thephilosopher

That's what I thought. I'm well behind in any technical details of AI, but when looking at replays from the perspective of the AI, it can see the entire map the entirety of the time. That feature was some of why this came to mind in the first place: I noticed that the AI seemed to behave very differently depending on what I was doing, and then I watched the replay and noticed it could "see" me the entire game.

Thanks! Some of the issue might just be that when I develop more quickly, my cavalry is more likely to wander near the AI's territory when hunting. It could just be responding to having earlier encounters with my cav/troops.

I'm not exactly sure quite how to ask this question, but I'll describe some experiences recently while playing single-player games against the AI (usually on Medium, sometimes on Hard). I've noticed that the AI seems to roughly match my pace of development. When I've developed more slowly, the AI has taken longer to go to Phase III and attack me. Whereas, when I develop quickly and expand my territory more quickly, the AI attacks earlier and develops more quickly. Meanwhile, when I set up games and watch the AI play another AI on Hard or Very Hard, the games seem to drag on forever and the AI develops pretty slowly. Are these just coincidences? Or does the AI develop more quickly when its opponent does?

As a beginner player, I definitely find it easier to raid human players than even an AI set to Easy or Very Easy. I don't know whether that's a good or a bad thing, but the AI does oddly prioritize stone towers over, say, generating more soldiers. If there were a fix needed, I'd think it would be less about how powerful towers are and more about nudging the AI away from lining its borders with them.

The OPs original proposal of having male citizens who gather resources and don't fight is one that seems worth taking seriously. And it passes any realistic test of historical accuracy. Just about all civilizations have had both men and women who gather resources and don't fight. There's variation in terms of which classes they come from, and so on, but the underlying fact of people of multiple genders who gather resources and don't fight is near universal.

On the other hand, when I've played the AI, it always builds lots of defense towers. Often what looks to me like too many. It's possible the AI is just built to prefer defense towers to palisades or walls?

Yeah, this is something I'm starting to learn. Even in games I've lost to the AI, I was still way ahead on resources. That seems to be a sign I'm not making enough soldiers.

I've definitely had the impression that there were strict limits to how much one can learn by playing the AI. I've watched lots of Tom0ad's videos of MP games, and it's obvious that the best players play very differently from the AI. The AI plays way too defensively and isn't able to pump out units quickly after initial units are defeated.

Out of curiosity, when do all of you think a person is ready to start doing multiplayer games? Right away? Only after beating the AI at a certain level? At the moment, I can easily defeat the AI on Sandbox or Very Easy mode. I can also win most of the time on Easy. I haven't yet tried playing the AI at a greater difficulty setting than Easy.

USA - Iowa. My nickname is my background: I did my degrees in philosophy, and I'm a recovering philosophy professor.

I'm really not a gamer much at all. Played Age of Empires (Rise of Rome and 2) in high school, and got into 0ad in the last few months.