Investigation of AI reassessment upon reload

[slackker]

rouge all CA currently stands in this issue is found here: http://p223.ezboard.com/fshoguntotal...ID=24377.topic

[therother]

I don't think we need a control for player passivity, as the player will be inactive in both tests, i.e. it's not a variable. It may well be interesting to try and devise a test for AI response to player actions, but I think it is unnecessary at this stage.

[roguebolo]

Well, then, that entirely discards the relevance of a real game, in which the player is actually making moves, but also loading and saving each turn, which is the way most people probably play. To simply refuse to move at ALL for 20 turns is to simply allow it to examine the starting position over and over again and decide amongst the many possible opening moves, but not to allow it to follow up on those openings because you are giving it nothing to "react to".

Most AI tends to be reactive to the human player -- sometimes called "triggers" in the gaming world. If you don't give it anything to react to, any kind of predictor on how you intend to play, it could very well just bide its time until you do. If a "load game" behavior triggers that particular AI behavior, it doesn't really mean much to me when I'm playing a real game and making moves. Because each turn I give it new information to react to when I make my moves.

[therother]

You may well have a point, but IMO it does not undermine the fundamental reason for this test. We are attempting to test if the AI acts differently in the two cases, where the player is triggering AI in exactly the same way, with the only variable being the saving/loading of the game in one case.

[Kraxis]

rouge the AI factions already react to each other... At least that is obvious from the non-save/load games. That we remove a single faction is of little consequence as the game is supposed to actually feature non-reactionary regions (rebels) and dead factions. One faction out of 21 is not much, and in general only means another 2-3 'rebel' provinces.

From all my games it doesn't seem that the AI factions react any differently to us than to all the other AI factions. We are 'just' another faction. And the AI factions have plenty to react to, each other.

[roguebolo]

Unfortunately, I think you're seriously wrong about that and it was one of the main issues I pondered over when I first played MTW. The faction AIs do indeed seem to act as seperate entities, but there seems to be an overriding AI governing the game in a certain direction for the benefit of the human player. I've always thought this is one of the reasons they've skirted around the prospect of a multi-player version of the campaign game. As long as it is not designed to be multi-player, balancing the relative strength of different factions on the campaign map is unnecessary. It allows the game developers to take liberties to impose situations on the human player. For instance, it would be simple for ANY bordering faction to simply crush the Polish faction in MTW early in the game. But they don't. Otherwise, it wouldn't make much sense to try to play the Polish as a human player, right? So this AI "overseer" makes sure that doesn't happen. I think we get a small glimpse of him through the Pope and the Senate, wherein he tries to direct your actions as well.

After you reach a certain skill level in the campaign game, the AI is never really that challenging, but what it can do (if you allow or encourage it to) is set up some really interesting scenarios.

[Pode]

For the benefit of newcomers to this issue, let me try to distill the past history of testing that lead us to this point. Not all of these points have been established to the same level of proof.
-Standard test methodology has been as described below. Run for a bit just ending turn and note the number of provinces taken or sieges prosecuted if you had FOW off. Run the same campaign saving and loading every turn and watch things fail to be conquered and the AIs move defensively or aimlessly.
-Quicksaves, autosaves, and named saves have all been tested and found to display the same behavior.
-Loading from the manual interface and loading using continue campaign have been found to produce the same behavior.
-Loading every other turn has been found to catch the AIs in a loop of alternately laying siege on the turn not preceeded by a load and lifting siege on the turn preceeded by a load, indicating that the decisions produced after a load are materially different that normal even in very similar situations.
-Timing of the load within the player's turn if the player is active has been shown not to have an effect.
-Player inactivity with loading produces AI inactivity. Player inactivity without loading produces AI activity.
-Two loads per turn without player activity does not appear to affect the AI's pacifism after loading in my VERY limited test last night. The fact that Roguebolo loads multiple times during a turn and has yet to see a single AI siege lifted in his campaigns indicates that this one needs testing badly.
-AFAIK, RB is the only person who has experienced the bug in testing but not in campaign.

That is the body of fact as I see it. My understanding of the purpose of this thread is to gather statistical evidence of these facts instead of the semi-anecdotal evidence currently available. Hypotheses that can explain these observed facts are probably welcome as well (especially testable ones), although that is the moderator's call. Personally, I'd be particularly interested in anyone that can explain or duplicate RB's results. What makes him special that his AI's work?

