KuroTora

Join Date 07/2004

Does the Hard computer AI cheat? Or am I still too green?

Hey there, im not super skilled with Sins yet. Im on my 6th game now, but I am usually a quick learner to new strategy games. So here is my scenario.

I moved from a multi-star medium game with 5 average AIs, to a small 7 planet, 1 star system vs. 1 hard AI. It appears that the AI had about 10-12 light frigates during our first encounter, while I had 4. Near the end of the match (at which point I said "screw this noise"), through scouting that I did I confirmed we both owned the same number of planets (2), same resources (3 crystal & 3 metal), same 2 planet types (homeworld Terran, and 1 huge asteroid base), yet at the end it had 32 or so Light Frigates, while I owned 6 (I lost about 7).

We were both TEC (by random chance).

We appeared to have the same income in game, and even at the end of the match when I DID finally destroy his Capital Ship, about 10 min later the AI had another Capital Ship and the additional 20 light frigates (maxed out at 32) that closed up my escape routes. Basically he surrounded me and kept me from expanding, which was the end of the match when my remote sensors saw he was about to colonize the only other 2 worlds (both were ice worlds).

Is there something I am missing here about the early economy since I am still "new"? Or did the computer just have extra resources to pool from that I dont due to the programming?

Thanks for the response!

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Unless you're playing unfair AI, the AI does not cheat in any way. Perhaps, you're not using the market system? The hard AI does not cheat. The update 1.04 patch has the best AI so far.

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The AI probably just devoted more resources to it's fleet instead of research.

Barring that, check your settings, make sure you don't have him set to "unfair".

Hard difficulty does not get any advantages, just a better AI.

Unfair difficulty *does* give them more resources, but that's it (aside from better AI).

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Hey could be. I use the Market to sell excess resources when I am low on certian ones, but im mindfull of the price changes.

I am still not certian how lowering and raising my asking price alters the market, outside of supply and demand from other players - is that all that was intended with those buttons? Or is there more I dont understand?

So I did use the market when I was too low or too high on a resource, but otherwise I diddnt spend any at all. However since I was usually strapped anyway, my expendatures were equal to my income almost all the time, with very little in savings.

Maybe I am still not skilled enough to take on the Hard AI yet.

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I am still not certian how lowering and raising my asking price alters the market, outside of supply and demand from other players - is that all that was intended with those buttons? Or is there more I dont understand?

This doesn't matter against the AI. When you list resources on the market (not quick sell), they are bought whenever anyone buys resources. Setting prices allows you to undercut other human players so that yours get bought before theirs. But when you're playing against the AI, it doesn't matter

Although I'm fairly certain raising it above the quick-buy price won't get them sold to the AI either.

Hope that helps

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Ah ok! I had no idea, so theoretically if the market was higher than my asking price, if someone bought resources then I would get the money for it, and not the "black market". Thats pretty neet, I had no idea.

I can see how this would work against an AI, but unless the AI bought resources at my price, and since giving resources to a competetor would be a bad idea at a low price, its a bit of a double edged sword.

But thanks for clearing that up Annatar11!

After reviewing my play style, the few errors I made were :

Not upgrading my home Terran colony within the first 12 minutes (usually I never upgrade till 30min or 45min), which resulted in him having 12.8cr/s to my 10.1cr/s by minute 14
Devoting 2 Civilian tech research centers too early in the game, especially on a small map where early expanding doesnt work as well
Not using a colony ship and small raiding party to capture colonies in the beginning, and waiting for all enemies to be dead before capping the planet

Otherwise we seem neck and neck in my current 1v1 Hard AI game, even on micro-managing (im pretty quick from playing lots of games all the time).

I appreciate the help guys, any further tips appreciated!

Edit : Further update - I was able to win my 2nd game against a Hard AI, and hopefully this will be a useful post to players that are learning.

By focusing on building units (the age old addage, your units win the game for you, not your buildings), and upgrading my planets for maximum output as soon as I was able to hold my ground, gave me an equal footing for income.

That, and having a large enough defense fleet to keep enemy siege frigates at bay gave my raiding group time to move into a system and destroy vital equipment. Once I had enough, purchasing a Dreadnaught Capital Ship, and buying 5 siege frigates sealed the game once I was able to distract the AI with one large attack, forcing his units to leave the outer worlds undefended to the Siege group.

My total user actions by the end of the 1 hour and 30 min game was 1800, about the same as another normal 8 hour game I played the other day. It is quite a bit more intense!

Gl to anyone learning the ropes out there!

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Setting prices allows you to undercut other human players so that yours get bought before theirs. But when you're playing against the AI, it doesn't matter

Not quite true: selling resources yourself gets you loads more money because the Black Market isn't taking their cut. The Black Market gets you 230 or so cash for each 100 you sell, but you get paid IMMEDIATELY. Medium-skill AI doesn't use the market for much, but they eventually (and way too late) will get around to buying what you post at 450-550 per unit. I haven't tried vs. Hard though, usually because I'm just trying to survive.

