AI management of planets in sectors is absolutely awful...!

[Mac]

Ok... I have seen enough...

Granted the sectors OVERALL usually manage to produce a slight surplus of minerals, energy and sciene...

The individual management of the planets however is dreadfully inefficient and simple put HORRIBE. I encourage everyone and especially the developers to take a serious look at how the INDIVIDUAL planets are managed or rather RUINED by the AI.

In my recent game I had close to a dozen sectors with several planets in each of them.
I've experimented a lot with the different focus options (Financial Focus, Industrial Focus...) as well as "Allow Redevelopment" and "Respect Tile Resources" and I was SHOCKED.

The AI seems to be completely unable to grasp the concept of FOOD in this game!!!

I want to tell you my favorite story about a rich planet with 100% habitability and 23 tiles:

Situation:
23 planet size
21 population
20+ food surplus
allow redevelopment OFF
respect tile resources ON
sector has been set to FINANCIAL FOCUS from the very start
21 out of 23 tiles have buildings (mostly hydroponics farms)
both remaining tiles have no resource on them

What SHOULD happen:
Power plants should be built on both remaining tiles since no other resources are on them and the sector is set to financial focus. The planet already has enough food to rapidly grow the remaining 2 population and easily feed them.

What THE AI DOES:
Both remaining tiles were used to build hydropinics farms on them. After the hydroponics farms were finished the AI proceeded to UPGRADE both of them.

My INTERMEDIATE THOUGHTS:
Ok... the AI wanted to grow the remaining population really fast apparently to minimize the time it takes to reach maximum population... ok... I can understand that... kind off...

Nope... AI is COMPLETELY CLUELESS:
I then allowed the AI to redevelop tiles and not respect tile resources. I was hoping the AI would realize that this particular planet produces WAY TOO MUCH FOOD and replace at least some of the hydroponics farms with POWER PLANTS since the sector is set to financial focus. Nope... didn't happen. AI started to replace hydroponics farms with basic science labs.

Yup... AI is now STUCK IN A LOOP:
Wait... what? Basic science labs? I thought the focus was set to finances? But wait... IT GETS BETTER... Not only does it replace one of the hydroponics farms with a basic science lab. NOPE... once the basic science lab is finished on the tile the AI replaces it with a hydroponics farm again... AND WE ARE BACK TO WHERE WE STARTED!

END OF STORY:
I have a planet which seems to almost exclusively produce food to burn and eats away at my energy reserves although it was supposed to produce them. Furthermore it seems to be stuck in an everlasting loop of replacing the same buildings over and over...

Are you serious? How hard can it be to add some lines of code which tell the AI TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT HOW MUCH FOOD THE PLANET HAS AND NOT DO THIS? Pretty simple is the answer...! (And yes... I do have experience with coding...)

This needs to be REWORKED COMPLETELY!

Thanks for reading...

TLDR:
1. AI keeps building and upgrading hydroponics farms on planets that are fully populated and have 20+ food surplus.
2. If you allow the AI to redevelop tiles and not respect tile resources you can often watch them literally running in circles. Hydroponics Farm I is replaced by Basic Sciene Lab I. As soon as Basic Sciene Lab I finishes it is being replaced by Hydroponics Farm I again and so on... I've personally watched this happen... The punch line: The sector was set to FINANCIAL FOCUS!

[F-22]

I gave up on sector AI, to get around what you described I only give the sector AI control of a planet if the planet is basically completely developed and then I don't allow it to change tiles. The sector AI is basically only good for upgrading buildings and even doing that it does it slow.

Because the sector AI is so crap i've even run at 6/5 planets because my other planets were not completely developed, but the negative modifier isn't really that bad, for my race they have a % bonus to minerals and energy so it's not even a problem going over the planet limit, I was already nearly rolling in cash.

At this point I NEVER put new planets into sectors, the sector AI is just trash.

[Casey]

Sector AI is WIP, expect improvements over the coming months. Basically we bought the barebones Stellaris. I assume due to publisher deadlines but I could be very wrong. Future updates will put the meat on the bones.

[Pseudo]

They recently said they were working on improving it so I think you can relax and not capitalize every three words.

[Mac]

@F-22
Thanks for the reply.
That is a really good suggestion to circumvent the problem. However I just cannot grasp why they even implemented sectors if the only solution is to micromanage every planet by yourself... It adds even more work to the micromanagement... The exact opposite of what the sector system was supposed to do.

@casey28xxx
I find it a really big deal if a game like this gets released with such a horrible AI. If this was early access I could understand it but it is not. The AI does not even try to appear smart... it blatantly slaps you in the face with how little time was invested in it. The things that I explained in my post could be easily fixed within a couple of days at the most. Some simple lines of codes which check for food surplus, population size, sector preferences and resources on tiles and weigh them against each other. It does not need to be perfect by no means. However all the AI does instead is build farms and more farms and more farms... Calling this a work in progress would be like calling a brick a house in progress...

[Mac]

@Pseudo
Ye ok... if you want me to build you a house give me a call. I will just put a single brick on the ground after several years of "development" then charge you the full price and say "relax buddy I'm working on your house".

I am getting the impression that the developers were hoping that in a complex games like this the customer might not realize which corners were cut during development. I think I have the right to be slightly upset if I realize that my house has no windows at all.

Oh right... sorry... I'll just "relax and wait"...
Apparently "early access" also applies to full releases now...

Definately the last paradox game I ever bought...

Really cheap product...

[MaxStr]

It's almost better to just take the 10% hit for each planet over so you can manage it all yourself. I hate the sector mechanic so far, its rules of not redeveloping don't even work and it can't manage robots/slaves/etc.

[Mac]

@MaxStr
Just read that you can edit the amount of core planets in the 00_defines.lua file in your steam games folder... I might increase that to 100, set the costs for removing sectors to 0 and start a new game another time in a really small galaxy where I can micromanage every planet combined with the suggestions from F-22.
The really bad AI and the stale midgame have killed the game for me at the moment though...

[BoogieMan]

As good as the game is, a lot of stuff feels like a placeholder...