Game Difficulty

[Llywylln]

It seems to me that the most important difference in what happens in various game difficulty settings is that the opponents get increased rates of Food, Production, Research and Growth that they don't 'deserve' just because of the difficulty setting.

In the game I just started, on turn 100, the Alkari had the second highest population (15) they had 300+ research, 5 Colonies, and the strongest space fleet. So they managed to produce scout ships, research, colony ships, war ships, and still have enough people to put farmers in cells.

I really dont like it when the computer players use a different set of rules than the human players. The AI 'choices' and strategies should be different according to difficulty but the games rules and functionality should be identical. They should have to earn everything the same way a player does and not get pennies from heaven.

[conqueroradams]

I think You are severly overestimating the capabilities of "AI" in video games.

[MAD]

Its easier to just give them bonuses than write an AI

[conqueroradams]

Originally posted by MAD:

Its easier to just give them bonuses than write an AI

You are saying that, like there are people who can create an AI without billions of dollars

[purdueguy]

They should at least make all the races more diplomatically aggressive in the higher difficulty levels. I can always pacify the AI while I bide my time even on Very Hard difficulty.

[Imricdaelf120741]

I'm perfectly fine with giving the AI bonuses on harder difficulties, as well as better algorithms.

However, cheating should be reserved for Extreme. I don't like playing on Hard or Very Hard and having a fleet of 10 to 15 ships show up on my doorstep from the other side of the galaxy on turn 70 just because I met that race on turn 50 and did nothing to anger them other than exist.

[purdueguy]

Originally posted by Imricdaelf120741:

I'm perfectly fine with giving the AI bonuses on harder difficulties, as well as better algorithms.

However, cheating should be reserved for Extreme. I don't like playing on Hard or Very Hard and having a fleet of 10 to 15 ships show up on my doorstep from the other side of the galaxy on turn 70 just because I met that race on turn 50 and did nothing to anger them other than exist.

Are you seeing this? So far I am finding Very Hard to be pretty easy. Maybe because I play with Terran and they have the -20% ship cost trait.

I am finding the spiral galaxy more hard right now then the circle galaxy since I was boxed in with a psylon and he was better at grabbing planets.

[Maj_Doogie]

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

I think You are severly overestimating the capabilities of "AI" in video games.

Actually, if the Devs just do the math on tech/production order, you will come up with the most efficient order in the early game, based on each type (Production/Lithovore/Psilon) etc. Little AI Cheating needed. It's all math.

[madocs]

SO many times I hear this! The AI is cheating!
Truth is that a good AI is very hard and time consuming to do! Over time it will get better as they work on it more. BUT you will still need for the AI to cheat against us wiley humans!

[conqueroradams]

Originally posted by Maj_Doogie:

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

I think You are severly overestimating the capabilities of "AI" in video games.

Actually, if the Devs just do the math on tech/production order, you will come up with the most efficient order in the early game, based on each type (Production/Lithovore/Psilon) etc. Little AI Cheating needed. It's all math.

The Player would still crush the AI in any war.
The AI could keep up with the player in terms of infrastructure, but never on millitary prowess.

[Llywylln]

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

I think You are severly overestimating the capabilities of "AI" in video games.

As a person who actually programmed AI and assisted in some of the reasearch that led to the current state of AI programming i have a fairly good idea of what is possible. What WG is willing to do or capable of remains to be seen.

[Llywylln]

Originally posted by MAD:

Its easier to just give them bonuses than write an AI

Ok, you walk into a casino to try your luck at blackjack. Like all of the games in the Casino, they know that their dealer will win at least 50% of the time overall. (The aren't gambling, you are) So in order to reflect this, the Casino decides that the dealer will flip a coin at the start of each hand and if the dealer wins the toss, he wins the hand. If not, you get to play normally. This process is much easier for the casino, so you would have no problem with it?

[Llywylln]

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

Originally posted by MAD:

Its easier to just give them bonuses than write an AI

You are saying that, like there are people who can create an AI without billions of dollars

Yes, you can. You can create them in a matter of hours if you know what you are doing. 'AI' doesn't mean 'the Terminator' all it is a a set of decision making systems that analyze information and produce 'intelligent' results based on the input. Sure Siri and the Google coice recognition software are a lot more robust than that but both of them are based on work that was done at colleges around the world for many years prior to the smartphone. No professor was ever given 'billions' in reasearch grants to do that.

[Llywylln]

Originally posted by Maj_Doogie:

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

I think You are severly overestimating the capabilities of "AI" in video games.

Actually, if the Devs just do the math on tech/production order, you will come up with the most efficient order in the early game, based on each type (Production/Lithovore/Psilon) etc. Little AI Cheating needed. It's all math.

I'd be very surprised if they hadn't already done that. The 'most efficient' path should weigh towards the higher difficulties and more blunt choices should weigh easier. I would also like to see the Saakra and the Klackons doing more dumb things and the Psilon playing smarter for obvious reasons.

[Llywylln]

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

Originally posted by Maj_Doogie:

Actually, if the Devs just do the math on tech/production order, you will come up with the most efficient order in the early game, based on each type (Production/Lithovore/Psilon) etc. Little AI Cheating needed. It's all math.

The Player would still crush the AI in any war.
The AI could keep up with the player in terms of infrastructure, but never on millitary prowess.

They also said an AI could never beat a Human Chess Master... until it happened.

[conqueroradams]

Originally posted by quinion:

Originally posted by conqueroradams:

The Player would still crush the AI in any war.
The AI could keep up with the player in terms of infrastructure, but never on millitary prowess.

They also said an AI could never beat a Human Chess Master... until it happened.

Chess is a significantly simpler game than a 4X title.

And I meant AI as in Artifical Intelligence

The real one, not the ones that are used in games.
I never even heard of anything that could pass the Turing test without exploiting some human trait.