-- Retro

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What I meant to say is that lowering your price doesn't matter because you're the only one "competing" to sell the stuff. So yours will always be bought if you list it at the default asking price if you're playing with AIs

Lowing it only helps when you're trying to get yours sold before other human players in MP. Sorry for the confusion

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Here is a basic starting setup if you'd like to try it... this works for me more often than not (so far, hasn't failed me yet) for TEC.

1 Right away, and I mean immediately buy 100 units of crystal, and no more.

2 Upgrade your home world population infrastructure one level.

3 Build your cap ship factory, highly recommend a cap ship with colonize if it's not too small a map.

4 Build your mineral/crystal extractors while this is going on, and queue up two scouts. Put those on auto explore.

Do these four+ things right away, then let the info you learn from the scouts determine your next move.

This should use up the majority of resources you started with. From here things get pretty situational. A hard and fast build list means you're probably not paying attention nor reacting to immediate events, which I consider crucial to survive the initial stages of the game until you've established an economy and some defence choke points. The map layout is key here. If there are lots of ice/volcanic worlds around, I throw up two civ stations, get the appropriate planet tech first and then go trade centers. Otherwise I put up 1 or 2 military centers and go for LRMs (I'm still working on TEC). Either way I start filling out my fleet ASAP.

I'm finding especially early game, military upgrades aren't worth it while making sure you're using as much of your fleet capacity as possible is very important. You're paying upkeep irregardless if it's full strength or not so I recommend keeping it maxed, plus try not to upgrade your logistics until you really have to.

I'm writing a strategy guide for newer players and will go more into detail then... hope this is helpful. The first handful of minutes in the game are pretty far reaching in consequence.

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NO. The AI does cheat. In fact, hard AI's get a 50% economic advantage.

Here is a basic starting setup if you'd like to try it... this works for me more often than not (so far, hasn't failed me yet) for TEC.1 Right away, and I mean immediately buy 100 units of crystal, and no more.2 Upgrade your home world population infrastructure one level.3 Build your cap ship factory, highly recommend a cap ship with colonize if it's not too small a map.4 Build your mineral/crystal extractors while this is going on, and queue up two scouts. Put those on auto explore.Do these four+ things right away, then let the info you learn from the scouts determine your next move.This should use up the majority of resources you started with. From here things get pretty situational. A hard and fast build list means you're probably not paying attention nor reacting to immediate events, which I consider crucial to survive the initial stages of the game until you've established an economy and some defence choke points. The map layout is key here. If there are lots of ice/volcanic worlds around, I throw up two civ stations, get the appropriate planet tech first and then go trade centers. Otherwise I put up 1 or 2 military centers and go for LRMs (I'm still working on TEC). Either way I start filling out my fleet ASAP.I'm finding especially early game, military upgrades aren't worth it while making sure you're using as much of your fleet capacity as possible is very important. You're paying upkeep irregardless if it's full strength or not so I recommend keeping it maxed, plus try not to upgrade your logistics until you really have to.I'm writing a strategy guide for newer players and will go more into detail then... hope this is helpful. The first handful of minutes in the game are pretty far reaching in consequence.

Good ideas. But they will not help you against a hard AI as TEC.

Here's what you have to know as TEC to win against a hard AI:

The AI always builds a lot of light frigates at the start, but it cannot really seige your base with them. The exception is Vasari. It tries to seige your base with the frigate.

DO NOT build these yourself. Light frigates counter seige frigates (useless when you don't have anything to hold the front), and they counter support craft. Your opponent doesn't even have those... He has more light frigates. A human advent player will sometimes churn out support craft early on, but that's another story. (It kills the LRM rush if he does it right)

My suggestion is that you immediately tech to LRM's, and focus on extracting crystal. Do not buy it in the beginning unless you have no other way to get it. Put some metal on the market and hope someone buys it, if you resort to buying crystal.

I play Advent mostly, but I hope this helps.

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Here is a basic starting setup if you'd like to try it... this works for me more often than not (so far, hasn't failed me yet) for TEC.1 Right away, and I mean immediately buy 100 units of crystal, and no more.2 Upgrade your home world population infrastructure one level.3 Build your cap ship factory, highly recommend a cap ship with colonize if it's not too small a map.4 Build your mineral/crystal extractors while this is going on, and queue up two scouts. Put those on auto explore.Do these four+ things right away, then let the info you learn from the scouts determine your next move.This should use up the majority of resources you started with. From here things get pretty situational. A hard and fast build list means you're probably not paying attention nor reacting to immediate events, which I consider crucial to survive the initial stages of the game until you've established an economy and some defence choke points. The map layout is key here. If there are lots of ice/volcanic worlds around, I throw up two civ stations, get the appropriate planet tech first and then go trade centers. Otherwise I put up 1 or 2 military centers and go for LRMs (I'm still working on TEC). Either way I start filling out my fleet ASAP.I'm finding especially early game, military upgrades aren't worth it while making sure you're using as much of your fleet capacity as possible is very important. You're paying upkeep irregardless if it's full strength or not so I recommend keeping it maxed, plus try not to upgrade your logistics until you really have to.I'm writing a strategy guide for newer players and will go more into detail then... hope this is helpful. The first handful of minutes in the game are pretty far reaching in consequence.

