Being mopped by the AI - tips?

[holy-death]

I returned to the game after the release and I've found that the AI is clearing the floor with me every time on medium difficulty.

I seem unable to expand as quickly as the other companies mainly because I have so few claims and resources, and from there it easily snowballs out of control. I am unsure as to how can I get any better, so I am looking for the tips from the community.

For example: I start as an expansive HQ. I take high iron resources, high aluminium resources and a steel mill. I noticed that one steel mill is not enough to produce enough steel to expand quickly. Should I forget about aluminium and make two steel mills in the beginning?

[impsuley]

Maybe yes,Expansive HQ can cover many tile.
So let's build HQ on many aluminuims and build aluminium mine at HQ level 2.

[akmoilan]

I have trouble with Manager difficulty as well, can't beat the last "Learning to play -> Practice games" (manager, any HQ, 3 AIs). I'm starting to think I'm doing something horribly wrong but it just seems the AI expands at a rate I have no idea how to keep up with -- even though it should have no bonuses on Manager and follow exactly the same rules as the player?

[Mike Honcho]

Check out Zultar on youtube. He has some good tutorials and a several multiplayer matches where they talk about strategies. For example, in this one he talks about all the thinking that goes on before picking a starting location.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyrvKg77G14

I don't have the game yet, but am very interested. I always research a game before buying, and from these videos it looks pretty great.

[Dragon]

I have to admit this game is well designed and kudos to the devs on the brilliant AI, if manager AI is not cheating. I was struggling on the last tutorial as well but then I went for an all in water, food and strat from the beginning as expansive and I won.

But I am curious... how do the AI upgrade to level 2 and 3 so quick?

[Bone White]

Originally posted by Dragon:

I have to admit this game is well designed and kudos to the devs on the brilliant AI, if manager AI is not cheating. I was struggling on the last tutorial as well but then I went for an all in water, food and strat from the beginning as expansive and I won.

But I am curious... how do the AI upgrade to level 2 and 3 so quick?

Initial placement on high quality tiles, only building mines to get the resources to upgrade. - Robotic HQ are especially good at placing on high quality tiles.

Try to have a plan for the game when you go into it, and base that around which HQs your opponents place. Lots of robotic enemies? You can bet that power will be valuable - especially if you can beat them to geothermal tiles or good wind turbine spots. A good patent rush can be your friend (build on the only carbon deposit and research carbon scrubbing to deny it to everyone else gives you the monopoly on carbon.

Never go in with "we'll see how it goes". Always plan in advance.

[holy-death]

I see I heavily neglected the HQ placement as part of the overall starting strategy. I will watch Zultar's videos to see how to improve more. Thanks for trips everyone.

[Ragna]

Originally posted by Bone White:

Originally posted by Dragon:

I have to admit this game is well designed and kudos to the devs on the brilliant AI, if manager AI is not cheating. I was struggling on the last tutorial as well but then I went for an all in water, food and strat from the beginning as expansive and I won.

But I am curious... how do the AI upgrade to level 2 and 3 so quick?

Initial placement on high quality tiles, only building mines to get the resources to upgrade. - Robotic HQ are especially good at placing on high quality tiles.

Try to have a plan for the game when you go into it, and base that around which HQs your opponents place. Lots of robotic enemies? You can bet that power will be valuable - especially if you can beat them to geothermal tiles or good wind turbine spots. A good patent rush can be your friend (build on the only carbon deposit and research carbon scrubbing to deny it to everyone else gives you the monopoly on carbon.

Never go in with "we'll see how it goes". Always plan in advance.

I'm acutally curious too.

I tested it by restarting after seeing the AI does in the first 5 mins to expand to 3 super fast (manager level) and I copied them exactly and they still would hit 3 faster then me.

Then also ultra spam the PVP otions instantly and on point. The moment I get ahead all the AI at the same time will disable as my buildings as much as possiable while generally ingoring one another.

To be honest what makes the Ai difficult is the perfect opimization/play they have since they do stuff near instantly while making the most optimal calucations. Different difficulty modes should be to slow down/make the AI more ineffiecent then static more/less resources for both players. If you acutally manage to easily beat them on "medium" you would be far drastically better then the average person in playing the game then just "average".

Even on manager I manage to make it to late game, making tons of money. The AI will always manage to buy me first (for some reason they usually target you first too), even if I buy another company to boost my company value. They'll sit in one company and still manage to save up money faster then I could make money with 2 companies.

While the AI is fun it feels that your defeating the AI script to a tee (AI does XYZ so you do this to get ahead of them or instantly lose) as oppose to each game being completely different from one another.

I manage to win a game below manager because the extra 4k gold (Made the geo plants) allowed me to make a monopoly on power when everyone else went robotics and protect it with goon squads that everyone kept blasting emps/whatever at me that I shot back at them. Which was only possiable since I had a ton of extra resources/money at the start.