[Pode]

You may well have a point, but IMO it does not undermine the fundamental reason for this test. We are attempting to test if the AI acts differently in the two cases, where the player is triggering AI in exactly the same way, with the only variable being the saving/loading of the game in one case.

The goal seems to be to confirm statistically that there is in fact a difference, and only then evaluate whether that difference has a gameplay impact, correct?

[roguebolo]

Well, something must trigger the AI to be aggressive again. Possibly activity on the part of the player?

To be fair, I must admit that I never "sit out sieges". I always rally, usually on the turn after being besieged and never later than the turn after that.

I should mention that in my current campaign, which I'm playing as the Julii because I reinstalled RTW and Patch 1.2 from scratch, I still have the save games from just about every turn in the game. I think I will go back and take a look at them and turn off FOW and see what's happening with the OTHER factions -- the stuff I can't see.

*edit*

Actually, I just thought of another load game issue which I've always thought was unrelated but might not be. You know how random events can happen when you select End Turn? Well, if you don't like the outcome of those events, you can do a load game. If you just hit End Turn again, you usually get the same random events. But if you make ANY change -- say, move a noncrucial diplomat or something -- it will re-roll the dice for all of those random events, and you will get a completely different set of results.

Perhaps this is related, perhaps it is not. But the change definitely occurs only if there is player activity AFTER the load game and BEFORE the End Turn.

[roguebolo]

Looking back through my save games, I have found that I saved each and every one of my first twenty moves immediately prior to hitting "End Turn", so I can track each faction's activities for the first 20 turns. However, FOW doesn't seem to want to be disabled if it was originally enabled.

By turn 20, the majority of the nations were still in control of only their starting territories and had not engaged in warfare with other factions, with the following exceptions:

1.) The Seleucids and Egypt were at war, Egypt gaining a territory on turn 11 and losing a territory on turn 18; the Seleucids gained a territory on turn 18.
2.) Parthia and I (Julii) both gained a territory on turn 2.
3.) The Brutii gained a territory on turn 4 and another on turn 14.
4.) Pontus gained a territory on turn 14 and another on turn 16.
5.) The Greek Cities were at war with Macedon and Pontus.
6.) The Seleucids were at war with Egypt and Armenia.
7.) Gaul and I were at war.
8.) Brittainia and Germania were at war.
9.) Scythia and Parthia were at war.

Now, that's not exactly inert inactivity, and there were a considerable number of load games during those first twenty moves. I think the fact that I can upload each and every save game to whomever wants to look at them, as well as numerous variations I tried throughout the course of the campaign, is proof of that.

So far, I managed to find only one save game where I was under siege, in Thapsus, later in the game. There was another Numidian army approaching Carthage, obviously intent on laying siege, at the same time. As usual, I sallied when I was actually playing the game. However, if I load the save game and simply hit "End Turn" without sallying forth, the Numidians do indeed abandon the siege -- to block the bridge between Thapsus and Carthage, the only way I can get reinforcements there, while the other army layed siege on Carthage. Note that the second army did not forget that it's plans were to lay siege, and that the first army did move to a logical strategic point! (Except for the fact that I had a trireme in dock at Thapsus.) However, here's the bummer:

If you do a save/load at that point and hit "End Turn", Numidia also abandons the siege of Carthage and both armies walk away. If you just hit "End Turn" without the save/load, then they maintain the siege. So there's apparently some validity to this observation and it is some type of player activity which is defeating it. I will look at some additional save games and see if I can identify it. Anyone else who wants to look at them is welcome.

[hrvojej]

Hi all,
I apologize for not being around in the past few days, life got in the way of testing.

Okay, just checking to see if you thought it was okay. I think the Brutii are perhaps the best choice, given their sheltered location, the fact that they are unlocked to begin with, and that they are a Roman faction (it is Rome: Total War after all). Of course, that last bit works against choosing them to some extent as you also have the Senate AI hardcode possibly interfering with things. Perhaps we can do both, and see if there are any significant differences?

