What about combining the 2 -- when you get to turn [randomized] turn X change priorities (your #1) unless Event Y happens (your #2) first?  That way players can't indirectly affect AI players by doing/not doing something that would trigger a certain, undesired, AI response.

Wait...I thought the Chinese were taking over the world...?

What about people that are already Korean, will they turn into some frighting Super-Korean ??

From the AIs I have seen till now the greatest problem always has been trying to get a high complexity while still having a decent response time.

Since a good/high complexity always needs a fairly long evaluation period I am wondering if it is possible (or even already done in some games) to start evaluating the current condition already during a players turn, thus being able to check for some things and eliminate some "bad" strategies before the player hits the "next turn button".

And yes, I really like the idea of the AI being as accessible to the players/modders as possible.

CharonJr

North Korean I hope. Every sovereign you create has only one template-

Strengths- Genius, superhuman physique, weather control, beloved by all.

Weakness- THE DEAR LEADER HAS NO WEAKNESSES. IT IS ALL CAPITALIST LIES.

Expanding on my previous irrelevant opinion from my reply 41 (not repeated here for brevity):

Data (not John_Hughes' android DATA, the not-capitalized numerical data) -- some is referenced in reply 41:

Strength is determined by # of units, their 'hit points', armor, weapons, strengths&weaknesses relative to attacker's units, etc.

Significant attack failure = more than half attacker strength lost in a failed attack, lesser failure is otherwise.

Upon significant attack failure the strength of the next created attack force doubles, lesser failure would increase by 50%.

And say the formula to determine which target to attack (attackValue) is (defenderStrength x 1) + (distance x 3) -- the lowest value is chosen [better to hit the nearer, stronger target -- up to a point].

And let's say there's 2 possible targets (cities for example):

target1: defenderStrength of 30 and distance of 10 (attackValue of 30x1 + 10x3 = 60)

target2: defenderStrength of 10 and distance of 20 (attackValue of 10x1 + 20x3 = 70)

Target1 is chosen as it's the lower attackValue.

So let's say the first attack was sent out and failed significantly.  The AI would learn from this, modifying the next attack as defined above. But let's add in a few more options.

1- Next attack force would be doubled in 'strength' (as mentioned above)

2- A second possibility would be to give defenderStrength a different weight.  Let's increase it to 2x (the strategy being to avoid the defenders strong points and hit her/him where she's/he's weakest, even if further away), all else unchanged, so recalculating attackValues:

target1: defenderStrength of 30 and distance of 10 (attackValue of 30x2 + 10x3 = 90)

target2: defenderStrength of 10 and distance of 20 (attackValue of 10x2 + 20x3 = 80)

Target2 is now chosen for the second attack.  It's possible that in other situations this won't result in a different target being chosen (I fudged the numbers to get this result )

We can even modify this a bit more by adding in consideration of distance and attack force composition -- if distance is over a certain value (dependent upon map size) then the attack force composition would shift to faster units (cavalry, or units with movement bonus items, etc.).

3- a third possibility is to combine both 1 and 2 -- a distraction attack, or feint, or an attempt to split the defender's forces.  This would entail the AI waiting long enough to construct both attack forces (a disadvantage, but one countered by the advantage of a double attack).

Let's give choice 1 a weight of .5, 2 a weight of .4, and 3 a weight of .1 (weights total 1.0).

Recapping, after the significant failure of the first attack, the AI would learn and respond by:

-50% chance of hitting the same target with a doubled force

-40% chance of bypassing target1 to hit target2 with a doubled force (as the AI's initial assessment of what is required to defeat a certain defenderStrength was insufficient, it learned and adjusted for all subsequent attacks, not just repeats of the initial, failed attack -- and remember that significant success would result in attackStrength being reduced so it's not just a one-way adjustment).  This doubled attack force would be comprised of faster units to try to catch the defender off-balance, unable to reinforce the new target in time.

-10% chance of doing both

==============

I don't see this requiring extra files or some special noggin to store and retrieve all that learned knowledge, just modify existing priorities/algorithims/weights/data values.  The original values would be kept, and there could be checks made against them to keep the modified values from getting too far out of whack (to prevent unforseen interactions) and to 'start over' the next game (or the modified values could be kept to allow the AI to improve from game-to-game, as the human players skill increases).

This involves no 'cheating' by the AI, just the AI adjusting according to successes/failures -- ie learning.

Oh, to be sure the current Civ 4 AI is still lacking and has to rely on substantial bonuses to remain a challenge.  I'm more focusing on the improvement I saw in the AI over time and thanks to community involvement; it got a heck of a lot more challenging with the late BTS patches than it was when Civ 4 was first released.  Vs. the Total War series which tends to have terrible AIs that are never improved.

I wonder what Brad's view is on AI bonuses?  Surely its ok for the AI to recieve some bonuses; the better the AI, the smaller bonuses needed but I don't think there's any shame in the AI using some bonuses to be a challenge.  This isn't chess after all.

What resources and restrictions will there be for AI community modifications?