I've beaten every skill level including Unfair on 1.04 using this as a base, but honestly I think it's almost always how I react to the map layout that allows that to happen.

My fleets at the beginning are usually just lots of mixed frigates but always end up mixed arms fleets containing certain proportions of all the types of ships, tailored towards whatever I'm facing at the time.

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They were good ideas, and I am sure you know what you are doing. I just wanted to make sure this player knew he needed LRMs... fast.

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I've beaten every skill level including Unfair on 1.04 using this as a base, but honestly I think it's almost always how I react to the map layout that allows that to happen.My fleets at the beginning are usually just lots of mixed frigates but always end up mixed arms fleets containing certain proportions of all the types of ships, tailored towards whatever I'm facing at the time.They were good ideas, and I am sure you know what you are doing. I just wanted to make sure this player knew he needed LRMs... fast.

Ah, oh I'm sorry, you're right... I left out a specific detail I think... where it stated using all your command points for fleet size is important. Right at the point where I'm waiting for the cap ship to come out, I start putting out Cobalts. Usually I have a small handful of cobalts when the Capship comes up, and I create a small fleet set on close formation.

Until my fleet reaches max size I don't stop building frigates very often outside of to upgrade infrastructure on a new system. I don't normally (depends on circumstance but I haven't been playing small maps lately) have LRMs until I have at least one other system taken unless the map is small. At that point, I immediately switch to building LRMs until I have at least an equal number of them to cobalts or more.

Normally by this time, I'm looking at a small portion of the map opened by scouts and can figure out whether I'm safe to immediately start expanding, or if you'll need to defend from a quick invasion/rush or not.

Through the game I try my hardest to have a full fleet at all times, and will usually immediately upgrade logistically the first 2-3 upgrades when I run out so I can continue expanding my fleet. But by this time I've usually laid down my main trade route and once the ports are constructed I can afford to really concentrate on getting some more ship classes to balance out my fleets with.

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You know, given the style of play I lean towards and generally the type of campaign I like to play, I think I really should work on playing small maps more. I probably suck on them

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Im on my 3rd AI game, and after reviewing some replays I dont see any bonus to economy that the Hard AI gets.

I has very good micromanagement though, and attacks multiple fronts at a time, which makes it pretty difficult to play against

Its good to find a game where the AI is really powerful!

Edit 1: And thanks for the replys all, very good tips for battling the Hard AI in differing map sizes.

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military upgrades aren't worth it while making sure you're using as much of your fleet capacity as possible is very important.

I'll note one exception to this: getting an extra 5% health on all of your ships for a total build cost of military lab + level 1 research, particularly when this is scattered across a large number of frigates in your fleet, is a good thing. Grab that relatively early (say, after your first Supply upgrade) if it's offered at Level 1.

And I recall seeing somewhere that the Hard AI does NOT get any bonuses. That's why "Unfair" is named "unfair".

-- Retro

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Hey definatly, its important to note when it is more important to have more troops, and when it is important to protect your investments with upgrades and new abilities.

Im sure everyone posting here knows this, but for those that are still a bit new, say you have good scouting going and you know that the enemy forces are just as strong as yours.

For this scenario, you are running OK on credits and resources, and there isnt really any other areas to expand to without overextending yourself. Your defenses are doing well, and adding more troops to the fold is coming along at a good pace.

Now is the time to protect your current investments, and give yourself the edge in combat.

By the time you can add 8 or 9 troops to the fielded positions, you can upgrade your existing troops and make them as strong or stronger than 8 or 9 more troops.

For TEC, I really really reccomend upgrading armor first before weaponry. I went one of my first games going without armor (I was unsure of its mechanics), and the next game doing it first, and it made the biggest difference in the world. The TEC armor bonuses are much larger than the other 2 races, and that combined with our superior hulls & hull repair tech our longevity is enormus.

Combining that long lasting flavor with a healthy complement of Command Cruisers, and a fair number of Repair Cruisers can make combat with almost no losses. (barring extreme concentrated fire)

When possible, upgrade your largest fleet weaponry benifits next, like lasers/missiles/projectile according to how many you have more of, and make that 200 frigate fleet equal to 400.

If you can manage this while adding troops the entire time, you'll win your objectives and deny the enemy theirs!

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