I don't think the Brutii would be great because of the senate, as you have mentioned, and because they are supposed to be an active faction due to the senate as well. Which therefore means that they are more likely to conquer something when controlled by AI and produce results.

As to the player's activity influencing AI moves, that's a separate variable that the test I originally proposed does not test for. However, it's kept constant in it, and hence does not influence its results. The only thing that is not constant, provided that everybody does the test in the exactly same way, is saving/reloading. This very basic test will tell us whether this single variable is doing something to the game, provided everything else is kept constant. Nothing more, nothing less. I won't go in whether the AI responds to player's moves or not right now, as this test is not designed to test for that in the first place. If really nothing happens when the player just stands still, then we'll go from there and redesign the test. But I can say right now that even though I'm highly aggressive in my campaigns, with sufficient reloads everybody else is static no matter what I do. Also, the preliminary result by Bromley are promising (thanks for posting them btw), and hence I think the save/reload test is worth doing in any case.

As far as my testing goes, I'll do my runs by tomorrow. Feel free to PM me your results if you already did your tests.

Cheers,

[roguebolo]

MORE TESTING

I decided to use the same, identical test that was proposed on this thread except starting from my save game at turn 19 rather than at turn 1. The Brutii laid siege to Segestica on the second turn and immediately released it after a save/load and "End Year". However, the following turn it laid siege again and I discovered that the city had suffered from attrition just as if the siege had never been relieved -- it could hold out for 3 turns now instead of 4. I followed this with three save/loads immediately followed by End Year during which time the Brutii maintained the siege. In addition, other factions were still declaring war on each other. I guess this kinda blows away the idea the save/load always forces the AI to relieve sieges, or paralyzes the AI into some kind of inactivity. I think it just needs for some kind of opening moves to be initiated before it can follow up on them a little more decisively. Again, I have the save game if anyone wants to see it. I've done it more than once and the Brutii always besiege Segestica.

OK, I'm coming to the conclusion that CA is right -- as I would expect them to be, since their information comes straight from the developers. "Load game" does indeed seem to cause random events and AI behavior to change, but not in any way that is game-breaking. In the Thapsus/Carthage-Lemonum/Condate Redonum example I'm still forced to ostracize them from my territories -- whether I sally from the siege or attack them in the open terrain. Otherwise I must succumb to repeated attrition and devastation. The change in the behavior of the AI caused by a save/load procedure allows me to select which of those two options I prefer, sallying or open terrain, but it does not otherwise dramatically change the course of the game -- the main problem, as I see it, is that it denies me the privilege of being the defender in a castle assault, which happens to be a lot of fun.

One can hardly come to the conclusion that the AI's behaviour is indicative of losing track of long-term goals in the light of these results. It took a total of five turns for the Brutii to arrive at Segestica by boat, initiate a siege, relieve the siege, then reinstate it, hold it for three turns, and finally occupy the territory.

Furthermore, in the test involving Thapsus/Carthage and Lemonum/Condate Redonum, although the existing sieges were temporarily released, those units that were approaching a settlement to initiate a siege continued toward their objectives. In other words, they did not lose track of those objectives. Apparently in these cases the AI deemed that instigating conflict through a siege or through desecrating the territory were equally acceptable and the load game caused them to choose the opposite one that was in effect at the time the game was loaded. This is something which can be exploited if I feel I'd like to endure the siege for a turn with the likelihood of being able to meet them in the field on the next turn by doing a save/load, but it's definitely not a game-breaker.

[Colt45]

Currently, the tests Ive seen are too broad, given the large amount of factions in the game. I propose that someone mod a game to be setup with 2 factions, plus senate. Use an isolated area and put both factions there, i.e. Britain. Give AI large army and yourself a minimal garrison. Now let him siege you and perform the save/load system. Make sure there are no rebels in his/your area for accuracy. Report results.

I feel, given the CA description, that you need to limit the variables much more than just starting a campaign with all factions on board. I feel this would definitely give a much better example.

[ShellShock]

As well as testing the effect of reloading every turn, I suggest we also test at other frequencies of reload, e.g., every 2, 4, 8, 16 turns (I know this is a lot of testing!). I know some people have done this elsewhere and they show evidence that the expansion of the AI is directly proportional to the frequency of reloads - this should produce a very convincing graph (number of provinces changing hands by rate of reloads).

