Campaign Difficulty, HELP?

from GalCiv2 Forums

Ok.  So I've been playing this game for a good while now.  I've played every race, won with half of them.

I play on the difficulty "Bright", usually.  I've played on Challanging and Tough before though, but they are a bit too easy for me.  I've never played anything over Bright difficulty.

I was wondering if anyone  of me fellow Gal Gamers can tell me some of the main differences between difficulty levels?

Does the AI actually get smarter? or is it just a bunch of generic state boosters (like most other games =fail).

This is the main problem I've been having with GalCiv2 and it's really been turning me off from the game.

Starbases.

Every single game I play, whenever I go to war, my enemies ALWAYS attack my starbases first and generally completely ignore my planets.  I can have a completely undefended weak planet right next to a powerful starbase, and my enemy will send hundreds of ships, wave after wave after wave after wave after wave against a starbase they can not destroy.  Usually they can't destroy my starbases because they only have a logistics low fleet that can't beat up my outposts in time.

I can go many many turns with my enemies of all and any Nation wasting all there ships on my outposts while completely ignoring my planets.  The only time an enemy will try to take my planet is if there happens to be ZERO outpost/starbases within the vacinity.

Meanwhile, I'm going ape on there planets and taking over all there space.  I simply navigate my fleets "around", enemy star bases and go straight for he planets.  The only times I fight enemy star bases is if I want to disable a strategy they are using, such as military assistance, infulence bothers and economy boosters.

I even have enemies try to destroy influence star bases when tha should not matter to them at all because they come from across te galaxy.  I'm so confused as to why they don't just attack my weak planet and take the region fully?

I mean, they could take it within 1-5 turns......  yet they would rather spend 40-50 turns wasting all their ships and resource building time vs my ONE undying starbase.

This happens to me every single game I play.  I'm just not feeling the strategy anymore.  I can easily predict AI battle strategy with ease.

 

****If I boost up the difficulty, might the AI become smarter and actually navigate around outposts? or choose better targets in war, such as planets?

I'd appretiate any help here.  I wantto keep playing this game, bu I can't overlook this game breaker AI issue.

6,580 views 5 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top


they would rather spend 40-50 turns wasting all their ships and resource building time vs my ONE undying starbase.

This is my Issue #58.

Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Hi!

The AI doesn't get "smarter" above "tough", but gets bonuses. If "tough" is too easy, try "crippling" ("genius" AI setting). IIRC AI there gets 25% bonus to econ, research and production.  Not much, but for a casual playing a good challenge. More on this you can find on  https://www.galciv.wikia.com/wiki/Difficulty_level

As for starbases: from your post I'd say you're playing Dread Lords. Only there can a SB be made nearly indestructible.  DA and TA use different combat mechanics, where the whole fleet attacks a single terget, and even in mid game a SB simply can't mount enough defenses to survive such an attack.

BR,  Iztok

 

 

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Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Also, check to see if you've enabled max CPU. It hasn't been confirmed how much this helps the AI, but at the very least, it's known to cause them to upgrade their ships much more often.

As for starbases: from your post I'd say you're playing Dread Lords. Only there can a SB be made nearly indestructible. DA and TA use different combat mechanics, where the whole fleet attacks a single terget, and even in mid game a SB simply can't mount enough defenses to survive such an attack.

It should be noted that DA and TA also have significantly improved AI. The DA AI is a considerable step up from that of DL, and the TA AI is a further step above that (although some races' AI was badly messed up by the new tech trees).

Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

I'm playing TA.

Granted the AI is better, but not good enough.

In TA, my outposts/starbases are supreme.  I generally upgrade them halfway to max.  I tend to focus my research on starbase power early on.  I don't even have to throw all the weapon on them, I just give them a few type 2 wepons.  I don't even have to give them shields.  I cn easily destroy 6 light cruisers at evey wave they throw at me, per turn.

I take some damage, but it gets mostly repaired by the next turn.  My outpost wepons tend to destroy enemy ships faster than they can utilize their own wepons on me!

So, the difficulty settings are just handycaps then in bonus' and not actually a smarter AI.  That is a true shame.

Pumping up the economy handicap really just unbalances the game.....  it's not really a stratigic difficulty level.

I'm not sure this game will continue to challange me anymore regarding a smart AI.

It's just too easy knowing that every AI race in the game will always attack my well defended outposts no matter what and at any cost, even though their are much much much better targets for them to run at and with much better success.

 

What a shame this game, I think I'll be taking a break from it until agood AI patch comes out.

Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

You know, there is a point where ships-even single ships-even single ships built by the AI-can take out any starbase, no matter how many attack/defense modules it has on it.

Granted, techs cost more in TA, due to more than one reason, but if you haven't yet reached that point, then, speaking purely personally, I don't see why you're complaining yet.

Particularly since, given the title of the thread, I assume you're actually fighting the Dread Lords, who reach that point much sooner than the rest of us.

Those of us who do reach that point discover that SBs are in fact underpowered, in the grand scheme of things, and continually wish they might be more powerful in the same way that ships become more powerful.

Which isn't to say that they're useless; they're far from it.  But I never really arm my SBs anymore-all they get is Battle Stations I for additional modules.