AI race preference

[Seravy]

When the AI wants to build a settler, it will not do so in a city that is of a race which has a lower priority than any other city they own. In case of equal priorities, any of the races might build a settler.

Since I'm revising everything related to AI settler use, I'm planning to update this table as well to contain races in the following order of priority - other suggestions are welcome if I misjudged a race.

Priority 0 - Barbarians
They generate no resources and their units, although powerful, are vulnerable due to low resistance. Amazing race to have as your start, but building more of them if you can build anything else is a bad idea.

Priority 1 - Gnolls
They cannot build quite a lot of resource producing buildings, and their units are also low resistance. Another early game race which has better late game than barbarians but probably not worth mass-producing.

Priority 2 - Lizardmen, Klackons, Halfling
Halflings are a weak choice for the AI because they lack versatile military - they only have easy to kill ranged units, if the player can counter these, Halfling cities fall in no time. However, the race accelerates research on top of having every resource production building, which balances out the poor military somewhat.
Klackons work much better but they also lack versatility : Stag Beetle is an amazing unit but once the enemy manages to deal with them, not much else the race can offer. Resource production is weaker than halfling but better than barbarian and gnoll.
Lizardmen are actually a scary weapon in the hands of the AI now due to their extreme growth - they can colonize at a crazy rate and their units are pretty good for the early game. Even in midgame Dragon Turtle can be a scary force due to the armor, but they aren't all that good for late game, and their building selection is decent but doesn't allow everything. Moving across water is effective against the human player however, so maybe they should be ranked even higher?

Priority 3 - Orc
Orcs can build anything, they grow fast, and they have some not outstanding but at least decent late game units, hordes and wyvern riders can be effective, especially the latter with the high mobility can punish the player for leaving places undefended very well.

Priority 4 - Nomads
Nomads can also build everything that matters for the AI, and although they have 5 pop smaller cities due to no food buildings, their units are way better than orcs : Griffons are not only fast but have first strike and armor pierce, pikemen are way better than halberdiers, and the race has high resistance, so it's harder to defeat by resistance based units as well. Not sure if they should be priority 3 or 5 or just stay in the middle. Fewer categories can let the AI have more variety between their units as they are not limited to producing settlers of one race only.

Priority 5 - High Men, High Elf, Troll, Dwarf, Beastmen
High Men are an amazing race for the AI which is less concerned with having to maintain a lower tax rate due to extra rebels, while Paladins, Magicians and Pikemen are all amazing units and the race can build every resource building as well.
High Elves are equally good, Elven Lords are almost as powerful as Paladins, Pegasai have high mobility and are flying ranged units, other units are also above average thanks to the +1 hit bonus, and everything can be built.
Trolls are a pretty strong race, regenerating powerful units are hard to stop, and Mammoths are amazingly powerful, especially if buffed. They can build quite a lot of stuff although less than the other races in this group, the regenerating units make up for that.
Beastmen are very much like High Elves as their units are also above average and they also produce power and can build everything.
Dwarves are hard to place but I believe they belong here, as they cannot build the magic boosting buildings, but they have even more amazing military units than the others in this group and their mineral, tax and production bonus is crazy.

Priority 6 - Dark Elves, Draconian
Draconians are an obvious choice for top priority : they produce power, they fly which is important for the AI both in combat and overland, and their Doom Drakes are unstoppable, fast units that can easily wipe out opposition.
High Elves I'm not 100% sure about but their double power production paired with all buildings is scary in the hands of the AI, and their units are excellent at defense since everything can use magical ranged, and warlocks are pretty hard to get around without massive losses, so I believe it should be the best possible race for the AI, the only concern is their slow growth, so slow that it might even hold the AI back a bit too much?

[namad]

I think barbarians and gnolls and klackons might all be bad enough to be priority 0?

Although it would be nice if this system could take racial overlord unrest into account? Perhaps for every 2 points of unrest difference move the settler one priority tier?

Yes klackons work much harder than gnolls or barbarians but stag beetles are imo much worse per unit of production than berserkers or jackals.


I might move dwarves and beastmen both down a tier, or just simply create a new tier for them? (if you merge tier0 and tier1 you could add a new tier 4.5 for dwarves and beastmen?) Just on the grounds that golems/steam cannons/minotaurs/centaurs are all "meh" compared to things like paladins.

Another idea that might be impossible would be that the ai should build new barbarian settlers no matter what up until turn like 50 or something, or until they have at least 2or3 barbarian cities? but that's probably too finnicky to be possible?