I can imagine that CA may respond to a test of reloading every turn as being unrealistic (although I for one often only play one turn at a sitting). We can counter this by testing at other frequencies of reload.

Also I suggest we use the faction rankings graph (rather than removing FOW) to assess the impact on the AI. To simply things we could use the Top 5 ranking on e.g., Territory - that is, make a note of the number of territories each of the top 5 factions has. The beauty of the graph is it shows historical data too, so at the end of the test you can see how the AI expanded for each turn.

[roguebolo]

I think it is a confirmed fact that loading a saved game causes RTW to regenerate (or recalculate) random events and often changes the behavior of the AI, especially regarding sieges, and that it is supported by empirical and repeatable data.

My own tests were identical to the one that was proposed here, except that I started at various midgame points wherein alliances, declarations of war, and faction targets and strategies were clearly established to see what kind of impact this actually had on the game. I would have reverted to an earlier patch if it had turned out to be significant. However, I'm pretty convinced that this is not the case.

The problem with testing the phenomenon when no moves have been made by the player at the opening of the game is that it is testing an extrema which generally only happens once in a game -- at the first move. That is the point in the game where no alliances have been established, no warfare, no movement, and no building. Many computer algorithms exhibit awkward behavior with various extrema -- for instance, the quicksort (which is the fastest sorting algorithm on the average for most data types) exhibits its worst-case (slowest) behavior with data which is already sorted. That's not really a concern when the programmer expects the program to be working with unsorted data. Extrema can be very useful in determining actual bugs in a program such as integer overflow or divide-by-zero errors. But what's being analyzed here, the AI, is a complex network of heurisms and algorithms. The truth be told, the AI is probably playing a better game than the human player during this test, because it's undoubtedly building an economic infrastructure for each faction and moving its diplomats. It might be possible to force some military stagnation at the most extreme moment in the game through save/loads and nonactivity, but under more realistic conditions I found that it was not as easy to accomplish. Even in the first 20 moves, with multiple save/loads per turn I was unable to recreate that kind of stagnation. In midgame the proposition is even more difficult.

Knowledge of the fact that this reassessment logic is tied to the load game feature is surely something that I can exploit if I wish, but I am summarily unconcerned with any other ramifications of gameplay.

Finally, I'm not sure that it's really such a good idea to have the objective of just a few large AI factions in endgame, as was always the case with MTW. In the early stages of MTW, the AI was geared to force the player into situations modeled after historical realities. The historical reality is that Rome conquered each of these rivals individually, and ultimately become entangled in civil war.

[A.Saturnus]

roguebolo, just to clearify, you said you followed the research design developed in this thread. Did you compare a experimental condition (with save/load) to a control condition (the same without save/load)? If yes, did you find differences? I didn't get that clear from what you posted.

I don't think the Brutii would be great because of the senate, as you have mentioned, and because they are supposed to be an active faction due to the senate as well. Which therefore means that they are more likely to conquer something when controlled by AI and produce results.

I can't see how that should matter. If the effect is there for the Brutii, it exists and no alibi can lead around that.

I feel, given the CA description, that you need to limit the variables much more than just starting a campaign with all factions on board. I feel this would definitely give a much better example.

Why? All other variables are controlled. It doesn't matter how many factions there are, only whether save/load influences their behaviour. In fact, we want to test a vanilla version of the game. A mod with only two factions wouldn't be representative for the normal game.

[roguebolo]

I did not actually test twenty turns without the save/loads from Turn 1 because I have faith that I will get the same results that have been posted by others; the reason why is that I have a glimmering of the kinds of algorithms that were used and why and how the load game behavior is resetting the AI's behavior. It essentially feels free to select a new opening move. The available options are probably somewhat similar to a software random-number generator, which does not truly generate a random sequence of numbers but eventually will cycle through the sequence and start at the beginning again. While the test results are interesting, they seem to be specific to a given set of extrema.

The control, or the factor that was eliminated in my tests, was player inactivity. A review of the first 20 moves of my campaign -- each and every one of which was saved, because as I said I do multiple saves and loads each turn -- shows clearly that the AI factions are also seeking to expand. I listed the exact details of their expansion and other interactions with each other and with the human player (except alliances) in a previous post.