In detail :

1.- Will I be limited to changing numbers in that XML file with the actual AI implementation being unaccesible in the game executable? Or, will I have full access to the game state visible by each AI player in python and control over all possible actions an artificial player can do?

2.- Will I be able to read and write external files from python? Which could be be used for opening moves, in example.

3.- Will we have a game solver? That is, the game with zero graphics or UI where I could configure with command line options a set of AI players and have it run until one wins.

4.- Will there be a game reply feature? Where output from the game solver or a normal game could be loaded in the graphic game and replayed for review.

5.- Will there be any restriction in the distribution of 3rd party AI mods? Like Blizzard's "You can't make profit on mods for our games". Or "all your mods are belong to us".

I will be honest here before I start, I have yet to touch XML stuff. I'm 4 months into learning visual basic at college and thats only given me the most basic of knowledge to create a VERY basic AI for a game of cluedo I made when I was bored, so take this advice as you want here...

anyway the idea of grouping things to their priorities like this

<avoid>
  <war = 5.0>
</avoid>

to me is a good idea, however this seems to give the AI a very set structure on how it acts as a whole, and in a sense doesn't go towards the feel of it thinking strategically and more just making sure it fits tick boxes throughout the game.

I believe that creating some paramenters underneath these would be useful to make the AI more dynamic, but if possibly keeping them out becoming a necessity to people developing their own AI structure (yes it will be less dynamic but then less effort would have been put into the mod so I doubt people can complain on that regard)

anyway the modifcation I'd suggest would be something like this

<Avoid>

    <War>
     <standard=5.0>
     <AgainstEmpire>
        <standard=2.0>
        <Weakdefence = 0.5>
     </againstempire>
     </War>
    <War>
</Avoid>

in this example the AI would spend a focus of X5 priority on avoiding war. However on certain circumstances it would lower(or in another scenario raise) it's priority relative to that group (in this example the priority would drop to 2.0 if it was an empire faction the AI had noticed (wanting to go to war with him more) and drop even further if it knows an empire player has little to no defences)

What this would do is change the priorities based on the connections the AI has with that group and/or what information it had gained, and giving them a feel to being more human like, and you could code in a lot of these parameters to further "humanify" the AI and give the player the feel that they are creating the mindset that fits with them.

for example if you joined enough of these categories you could create an AI like this

<Avoid>
 <War>
  <standard = 5.0>
  <Exempt>

   <large force = 2.5>
  <introuble = 2.0>
 </Exempt>
 <againstempire>
  <goodtrade = 6.5>
  <intimidating = 3.5>
 </againstempire>
 </war>
</avoid>

(now you could set that the earlier it is in the section the more important that priortity is held as a form of conditional control.)

with this little XML coding you have an AI that will try to avoid war in general, however if it believes it has a large enough force (which could be specified in another section of the XML) or that it's in dire straights, would take the idea of forcing themselves to get some extra land a lot better.
if however none of these are at a level of worry then it would check things like if that group was empire or not, and if the trade was worth keeping them there, or if they're forces were giving them the "creeps"

a lot of this would probably need some comparisons (for example you would need the ai to compare if his idea of a "large force" is  "large" compared to the mega army over yonder) and that might be impossible! I don't know, this isn't something I've touched yet (unfortunatly)

also with the early/mid/late game category a <varied> category that the game may take priorities from at any point during the game to add a bit of a "chaos" factor and making the ai less predictable would be something else to consider.

anyway theres my food for though, eat it if you wish, I do not promise protection againt food poisoning!

-
Dingbat ( now going to sleep at 1 AM after writing this + deep thought - apologies for any typos!)

If we are still speaking of an AI opponent, then how are they to gain this knowledge without "cheating". Something a human can't do unless they spend time and resources taking said Tech by force, or facing said Military, thus gaining the knowledge, again by force of arms?

Changing behaviors relative to turn counters may not be the best, but in a Turn based game, it is something that can always be reliable and will be readily available always. Using "events" will certainly work, as long as those "events" actually happen. Stacking of multiple options would be great surely as well.

Perhaps Scouting may provide some of that Intel about the enemies Military strengths at certain game points, but unless you engage in Diplomacy, known enemy Techs would be more difficult to uncover.  Use Espionage? Well, they would obviously also have espionage, it would just be called counter-espionage etc etc.

Since making an AI that thinks may be a tad lofty, making an AI that can make assumptions (if/then's) (and/or) (this/that) or whatever the code allows based in any Intel discovered, may not be so hard.

We don't want to get away from the FUN part either. I have no doubt, a very smart AI can be had, but trying to have FUN while getting outsmarted by a machine, for whatever reason, doesn't always fit that bill.

I do really like the idea of players recording/noting things done in game and then doing some detailed AAR's based on the whole how/why/when/ they did certain things, as well as what drove them to do those things at those times.This assumes there will be no "game recording facility" built in of course.

If the Dev can see that as useful then having a recording device would be totally perfect for that cause. Record, then transcribe.

edit : sorry, double post.

Yes, let's learn Python!

It would help me out at work, so doing it with Elemental in mind makes it a lot more fun. My work is not focused on programming though, and I can really give no advice on how to begin with Python. But I'm really interested in learning!