AI + Entrenchment

Yep, this SB AI, as well as siege frigate AI and AI choices of caps have been frequently mentioned on the forums here as major AI weaknesses, and really exploits. Still no love from the devs though, ant Entrenchment's been out a while.  

The AI was buffed a while ago in entrenchment to make them take a but load more anti structure cruisers when attacking starbases. Too bad they will sometimes still have them attacking from withtin the range of the starbase.

I'll say it again, Vasari NEED a anti structure ship just so the ai has a way to fight your starbases.

The vasari ai doesnt know that it's anti structure unit is it's starbase, plus it takes to long to build against a decent player.

Plus fix the ai not building superweapons please!

Put it this way, the AI fights from the Empire tree.  The only ship that's micromanaged are the seige frigates. 

To be fair, they've sent one in with an escort on me, before.  In fact, they've had an initial fleet engage and then sent in the colony ship to build it.  I have no idea if this was by design or not, but it's the most effective way in my book (get my fleet busy and then sneak one in to start building).  Unfortunately for the AI, their modest fleets usually get trashed pretty quickly whenever they're within range of a starbase of mine.  I just think the tech that speeds up the startbase building for the Vasari (Assault Specialization? I forget) should be given a higher priority once they know or suspect enemy starbases are in play - that would have made things a lot more difficult for me.

I agree about the assault specialization, but it's the AI's fault on choice of targets.  The offensive SB doesn't really need weapons, just a presence with another fleet which is why it has the phase stabilizer option to bring in a new fleet quickly.  AIs have only so many options to choose from and doesn't really know how to change it's strategy other than running away to regroup.

Any ideas about ai not building superweapons? I would think it would be an easy fix....i guess not.

They need to add an algrorythm where the AI makes an assessment of the strength of an enemy starbase, support structures, any enemy fleet in the gravity well, and its own fleet and then decide that it either makes sense to attack the starbase or to keep away from it completely.  That might at least end the problem of the AI-suiciding-on-starbases.  Of course, if you want the real thing, you have to come play it against other people onilne.  It's lots of fun when you can trap a guy's fleet with phase jump inhibitors and have your Vasari starbase combined with subverters crush it.

That's the point, the AI can't do everything other than control everyship at once.  Online play is the best.

Yeah, AI target selection could certainly be a bit better.  They probe for weaknesses pretty well (sometimes excessively, imo), but then they don't always have fleets constructed that can get the job done.  I suppose humans can be much the same, but we learn over time as opposed to a static AI which doesn't so a better way to analyze those systems would probably be the most we could reasonably hope for. 

I would also suspect some specialized scripts would be interesting to see in action - prebuilt strategems based upon race/map size combinations that would occasionally get used.  Then again, if you're playing against the AI it might not be able to be flexible enough to adapt to a human response.  In addition, the scipts would have to be balanced against each other to make sure that one AI isn't any more dominant than another, which would require additional testing and terefore expense.  Maybe something best left for the next iteration of Sins.  Ah, well.

I find the AI in entrenchment to be a major step backwards in terms of been a challenge compared to vanilla sins. The AI is terrible at assaulting starbases not just player owned ones but other AI owned starbases.
 The AI wastes far to much resources on starbases not just in building them but also tech and upgrades and where are these resources taken from?
Its taken from their fleets, I have yet to see an AI fleet that was anywhere near the size of the fleets I would encounter in normal sins. Instead now I face a starbase in every grav well by mid game and they are not challenging to a player once you get used to them even 2 in the same grav well it just becomes tedious and I have yet to finish a game in entrenchment because of this.
I have watched my AI allies try to assault a single starbase multiple times, they lost 15 capital ships to that single starbase in 1 game and when I finally watched some of the action I could see the problem they where not engagaing the starbase but going past it and engaging the hangars/turrets, their fleets was woefully inadequate for the job to begin with so they just kept dying in droves to a partially upgraded Orkulus.

I have stopped playing entrenchment now since virtually any challenge has been removed.

I guess part of the algorythm would also need to include instructions to keep ships themselves away from TEC starbases since they could explode and wipe out the fleet.  (The only really safe way to take them down is from a safe distance with a swarm of bombers.)

I don't know if I've gotten better as a player, but I remember in vanilla sins the vasari would use their phase gates and whatever their replace ships tech was and I would be swamped. Now I just watch my starbases kill..........

Not to pry, but what's preventing you from trying it online?

One thing that surprises me is just how many people say that their Internet connections aren't up to snuff for online multiplayer.  I believe them, but I do find it kind of sad that it's still such a big problem today.  Perhaps it's just hard to get halfway decent broadband Internet access if you live out in the sticks.

I suspect that the developers won't put too much effort into improving the online multiplayer aspects of the game, such as the user interface and player-skill-based matchmaking, following the logic that you don't want to spent 33% of the development budget for a feature that only 2% of the purchasers will use.  However, ironically, improving the accessibility and desirability of the online multiplayer aspects of the game might very well be the best thing they could do in Sins2 because getting people to play it online against other people will solve all of these gripes people have about the AI, perhaps retaining people's interest in the game longer.

I'd like to see them come up with an optional matchmaking system that would match up players of nearly equal skill and experience against one another.  This would become feasible of thousands of players could be brought online at once.  The game also needs an online multiplayer tutorial and other means of encouraging single player only folks to come online, perhaps active invitations to people who have Internet connections but who aren't logged onto ICO to come join games for new (to online) players.  (It would know if someone has been online or not and thus whether someone is a new player by CD key, perhaps only issuing invitations afte someone has played 20 games in single player.)  "Game X has 8 new people in it and only needs 2 more, you are invited to join."  It could track people by CD key allowing them to play, say, 30 games on ICO without having to create an ICO account, making it very easy for newbies to play against other newbies.

Easing people into online multiplayer and matching people up based on skill might really be the best thing they could do in terms of improving the game's AI.

I would have thought that the AI needs to be coded so if it attacks a fully upgraded starbase it brings along 50 bombers.

Newly built ones can be attacked with a small fleet