AI Player Too Difficult

[miqrogroove]

As a novice player, I find the AI opponent extremely frustrating. I am having trouble developing strategies against it. The only one that worked so far is to Control Europe in the first two turns using a 10 point handicap. At a 5 point handicap, I can't even achieve a stalemate because the computer always finds a way to out-influence me, or to force some kind of DEFCON suicide situation, or some other nuance that I've overlooked.

I wish for a way to adjust the computer's difficulty.

[Benkyo]

It would be pretty pointless to make the AI worse than it already is. I understand that you are describing your experience, and therefore the experience of "average" players isn't important, but as soon as you start learning some basic strategy and become familiar with the decks, you will find that it is almost impossible to lose against the AI.

If you are having trouble, try playing as the USSR with no handicaps, as the AI is even weaker as the US, and +2 to the US is widely considered "standard" for a balanced game. You can also check out twilightstrategy.com for basic strategy advice.

A key flaw in the AI play is that it will often play 2 OPs into controlled countries to break your control if you have domination of a region, but not follow through to gain control. As long as you deny the AI domination of regions, and top up your own domination of regions, the AI will continue to play inefficiently and the constant 2-for-1 exchange will increase your OPs advantage.

[Twelvefield]

Originally posted by Benkyo:

It would be pretty pointless to make the AI worse than it already is. I understand that you are describing your experience, and therefore the experience of "average" players isn't important, but as soon as you start learning some basic strategy and become familiar with the decks, you will find that it is almost impossible to lose against the AI.

If you are having trouble, try playing as the USSR with no handicaps, as the AI is even weaker as the US, and +2 to the US is widely considered "standard" for a balanced game. You can also check out twilightstrategy.com for basic strategy advice.

A key flaw in the AI play is that it will often play 2 OPs into controlled countries to break your control if you have domination of a region, but not follow through to gain control. As long as you deny the AI domination of regions, and top up your own domination of regions, the AI will continue to play inefficiently and the constant 2-for-1 exchange will increase your OPs advantage.

Well said! The AI isn't all that strong, but it does do a few things well and it does have some tricks.

You just have to learn the decks. Once you figure out the early game, you can play the late game variant, since that presents cards that you wouldn't ordinarily see all that much.

For whatever reason, the AI doesn't hold Europe very well, while Europe is a major key to winning the game. If you hold Europe at all costs, you may or may not win, but you put yourself in a pretty good position to see how the game works.

GMT Games, which produces the boardgame version, told the story about a PC player who played his hundredth game. The publisher laughed, pointing out that he'd maybe played a couple dozen games with the boardgame, tops. The PC version makes it very easy to just keep playing over and over again until you get it.

[miqrogroove]

Originally posted by Benkyo:

As long as you deny the AI domination of regions, and top up your own domination of regions, the AI will continue to play inefficiently and the constant 2-for-1 exchange will increase your OPs advantage.

Perhaps you could elaborate on this. I seem to spend many points in the early war gaining or just trying to gain domination of Asia and Middle East. Then by mid war, the computer is already busy invading Africa and the Americas. How do I gain any advantage going into the reshuffle?

[Benkyo]

It's way too big a topic to go into here, but you should probably play into Mid War battlegrounds when you can before Turn 4. Try playing all your free OPs only into battlegrounds and countries that give you access to battlegrounds. If you find yourself filling up 2+ stability non-battlegrounds, ask yourself if it's worth it, and if you'll regret the waste of OPs later.

[miqrogroove]

Had a good game today with a bunch of luck. Headlined the AI out of Isreal, couped the AI out of Iran and Panama, AI's coup failed. Gained domaination of Asia in turn 1 due to sloppy play by the AI and gained control of Europe in turn 2 by headlining Olympic Games. AI held the Europe Scoring card for the whole turn and didn't put up much of a fight.

[Benkyo]

How is headlining Olympic Games a way of gaining anything other than VPs (or losing)? Are you saying the AI boycotted at DEFCON 3, thereby giving you 4 OPs?
Europe control is an easy way to exploit the flaws in the AI, but it doesn't make for good practice for real games.