GidMod, next version...

When the TO DO section is done, it will be available for download. Since that is just plugging numbers in to variables, it will be no great deal to do. The hard part (building the basic code framework to make use of the variables) is done.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Thanks, man! I was going to make something eventually, but that will be a long time in the future. So, until then, I'll use yours.

Cheers!

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

All values are now entered. Everything except that which is on the FOR A LATER VERSION list is implemented. Starting testing now.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Well, early tests show the AI getting pissed at each other much more often, and so far nobody has any treaties. Only mass warfare. Happily, the AI is keeping up with me in points (actually, starting to pass me up, which is worrying). Obviously more tweaking is required, but this is a good start. It is also possible to form treaties, but not as easy (I find in stock politics, I can easily form treaties with everyone early on, and keep them from bothering me for as long as I like). Its early game, so the wars that are occuring are pretty slow paced. However, the AI has invaded each other's planets (and mine :angry:), as well as tried to glass a few (of mine). At turn ~50 the UkraTal rolled up to one of my planets (in contested space) with a fleet that had 8 frigates and a troop transport. My fleet got there the round after, and what was left of the Ukra fleet (that would be 5 undamaged and 1 damaged frigate, plus troop transport) ate them for lunch. I may need to re-think my research priorities when I play, my useual tactic of spreading things out isn't working so well any more.

Anywho, I'm going to leave higher end AI changes for the next version, and see where I can get by tweaking values. I may be able to have a version I feel like releasing by this weekend.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Well, the universe still descends in to absolute chaos too quickly. I've been forced to change how the AI determines its attack and its offensive intel criteria. The AI now checks against its anger with a target to determine whether it will perform an offensive action (either military or intel). Anger is a value from 0 (Love you long time!) to 100 (Die-die, man-man!), and is based on an empire's mood (so you can see if they want to rip your guts out).

What this means:
The AI is capable of attacking you if you are treatied, but it doesn't like you.
The AI is capable of performing espionage/sabotage if you are treatied, but it doesn't like you.
The AI will NOT always attack you (or perform sabotage/espionage) if to does not have a treaty with you.
The AI will perform Cooperative Intelligence, if it feels so inclined.

This should provide a more interesting game, and ALSO provide time to "give peace a chance".

There are some random values involved, but the tendancy for an empire to perform an offensive action is heavily influenced by values in each _Main.txt file, so each empire can behave somewhat differently.

Continuing with testing.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Malfador didn't fix it...they completely left it out. The AI doesn't perform any comparisons between empires in stock SE5 AI.

In my mod this depends on the individual empire. For instance, the Abbidon like you less if you have more Military than they do, and like you more if you have less than them. The Sithrak, on the other hand, like you more if you have more military than them (since they respect strength), and like you less if you have less than them (since they consider you prey). The strength of this effect varies from race to race, as well. Relative military stength has a much larger effect on relations with the Sithrak than with the Abbidon, for instance.

The fields of relative comparison for mood adjustment are:
Military Strength
Economic Strength
Technological Strength
Intelligence Strength

Each race has the strength and direction each of these modifiers adjusted individually.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Economic strength involves all three resources, both what you generate and what you have in storage. Note that this is gross generation, not net. The AI cares not for your inefficent spending practices, it just wants to know what it could potentially squeeze out of you. Remember, some races like you MORE if you have more economic strength than they do. They see you as an attractive trade partner, and want to be your friend.

In a later version, the AI will drill down to specific resources (in conjunction with both your and their primary resource useage) in order to judge the value of give/trade packages, and to better arrange where it should attack.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Testing is continuing. Things are looking good for a release soon.

Current changelog:

v5.0.0b
- Extended popluation bonuses downward on the low end of the graph, and slowed population birth and migration rates.  This is done to emphasize high-population planets.
- AI will not accept or propose any treaty or alliance that prevents it from performing Research, Intel, Alliance/Treaty with Others, or Planet Bombardments.  This is temporary until a way is devised to have the AI renegotiate treaties.
- AI mood can never be better than a certain point without a treay in place.