To test further, I introduced player inactivity at midgame save points, wherein alliances, declarations of war, sieges and other policies had already been initiated, and tried hitting "End Year" repeatedly both with and without save/loads. I posted those results as well, but I will summarize here. Although the AI did have a general tendency to relieve sieges after a save/load, I found cases both where it did so and where it did not; and in those cases where it did relieve a siege, it did not abandon its objective but merely changed the way in which it manifest itself as the aggressor. Units in route to a siege consistently continued toward their target, even with save/loads; units that relieved a siege because of a load game consistently continued to threaten the territory and sometimes blocked access to other besieging units for reinforcements; in some cases they abandoned their siege to add support to another siege in which they were undermanned. I found no cases in which they yielded an inferior strategic position as the result of relieving a siege -- and quite honestly, they were more annoying when they were relieving and reinstating the sieges, almost as if they were taunting me!

I have some really interesting save games that will allow you to observe the phenomenon yourself. It's actually kinda funny, watching the British in the north and the Numidians in the south alternately engaging and disengaging sieges each turn, which gets triggered by the save/load, but it also becomes pretty apparent that they are no less of a threat to your Empire than if they maintained the sieges as they do when you hit "End Year" without a save/load. That's when I realized that if I were willing to endure a siege for just one turn I could use a save/load to exploit this AI behavior to meet them in the field rather than sallying forth from the castle. However, that's probably not a very useful exploit since they will probably end up with the terrain advantage and I will lose the castle which can protect my flanks as I approach them. My guess is that this is one of the factors in the AI's assessment that relieving the siege is equally acceptable to maintiaining it; they can choose which square (or which realtime map) they wish to defend, giving them the advantage of position if I decide to attack them. That's always been an advantage of the AI, that it has a database of which realtime battle map will be used for any given square of the campaign map.

The reason I chose Turn 19 for my other test was because it was still early enough in the game that there had been some interaction between the different factions, but not extensively. I wanted to find out precisely how close to a position of extrema you needed to be in order to observe more stagnant behavior on the part of the AI as the result of player inactivity and load games. I expected results fairly similar to starting the test from Turn 1, but perhaps not quite as pronounced. However, my testing was rudely interrupted after just a few turns when the Brutii laid siege to the rebel town of Segistica. After the first save/load they relieved the siege, then after another save/load they reinstated it and after subsequent save/loads they maintained the seige and occupied the territory. They do that consistently, so in the reassessment logic there must be no "equally viable" alternative to maintaining the siege. The one interesting thing that I noticed is that when the AI relieved the siege after the first save/load, then reinstated it, it had no effect on the attrition of the settlement! The settlement could only hold out during the siege for 3 turns rather than 4, just as if the siege had never been relieved!

For players that play only on turn per sitting, I suppose this behavior could have a small advantage in that sieges on their settlements will be audibly announced every other turn.

Anyway, as you've probably guessed by now, I'm a programmer myself. After reading the response from "The Shogun" at http://p223.ezboard.com/fshoguntotal...ID=24377.topic it seemed to me as if he had brought up the topic to his programmers, and as if they fully understand the phenomenon and explained it to him, but as if he did a poor job of explaining how a load game causes the AI to reset the list of equally viable options -- selecting the "seed value", to describe things in terms of a random number generator. He also did not explain the fact that although this behavior can produce some awkward gameplay at the moment of greatest extrema (which happens to be the first turn of the game in the presence of player inactivity), those side-effects diminish as the game moves forward -- and that it can, in fact, enhance the gameplay experience because the computer cannot be relied upon to make the same move after a load game as it did when you simply pressed "End Turn", thereby making it less predictable.

My guess is that the developers showed him some concrete examples, like the ones in the save games from my campaign that I've experimented with. That's why I've offered to send them to anyone who wishes to review them. They were not specifically constructed to create a point; they are just save points from my campaign that I thought would be good points to test the effects of this phenomen during midgame -- specifically, those points at which sieges were in effect. Combined with a little explanation, they are sufficient evidence of the viability of strategic reassessment after a load game. Unfortunately, I think something was lost in the translation from developer to customer relations to end user. Have you ever played the game "Secret"?

