governor never starts to build a part of the spaceship, so winning was impossible for me under my restrictions. Too bad, but actually building all the parts wasn't really necessary for me; I had met my masochistic goal of playing a full game under governor control, and the French only had built 3 parts by then. It had been fun, and somewhat interesting to see the difference to a micromanaged game! Not really a surprise of course, but still.

Now that it's over, I'd like to congratulate my governors of my size two tundra cities. They had built libraries, universities, and research labs, temples, colisseums and cathedrals, built barracks and military units, but never managed to build a single harbor. Well done!

Now I'm ready for the civ4 governor. I think.

Thanks for reading. See you in my report for my "real" game.

-Kylearan

[Rik Meleet]

My report

Can be found here

Launch in 1788AD.

[Rik Meleet]

Kylearan: well, it sure was entertaining to read your report on the AI-controlled game

I can feel your frustration. 2:

[Sullla]

Here's my report in the usual location.

http://www.kalikokottage.com/civ3/sullla/Epic48.html

As always, I'd love to hear what you think, either by replying to this thread or through contact in private at my email address.

[LKendter]

Based on the rules of no pre-builds I am writing off all ancient age wonders. The earliest wonder I will risk may be Copernicus. It depends how long before the wonder pop ups give me a hint of tech leadership.

With a space race goal and "limited" warring republic will be the government of choice. I plan to beeline to literature as early libraries will be key. The big question will be how large can I make the empire. Farmer's Gambit is out with the annoying raging barbs. The early goal is to hopefully research something unique so that the AIs will contact me. Without any trades it will take to long to become the tech leader.

I interpreted the no F4 screen to also mean no embassies. Of course, I don't know how much value they have without looking at F4.

Expansionist did earn its worth with a free settler in 3150 BC. Ceremonial Burial was free in 3000 BC. Warrior Code was free in 2670 BC. Masonry was free in 1950 BC. Mysticism was free in 1075 BC. I got one of those annoying free villages in 1750 BC that was so far from my home it wasn't worth keeping. I got the advanced village again in 1150BC that would have been pillaged to death and instantly abandoned.

We became aware of Spain in 3100 BC. France was found 2900 BC and they contacted us to trade Burial for Bronze Working. Spain contacted us in 875 BC to trade Iron Working for Writing. I become aware of Rome in 10 AD, Babylon in 50 AD, the Iroquois in 360 AD, and the Zulu in 450 AD. The AI tries several times during the game to sell me Monarchy. The Zulu offer an absurd in 1515 AD wanting to give me Printing Press for Communism.

I got screwed early with the combat rolls losing 2 attacking warriors to barbs. This forced a higher luxury rate and delayed my growth when the barbs killed a pop point. Have I mentioned I *hate* playing with barbs? I haven't seen it in so long that I forget that barbs will use roads and I watch 2 workers die. I never knew barb horses had blitz ability. WT????

I did pull of the Philosophy gambit to hit Republic first.

I forget how much the 3-man chariot sucks since it takes away the regular horseman, making mountain fighting a pain. It will take ages to get rid of those barbarians past the mountains. The massive barb uprising occurs in 30 BC when I am 2 turns from leaving the Ancient Age.

I saw no rules against accepting flips, so Toulouse joins our empire in 410 AD.

During the Middle Ages I did an atypical science run of rushing to Astronomy and Economics before Feudalism. I felt this was the best chance at the first to key wonders I wanted.

I completed the following wonders: Copernicus in 800 AD, Smith's in 990 AD (tripping our GA!), Bach's in 1170 AD (that will allow 0% luxury tax soon), Newton's in 1295 AD, Hoover in 1605 AD, ToE in 1675 AD (taking Fission and Rocketry), SETI in 1768 AD, and the Internet in 1792 AD. I did cut it close on ToE as France starting building ToE, as I was almost finished.

I entered the Industrial Age in 1200 AD. I can tell at least Spain is way behind when their free walls disappear several turns later. I finally notice smokestacks started to show up on the AI civs in 1415 AD after I have already completed 6 IA techs.

Rome was the first civ to die in 1505 AD. The Iroquois followed shortly after in 1575 AD.

This was the first game in ages that I really felt explorers had value. Without the ability to trade maps, this was the only way to map out the other continent. Not to mention getting a better lay of this continent.

The exterior casing requires rubber, so I felt a war to get it was justified under the rules. I saw key natural resources as those required to launch the spaceship based on the example. However, before I even start the war I find I am also missing uranium. There is no question that a war against France is justified. The war begins when I fire artillery into their lands to get the war option without using the diplomacy screen. It actually turns into a bit of a challenge when Spain also declares war. Since I never bother to get knights or cavalry as they distracted from the goal, I didn't need this extra enemy. Not to mention I hate fighting speed 6 conquistadors. I tripped a MPP and Babylon is also fighting me.

The war with France lasted from 1758 AD to 1772 AD. It only took the loss of 3 cities to talk.

The war with Spain lasted from 1760 AD to 1814 AD. Spain is a shell of its former self.

The war with Babylon lasted from 1758 AD to 1802 AD. I guess he got tired of the bombers hitting is coast and the number of ships that were sunk. It looks like the invasion fleet I started won't be needed, as I was beginning to think I would need to visit his continent to end the war.

In 1760 AD I secured the needed uranium. The French presence in the northern tundra went in 1762 AD. The Spanish presence in the northern tundra went in 1764 AD. Rubber was secured in 1768 AD.

The follow was the progress toward launching:
Apollo in 1792 AD, Cockpit in 1802 AD, Docking Bay in 1806 AD, Engine in 1812 AD, Storage in 1818 AD, Exterior Casing in 1830 AD, Thrusters in 1838 AD, Fuel Cells in 1840 AD, Life Support in 1844 AD, Party Lounge in 1856 AD and Stasis Chamber in 1870 AD.

I am not sure if I managed to keep the variant intent. The French war took out 3 cities. One for rubber, one for uranium, and a third that interfered with protecting the uranium. The Babylon war never saw a city exchange hands. I got that to end my bombing their ships out of existence and damaging the tiles that I could reach with bombers. The Spanish were incredibly stubborn. I kept increasing the pain level with lost units and cities but the wouldn't contact me for peace for ages. They finally give in when I was about to produce my first modern armor army. Over half the Spanish empire was destroyed.

Take away the annoying rule of can't contact for peace and I could have easily dropped 10 to 20 turns off the launch date. The AI civs barely made the modern age. Without the wasted luxury rate during the Spanish war I would have launched before the last of the AI civs went modern.

Our apologies if the professor's notes are a bit disorganized and scattered.

[bed_head7]

So I guess I need to link elsewhere if I want to put pictures in my post?

[Griselda]

Sorry, but yes. We're not able to host pictures at this time.

[Sullla]

bed_head7, try going to CivFanatics and uploading some of your pictures to their server; I'm sure Thunderfall won't mind as long as you hold it to just a couple. For instructions on how to do this, check the Succession Games Forum, and this thread in particular:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=55122

Good luck, and we're anxious to hear from you.

[bed_head7]

I think I remember seeing that microbe had his own thread at CFC just for his Epics, so maybe I'll do the same. I'll polish up my writeup and maybe put together a couple more screenshots, and then post something over there later on tonight and post the link here.