- To aid the player in judging the mood of an AI empire, the mood labels have been expanded.  The complete list, from best to worst:
---Brotherly
---Welcoming
---Amiable
---Friendly
---Receptive
---Tolerant
---Indifferent
---Wary
---Displeased
---Aggravated
---Angry
---Venemous
---Murderous

- AI now analyzes its own military, economic, and technological strength.
- AI now analyzes other empires' military, economic, and technological strength.
- AI uses comparisons of the two as a modifier of its mood towards other empires.

- AI mood includes a modifier from trade.  The more trade, the better an AI empire's mood.  The amount of this varies by empire.
- Some races dislike each other, and so have a mood penalty towards each other. (NOTE:  I did not say they automatically hate each other,or that they cannot form treaties/alliances with each other.)
- Espionage acts once again affect mood, though not as much as in stock.  Before, these alone could push an empire to near-Murderous.

- Each empire has had its treaty likes/dislikes tweaked.
- Each empire has modifiers for how important military, economic, and technological comparisons are, and how they apply
- Each empire research priorities have been tweaked to better represent them.

- New research groups have been created to better guide AI research.
- Each empire has had its colony type distribution tweaked.
- AI determines whether it will attack a location based on its anger towards the location's owner, NOT its treaty status.

- AI determines its intel actions based on its anger towards each entity, NOT its treaty status.
- AI will spend points on Cooperative Intelligence, if it feels so inclined.
- Split organic and crystalline armor in to their own tech trees, and expanded them to 100 levels.

- AI no longer builds Military Colonies, at least, until I can find a use for them.
- AI now reinforces a fleet when that fleet runs low on ships.
- Corrected an error in my AI satellite designs.  They should use heavy weapons now.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod

Thanks for the heads-up. I'll probably have the AI break treaties with that element, rather than attempt to renegoitate. That's a bit in the future, however. Much bigger fish to fry.

On the subject of the fish that I'm frying, everything is working well (at least as well as this version will allow, there is always room for improvement). Ran a test for 500 turns yesterday. At the end of that time, there were both treaties and wars, and the major empires were easily hitting the 200 ship limit mark. Large scale fleet battles, as well as planetary invasions/glassings would occure.

You would get some strange results, like one race would be brotherly towards another that it is at war with. Upon investigation, it was because there hadn't been much conflict over recent times between the two, and the other race still hated the one that was brotherly. I guess peace only works if both are willing to try it. I'm willing to accept that.

I found one race (the Abbidon) down to two planets, zero ships, no shipyards. Upon investigation, these appear to be colonies that were out of the path of the XiChung rampage (they now posses almost half the systems in the test map). The XiChung overwhelmed every other system in Abbidon space, including their homeworld, and never bothered to declare war in the process. The Abbidon, for their part, played the pacifists and seemed to just hope the XiChung would pass them by (which is fitting for that race). Just goes to show: never trust an insect, and gas-bags really don't have spines. This has caused me to create some AI so that if an empire has no more space yards, it will pick the highest production planet it has, clear that planet's build queue, scrap until it has enough room, and build a space yard there. This works like a charm.

I am not releasing yet, because I need to re-evaluate the reduction in population growth and/or the new population bonus graph. 500 turns later, epic fleets, massive battles, and most races had only barely started useing destroyers. The reason for this is because Research Points are produced by planets, which (with the settings I'm testing) produce very little with low pop, and population grows very slowly. I'm going to conduct the same test (I saved the game at turn zero) with higher pop growth rates and a more generous production curve, and see what happens.

I'm also going to tweak some of the math that determines if a race conducts sabotage or miltiary attacks, to see if I can make the AI a bit more relentless in its behaviour against those it hates.

"Only by being constantly at war with evil in all things, including yourself, can you truely know peace."
Download my mod here: GidMod