I like the general ideal of adding a harder AI.  I'll bring this up at our next meeting. Thanks for the input.

I definitely like the idea of adding a "Cheater" AI, that would just be gross. I was also tossing about the idea of a "Juggernaut" AI that would start off with a small fleet, some research, typical AI bonuses, etc, with the idea that it'd be meant for one real hardcore player or several friends to take on. None of this is final, keep in mind, but I like the discussion of new ideas.

I like the Juggernaut AI title.  That is fitting.

I think the Jugg AI should be close to the way most online players play.  Super Rusher.

The Jugg's should get a colony cap off the start, have 2-3X's resource generation, and build ships 2-3X's faster. This would give SP's a great "training" for eventual advancement into Multiplayer.  This AI will need to change strats by the 1 hour mark, however.  Jugg's would rush the first hour, then defense/tech up, then try to push out with superior fleets.  This would keep it interesting for the SP's out there. 

And Diplomacy would probably change much of this anywho.  Hopefully it just makes the AI fleet smarter without having to increase cheat levels (the seige frigs run from danger, how come the main fleet goes headlong into a starbase with no support?!?)

We'll probably go ahead and try to tweak some things during beta, and get some better feedback then.

Not to discourage the Dev's looking at this, because of course they could do it better and smoother, but a hard ai mod is possible.

There are several things that come to mind from the suggestions, probably starting with the militia and pirate fleets getting set to playable = false. The pirates of course are that way to start with, but the militia pulls from the tech setup, so it would mean creating a tech2 or even a militia setup, make it unplayable, and tweak the stats accordingly, faster build times, heavier weapons, or higher weapon upgrade rates, lower research costs and lower ship costs.

Perhaps higher upgrades in bonus percentages as they go up for militia planets, heavier armor.... etc.

While i have noticed the ai to run sometimes, perhaps even alot, i have thought this was because of a "outnumbered" or "out-performed" level in the game that looks at the strength of the fleet against the opponent. Lowering costs to output more militia ships (or Vasari or Tech or Advent as the unplayable race) means more ships, but all of that can be done now, though certainly time consuming to go through the ships, abilities, planetmodules and research and the galaxydef and gameplay.constants files.

Still doable though.

basically recreating a "complete" set of races as unplayable alternates used as the ai races. Unless i am missing something here. Can we designate the ai race in galaxydef? I know militia and pirates can be tweaked there. Or the constants file? Hmmmm..... i will have to check.

In addition, some of the mods already available change the gameplay tremendously. Depending on how difficult you want it.

Kiedjor's Epic mod for Vanilla and Unknown Darkness mod for Entrenchment show a great deal of really exciting opening with militia and pirates and opponent races attacking from the moment the screen opens.   Tons of ships and a major fight right off the bat.    Haha, i played the first hour solid without getting off my home planet because there was no let up in the attacks, it was fight/defend solid for over an hour. Haha, sorry to get away from the main ideas, but it seemed appropriate to show that hard ai can be done now with some creative and interesting tweaks.

Kiedjor uses what he is calling the "Battle System" and its not my place to tell how he does it, but it is interesting, and if you look at the mod it is there to be seen how. Creative uses of abilities and costs and in some cases giving abilities to the ai races that until now have been for the main races only.

Anyway, it is worth the effort, in my opinion, but again, not as polished or as smooth or even perhaps as nice, as the Dev's would do it. But still doable.

Just some thoughts,

I have to run off now for class, but maybe this weekend i can get some time in to try some of the ideas here to get a Hard AI Mod in the works.  

Take care,

And Happy Gaming and Modding!!!!

-Teal

Indeed; the current "unfair" AI already has some absolutely amazing resource cheats.  The problem is, there comes a point at which it could have all the resources in the world, it's just too dumb to use them well enough.  I think the hard AI already reaches that level.  The unfair is a little harder to overcome, but it's the same old idiocy.

Things that I would like to see with a harder AI.

Like has been mentioned, unfair starts out alright, but dies about the same time I actually start hitting them. Part of this is that the the AI starts shifting ships around for no purpose and in strange amounts. Have the Ai actually create fleets, and have it be able to actually coordinate with its allies. All too many times I can defeat unfair in detail because one member of the team has moved all their ships to protect a megnetic storm while the others do "patrols between core planets. Human players communicate to set up coordinating strikes, the AI should be able to as well.

Presently with the AI "styles" the options are limited, and pretty apparent which way the AI is leaning fairly early on. Fortifier is easy once you get big enough (if it wasnt already easy because it hobbles itself) Agressive is he opposite, just invest enough in defense and all that happens is they die upon the wall. the hardest, the trade option, makes a ton of money and reseources, but fails entirely to use them, so by end game, you are facing maybe the highest fleet status and with high level capital ships, but thestarbases are relatively weak, the research levels dont compare all of which make for a long, but low damage victory, which wipes out all real opposite and just means im spending an hour cleaning up the galaxy and getting even bigger.

You know that the AI could be drastically improved via non-cheating methods by simply changing the way it approaches siege frigates (sending them undefended to a planet is idiotic), stopping suicidal starbase attacks, and making good capital ship choices based on situation.

I agree with both making the AI smarter! and allow for cheating.  A smarter AI as mentioned in the posts above is really important.  Have the option to tweak how the AI cheats would be great too.  I remember when I play UT you can customise the AI and it was awesome!

I can play against AI whenever I want, with whatever settings I want, for as long as I want. Hard to beat that. Also doesn't help that my internet connection is terrible. And that I love LAN AI crushers.

Better AI would help most players. Online players are only a small minority. Everyone else plays singleplayer.

these AI improvements I think are a must-

Make AI use Capital Ultimate Abilities

Make AI Build Superweapons

Make AI make intelligent economic decisions, attempt to thwart your economic growth, and deal diplomatically efficiently.

I would think the last one is the hardest.

the biggest problem with the ai is that even for an unfair ai the income with high fleet support research is too low maybe the malus from fleet support should be dropped (or reduced) for unfair+ ai's.

I would also add to the list - make the AI use 40-50 bombers when attacking a fully upgraded SB