That would mean my personal tier list for the ai, assuming it has to be a static list without any wiggle room:

tier0: barbarian, gnoll, klackon
tier1: lizardman, halfling
tier2: orc
tier3: nomad
tier4: beastmen, dwarves
tier5: high elf, human, troll
tier6: draconian dark elf


As a human player though in the late game if I have 8 nomad cities 1human city 1dark elf city I'll build 2or3 human settlers and 3or4 dark elf settlers, because I want paladins to stand in front of my warlocks. I think an ideal system might be to use tiers and quotas, or tiers and turn limits, or tiers and unrest modifiers, but I suppose there's no code for any of that?

dark elf cities are amazing when you start on the normal plane and get your dark elf city as your 12th city, you can just dump 1000s of gold into newly settled cities, is that something the ai can do too? if possible you could leave dark elves at tier3or4 for the first 100-200 turns then move them to tier7 after that. To simulate the way a human might handle them.

[Seravy]

we can have any amount of tiers. (well up to 128 lol)

I rather leave racial unrest out of this because the AI can and will lower taxes if needed (and doesn't need the gold as much), plus when they use the spell of return they might end up anywhere which changes their "overlord" race

Another idea that might be impossible would be that the ai should build new barbarian settlers no matter what up until turn like 50 or something, or until they have at least 2or3 barbarian cities? but that's probably too finnicky to be possible?

If they start with it they'll build at least 2 since they have no other race to chose from.
If they started with something else and found a barbarian city, well then they're stuck with only one...which is the better option : building settlers instead of building up to berserkers pretty much wastes the barbarian city I think (yes they'll have more berserkers later but then they're no longer that useful against the human player - amazing vs nodes though but most races can do that with some units or other)

Klackons have a wizard's guild and amplifying tower which is why I rated them above gnoll, who only get a cathedral and sage's guild. I guess that's...only a little bit better, maybe you're right. Stag Beetle though..it's amazing. It moves 4 so stalling doesn't stop it , it has decent armor, high enough attack in one figure that it can damage armored units unlike what most other races get - in fact it's the highest attack score on a normal unit I think. Their halberdiers can be pretty nice too with the 2 extra armor. Am I overrating the race?

I think an ideal system might be to use tiers and quotas, or tiers and turn limits, or tiers and unrest modifiers, but I suppose there's no code for any of that?

This would be way more work than it is worth. The AI will still have cities of other races from conquering neutrals or other AI who did not have the better race to build those. I'm more worried amount the limit being global instead of per plane or per continent but even that is too small of a problem to be worth changing the code for. It's not like it really matters, if an AI leaves some empty places on a continent, others will fill it.

you can just dump 1000s of gold into newly settled cities, is that something the ai can do too?

Not directly but on high enough difficulty they'll have leftover gold and if other cities are all maxed it might end up spent there. It's reasonable to assume usually not though.

[namad]

Klackon settlers are fairly bad imo (for any non-klackon overlord at least). 9 stag beetles is just not good, it doesn't deal enough damage imo. Jackals and berserkers are imo more powerful than beetles for sure at least comparing their lower cost. Although klackons have really good production and their amplfying towers are pretty solid.

Stag beetles can tank hits from most normal units, and a few fantastic units, but they lack enough attack power to slay fantastic units and with only 1 in their stack buffs don't benefit them much towards slaying fantastic creatures. This said I am not sure the race needs to be rebalanced in anyway. Their normal units are quite strong against neutral city's neutral units and once they have access to other races they can compliment the units they do have which are strong but narrowly focused. Also if you mix archers and mages with stag beetles against a lot of enemy armies the stag beetles will be able to survive the enemy hits. However, they won't be able to harm the enemy fast enough to protect their back lines. Stag beetles are really really good in groups of 1-3 though alone. As a rapid deployment response force due to their quick map movement, and quick build time (given klackon production) but I wouldn't chosen them for my doom stack unless I had to (because my only other choice was dragon turtles, or something.) I would perhaps build them to defend map choke points or reinforce my doom stacks because they're hard to pick off and get to the front lines quickly. They also cost a lot less than griffins. Stag beetles are also quite good to hold the gate of the castle when defending the city walls.

As to the barbarian cities, I was taking into account having outposts or settlers die before turn 50 for ai wizards who start as barbarians. Moreso though the barbarian question was a question of if changing tiers as turn counters change was even possible. I just needed an example to phrase the question of if you could even do that sort of thing.

I think you might be overestimating amplifying towers in general though. A dozen ai cities doesn't scare me if they're all a race which produces weak military. When you play on a difficulty setting where the ai gets 300% cheating, then their economic strength doesn't necessarily matter as much as how easily I can crush a nine stack of theirs. Although in some cases you clearly were aware of this, because you did rank orcs below nomads. Orcs and Dwarves might need another downgrade of tiers to be honest, it's hard to say, I don't know how the AI makes decisions that well.
Does the ai consider city size/settler build time/distance from settler birth city to target destination? or does it currently just build a random settler with no idea where to send it? Then once it's born chose the location? As a human I can do things like settle my klackons near coal or iron or nothing, while at the same time settling my berzerkers or paladins near mithril. That's one reason stag beetles are a bit weak, as a unit of 1 they don't benefit much from buffs or mithril or even experience, early on though they're pretty decent to base an army on. If I cannot build my paladins/berzerkers/etc near mithril on purpose, then the only solution is I suppose to build them everywhere, which will just include the mithril spot.

edit: I had another idea. Make a set of tiers of economic settlers and a set of tiers of military settlers? Make the ai alternate between it's best economic settler then it's best military settler? This way the ai could say have 2 barbarian cities and 1 lizardman city and alternate between them. Lizardmen settlers get a lot better if you only build them about half the time, instead of all the time.

