Investigation of AI reassessment upon reload

[roguebolo]

Pode,

My idea about alliances is not 100% confirmed, but it's true that the human player can force ceasefires between AI factions with his alliances sometimes, which also means it would no longer be a "equally viable" option for the AI to change its mind about certain alliances, bringing about some degree of stabilization. An analysis of alliances and ceasefire agreements in the 20-move test with saveloads seems to support the idea that changing alliances are partially repsonsible for the loadgame behavior, as do the save games from turns 12 and 14 of my campaign in which the AI chose to agressively take territories (even distant rebel territories!) only because I had established three new alliances without any other movement, despite the fact that I was doing save/loads each turn. Furthermore, the exploit that has been reported (I've never tried it myself) which allows you to create alliances with an unwilling faction, or even to establish a protectorate (which I've tried only in midgame, to no avail) also seems to support the idea. I think it merits a little more investigation.

For example, let's take the first 20 moves, with no load games. A good player, who has a good grasp of the game and how to manipulate the other factions, will realize that he can use his starting diplomat to sail to Lilybaeum by the third turn and form trade rights and an alliance with Carthage, and then sail to Thermon in three more turns to form trade rights and an alliance with the Greeks, which causes the Scipii to relieve their siege at Syracuse. (It also establishes some fairly lucrative naval trade.)

Hence, the situation in Sicily is entirely under the control of the human player. If you consider the Scipii takeover of Sicily desirable, you can allow it; or, if you choose, you can prevent it. From that analysis alone I don't see the situation in Sicily as a strong contributing factor to the overall effectiveness of the AI later in the game. The Scipii siege of Syracuse was only as effective as I allowed it to be, so the AI was not any more effective in this case, with save/loads or without them.

However, with save/loads, it is a more difficult proposition to convince the Scipii to attack Syracuse. In this particular example, due to the unpredictability factor caused by save/loads, the AI is somewhat harder to manipulate, just as load games seem to make it easier to manipulate in other ways. Try making these moves yourself if you want -- you don't need to make any changes to the original test except for your diplomat and the boat he came in on.

But you are right about the fact that every single game will begin with a floundering period of uncertain alliances if there are a lot of load games, and that the period will last longer for different players depending on their style of play. One thing is for certain -- the AI won't be picking up a lot of rebel territories, giving the human player more time to invade unclaimed territories (assuming he can spare the resources and manpower) and to develop his own rebel acquisitions. Although I don't consider that to be a massive game imbalance introduced by the load game behavior, it certainly has some effect.

As to whether the AI begins to stabilize, I'm certain that it does as the result of some fairly extensive testing. But nevertheless its behavior is still worth observing because it gives me a clue about how the AI is reassessing the situation on a load game, a topic which continues to fascinate me.

Arphahat:

Chess programs are a great comparison in some respects. If you save between moves, they will reassess their next move each time you load and may not make the same move -- either if it's drawing the information from a database, as in the openings, or if it's in midgame and sees equally viable moves.

It's funny, because those same programmers on the other forum brought up the comparison between the AI in RTW and chess. One of them pointed out that chess is also substantially different because of the fact that it has only 64 squares, and a limited number of pieces with limited movements. So, yes, it's an unfair comparison in that respect.

A chess program would have the same type of bug if after you loaded a saved game the AI would expose itself to checkmate regardless of the difficulty setting.

That is, again, merely an unsupported assessment of the degree of impact of the load game behavior. I have encountered too many midgame scenarios which discredit the viewpoint that it simply gives up the game because of load games.