[Kraxis]

Interesting... Anybody about to duplicate it?

So if I understand you correctly, you only differed by actually going out and attacking and basically playing the game for a while (while saving/loading every turn) then you sat back and watched what else would happen if you became stagnant (still saving/loading every turn)?

[roguebolo]

Right. Both with and without save/loads every turn during the period of stagnancy.

[HarunTaiwan]

So, Roguebolo, what would be the point of the extra re-assessment after the save/load as opposed to just letting the game go on as if there had been no save/load? Especially as the no load/save seems to bring fine results as is.

I guess we'll need someone to recreate the Sicily run of turns, but start after one player move...or do we need to play more than that Roguebolo?

If the person who did that test could simply start on Turn 20 and make one move as his faction, and then continue the test, we'd know for sure.

Also, with the Total Protectorate feature, how can a player know if the AI protectorates were ill-gotten or not? In fact, I had several protectorates that seemed too easy. Is this part of the "re-assessment" function to accept all protectorate requests after a seige/lift save/load?

[roguebolo]

I labeled each of my save games before "End Turn" as "1st Turn", "2nd Turn", etc...all the way to the 20th turn. I was quite surprised when I looked back and saw this because I had no idea how useful it would become a few weeks later for these tests.

I had just reinstalled RTW and installed Patch 1.2 for the first time. (I had been playing a different game for a couple of months.) I played as the plain-vanilla Julii (again) since all the factions were locked and I decided to unlock them with gameplay rather than by modifying the text file, as before. Assuming that I did not accidently skip a turn, I started the tests just before hitting "End Year" of the 19th turn. At any rate, it was the Winter of 261 B.C.

At the end of the turn in Winter 261 B.C., despite frequent saves and loads, here was the political climate:

1.) The Seleucids and Egypt were at war, Egypt gaining a territory on turn 14 and losing a territory on turn 18; the Seleucids gained a territory on turn 18.
2.) Parthia and I (Julii) both gained a territory on turn 2.
3.) The Brutii gained a territory on turn 4 and another on turn 14.
4.) Pontus gained a territory on turn 14 and another on turn 16.
5.) The Greek Cities were at war with Macedon and Pontus.
6.) Egypt and the Seleucids were at war.
7.) Brittainia and Germania were at war.
8.) Scythia and Parthia were at war.

Alliances:

1.) Scythia was allied with Armenia and the Seleucids.
2.) Carthage and Spain were allies.
3.) Parthia and Thrace were allies.
4.) As the Julii, I was allied with Carthage, Macedonia, Gaul, Germania, Dacia, the Greek Cities, Numidia, Scythia, Spain and Thrace. I believe I initiated all of those alliances with the possible exception of Gaul.

On the following turn, I began an invasion of Gaul and we declared war, which is why I chose this turn to start testing stagnation; up to this point my only military conflict had been with Segesta and random rebel stacks.

I think I will go back a little further toward the point of greatest extrema -- say, turn 12 since most territorial acquisitions began around turn 14 -- and see if the byproduct of a stagnant AI is more pronounced. At that point only Parthia, the Brutii, and myself had gained a territory.

[HarunTaiwan]

Did Parthia gain the rebel territory?

I think Julii and Bruti do that as well.

Could it be AI versus rebels as opposed to other AI is different?

[HarunTaiwan]

Note Pontus and Egypt could also be taking Rebel only territory.

[roguebolo]

To be quite honest with you, I had never succeeded in getting a faction to submit as protectorate until this most recent campaign. I had beaten Gaul back to just it's capital in Celtiberia, and laid siege to it, and they patently refused Protectorate status. I read about the save/load exploit on a forum, and I was absolutely determined to have them become a protectorate even if I had to use an exploit. So I tried it, and it had absolutely no effect. They only finally caved in after the siege had been held for several more years -- for a price, of course.

I ran into the same situation with Spain a few turns later at their capital in Lusitania. They had no other territories and their capital was under siege. Again, the save/load had no effect. However, after a few turns of being besieged $14000 convinced them.

I should have save games of both of these situations as well.

[HarunTaiwan]

4.) As the Julii, I was allied with Carthage, Macedonia, Gaul, Germania, Dacia, the Greek Cities, Numidia, Scythia, Spain and Thrace. I believe I initiated all of those alliances with the possible exception of Gaul.