[Seravy]

Does the ai consider city size/settler build time/distance from settler birth city to target destination?

No. I tried to do that and checking if there is a place that can be settled in the continent (or plane) but it didn't work. For some reason it caused the game to be unstable and randomly crash every 10 or so turns. I had to simplify it to only look at how many settlers are already in the army and where.

or does it currently just build a random settler with no idea where to send it? Then once it's born chose the location?

Pretty much this one.

Make a set of tiers of economic settlers and a set of tiers of military settlers? Make the ai alternate between it's best economic settler then it's best military settler?

That would be hard to do mainly because it's hard to define, but putting the two races into the same tier pretty much does this already (although the race selected will be random, there is no guarantee to have an even amount)

As Klackons are the same tier in my list as Halflings and Lizardmen, the AI can have healers (shaman) and ranged units (javelineers, slingers and magicians) to support them, and they also get dragon turtles to tank damage with high armor while those ranged units attack.

I rate amplifying towers high because they pretty much power up the AI's army everywhere : even if they have a weak stack of 9, if they can summon an Earth Elemental (or paladins or cast word or death etc) 4 times every battle than in itself is more force than what normal units can usually provide. Wizard's Guilds likewise as those provide the power to pay the mana crystals for that.

I rate berserkers pretty low for the AI because they have low resistance and cannot have magical weapons (without Alchemy or Uranus blessing) so any experienced human player can easily neutralize them. A wall of fire plus a fire elemental can stop a large army of berserkers.

[rgp151]

Halfling should be higher IMO. Halflings are good to create new colonies with in the mid-late game because they grow relatively fast and can be used to simply produce food to sustain units. Personally I try to pump out Halfling cities all game long and end up with essentially all farming to support my armies being done by Halflings. Slingers and Swordsmen are typically a pretty good combination on defense, but even if not you can move in 1 or 2 powerful units from different races, like High Men Magicians or Paladins, etc.

Personally I always try to get at least 1 Halfling settlement on Myrror with Adamantium, but not sure if that's too complicated for the AI to deal with.

I think Dark Elves grow too slowly to bother producing past the early game, except maybe if you have Stream of Life and/or Gia's Blessing.

[Seravy]

Halfling should be higher IMO. Halflings are good to create new colonies with in the mid-late game because they grow relatively fast and can be used to simply produce food to sustain units. Personally I try to pump out Halfling cities all game long and end up with essentially all farming to support my armies being done by Halflings. Slingers and Swordsmen are typically a pretty good combination on defense, but even if not you can move in 1 or 2 powerful units from different races, like High Men Magicians or Paladins, etc.

Personally I always try to get at least 1 Halfling settlement on Myrror with Adamantium, but not sure if that's too complicated for the AI to deal with.

I think Dark Elves grow too slowly to bother producing past the early game, except maybe if you have Stream of Life and/or Gia's Blessing.

Halflings aren't better at late game farming than anyone else, since most others can build the animist's guild for the same effect.
The AI doesn't need much food either, as it gets a maintenance discount. Slingers are horrible defenders if the human player has access to guardian wind or missile immunity, which is probably the most common unit ability in the game. They are even worse on offense when the human player gets the first turn to...just kill them all before they can shot.

It's safe to go with the assumption that the AI does not produce new cities in the late game because there is no room left. It will fill every vacant spot before turn 100 or so on higher difficulty levels.

[rgp151]

Halflings aren't better at late game farming than anyone else, since most others can build the animist's guild for the same effect.
The AI doesn't need much food either, as it gets a maintenance discount. Slingers are horrible defenders if the human player has access to guardian wind or missile immunity, which is probably the most common unit ability in the game. They are even worse on offense when the human player gets the first turn to...just kill them all before they can shot.

True. I guess they are better as a human player than as the AI. Obviously Flame Strike totally kills Halflings, but other than that they are typically still decent against the AI.

But as for farming, it's true that Animists Guild improves everyone's farming, but the nice thing about mid/late game Halfling settlements is they still tend to develop faster than most and you get the farming benefit right away instead of having to build to it.

But yeah, I see your point.

[namad]

Late game you can dump 1000 gold into a dark elf settlement to accelerate it's start.

That pays off a lot more than dumping the money into say a halfling settlement. Dark elves are much worse in the early game when your overall population and income are even lowerer.