LOL. That's pretty amazing for 20 turns. If you had asked them all to become protectorates, you'd have sewn the game up. When I play without save/load, I don't think I can achieve so many alliances.

[roguebolo]

Well, I guess that's just proof that I do save/loads every turn, in support of the other data I've provided.

I always send out my diplomat by boat from the first turn of the game. He moves from faction to faction trying to sell trade rights, usually unsuccessfully after which he gives them away. Then he tries to sell an alliance, which he also gives away if unsuccessful. As the Romans, it's easier to get alliances because it inhibits other Roman factions from warring with the proposed ally and often causes a ceasefire if hostilities are already underway. The AI is aware of this and likes that insurance policy. The wealthy Greeks are particularly suckers for this technique. If trade rights have already been established, an alliance seems easier to sell or give away. The last thing he tries to sell is map information.

I also build a diplomat in my territories so that I can approach foriegn diplomats traveling nearby. Sometimes I reject their diplomatic offers and come back to them with the same offer on the following turn, so that my diplomat will get the influence bonus.

I will check which territories were taken over, and I'm also going to try the same test from Turn 12.

[Bromley]

EDIT: Apologies, but I have missed out Rhodes (Greeks) in all of my tests. It's immaterial to the conclusions though.

As far as I know, only DimeBagHo has tried to quantify the effect on the AI of different intervals of save/load. I've just finished a series of tests to provide some similar evidence. Unlike Dime, I just ran one test for each interval, so I don't have averages. That weakness is offset by running the test for all intervals between every 2 turns to every 10 turns (inclusive).

Just to be clear, when I say an interval of, say, 4 turns I mean that I click End Turn 4 times and then save/load.

As intervals of 4-6 turns seemed to be key, I did perform a second run for each of those, so I have basic averages there. I also ran a no-load game. The first column in the results, labeled "Start" is the starting position in 270 BC. I started all the runs from this same saved position.

So:
RTW 1.2, no mods, M/M, Brutii, 20 turns, various intervals, everything moved to cities at start, no other player action, answer "no" to any diplo/marriage.

I recorded the number of territories owned by all of the factions (except rebels). The total of these show the total AI expansion, which is the key result for this test. The data on the individual factions is still there though, so others can draw conclusions from those if they'd like.

I also specifically recorded the state of Sicily.

Conclusion

Observations of Sicily show that the AI has real trouble expanding if loaded every 4 turns. The cusp seems to be 5 turns, where the Scipii in one run took one city yet in the other remained static. With 6 or more turns, the Scipii managed to overrun Sicily every time (although it took them longer at 6 turns than at 10).

Total AI expansion seems to really suffer until you hit intervals of 4 turns. It seems to require an interval of 7 turns to maximise (or get close enough for there to be little difference). Obviously, more runs would generate averages that would better pinpoint this, but I'm happy that the general trend is pretty obvious with what we've already got.

Note how that last paragraph disagrees with the first. i.e. in the first I'm saying that 6 turns will allow the Scipii to conquer Sicily happily and yet in the second I'm saying that intervals of 4 and 7 are the key ones. I believe this has to do with things like the distance between the cities and the level of opposition in the area. So extending the interval beyond 6 makes no difference to the Scipii in Sicily because they only need 6 clear turns to reach and overrun a city. It does help other AI factions reach the cities that are further away though. Likewise, the Scipii are completely boned with an interval of 4, yet other factions manage to do okay. That's because the Scipii are facing walls and armies rather than rebel settlements.




If I haven't explained something properly, pm me (to keep this thread as uncluttered as possible) and I'll fix it. Likewise, if people want any of my saves pm me and I'll upload them somewhere.

[Bromley]

EDIT: Apologies, but I have missed out Rhodes (Greeks) in all of my tests. It's immaterial to the conclusions though.

I did a short extension, just to see what happens when alliances/wars etc are firmly in place.

Loaded the no-loads 260 file. Then (a) played to 250 with no loads and (b) played to 250 with 4 turn loads (i.e. long enough for the AI to recover from the previous load but still expected to impact AI behaviour).

Here are the results with a few notes. Basically, loading cut the Rebels some slack but also prevented the destruction of Gaul and held Egypt back. Also, the Brutii didn't try to establish a foothold in North Africa.



Interestingly enough, if you look at the absolute differences for the 250 no-save and 250 interval 4 compared to the 260 load used to start the test, you see some startling results.

The bottom line shows that the no-load has increased in total by 7 and the Int-4 by 3. A big difference, but not huge.

But then look at the territories by country though and compare them to the 260 start.
* Looking at the absolute changes (i.e. ignoring + and -, just the number)
* Removing the number of rebel provinces in that amount (which we know by looking at the total provinces owned before and after)
* Dividing the resulting number by 2 (as all provinces were taken from another faction, so are double counted)

That gives some stunning results. No provinces were taken from other factions in the interval 4 run, whereas 8 were taken in the no-load run.

That's huge. I know there might be a few logic errors in what I just did (as I haven't done maths for 15 years ), but not enough to explain away a variance that large.

Where it says "20", that's meant to read "start" or "260". Can't be bothered to fix the image .

[roguebolo]

[edit] Sorry, I misunderstood something. OK, the AI factions have all made alliances but the human player has not made any alliances nor expanded yet after 20 turns, right? That introduces an entirely different extrema that is a little hard to concieve of, since the AI definitely attempts to respond to the human player.

I'm finding that alliances are actually a key factor. If I load my game at turn 14, then play forward to turn 19 with or without save/loads, I get results that are identical to when I was playing the actual game. The same factions have acquired the same territories, except that when I did not use save/loads Egypt apparently beat the Seleucids in their war because on turn 18 the Seleucids did not gain a territory and the Egyptians did not lose one; so the game with save/loads was actually less static, but that's merely a matter of an autocalculated battle turning out differently.

HOWEVER, there IS a breaking point. If I move back to turn 12 and play the game forward to turn 19 with save/loads, none of the factions take their rebel territories. Whether I use save/loads or not, the alliances and declarations of war are considerably different than when I had established alliances on my own, as well as considerably different than each other. The save/loads seem to be affecting who they select as allies and who they select as enemies, much the same way that random events are affected by a load game.

I know exactly why different declarations of war are occuring. At the beginning of turn 12, my only alliances were with Gaul, Germania, the Greek Cities, Numidia and Spain. At the beginning of turn 14, most of my alliances had been established and included Carthage, Germania, and Thrace as well, thereby preventing many of the other factions from declarations of war in order to keep their alliance with my Roman faction. Without these alliances, which is the only thing I did while actually playing the game except for building my faction's infrastructure, the other factions were free to make war or love as they pleased, without any regard to my faction's alliances. This strongly reminds me of MTW.

When starting from turn 12, without my alliances to guide their decisions, the alliances and declarations of war that they chose were considerably different depending on whether I used save/loads each turn or not. Without save loads, several of the factions were less active (but not inactive) in taking rebel territories, and several other factions were more active. However, WITH save/loads, no faction took any rebel territories. If this had something to do with the different nature of the alliances and war declarations, because they thought they needed the forces elsewhere, or because of other reasons, I cannot say. In any case, it does seem to support your idea that the rebels get a break, and it also seems to be growing in prevalence as I move closer and closer to the point of greatest extrema. But let me point out that it also seems to grow less in prevelance as I move away from it, so that by midgame it seems to have no effect on gameplay at all.

I don't know if this is coincidence or if it has something to do with the anomalies you've pointed out, but turn 12 also happens to be an even multiple of 4 and 6.

HarunTaiwan:

The point of reassessment after a load game is that it makes the AI less predictable. You can't say, "Oh, I didn't know it was going to do that. I'll just load the last turn and play a little differently."

[ShellShock]

Thank you Bromley.

Your second analysis answers the question that occurred to me on reading your initial results - the number of territories that changes hands is a much better measure of the effectiveness of the AI compared to the number of territories each faction owns. I assume as players we generally prefer an AI that is aggressive, expansive and therefore more likely to attack (if not conquer) our territories.

The community owns you a big thanks for the time you've put into this.

I hope this data will give CA some insight into the game mechanics over time, and will help them in their plans for the future of the TW series, if not RTW itself.