"the game is too easy", they say

If I may rephrase something a Stardock employee once said: "People who can reliably beat the game at the highest difficulty levels are probably using exploits." No offense or criticism meant to any of those players. Of course, there are varying definitions on what an exploit is, and that is not really the topic at debate here.

There will always be people who believe the game is too easy. Much depends on how you view a particular game, and how you play it. I play the game on difficulties I am comfortable with, which is mostly between Normal and Painful, depending on my mood. I don't believe the game is too easy or too hard, and I'm not bothered by others claiming the game is too easy.

In fact, many times when people express their opinion that the game is too easy, they add one or two "exploits" with which to beat the game, e.g. the AI doesn't value tech enough, or it used to be that one could buy their mining starbases for a pinch (effectively stabbing them to death with money). In very much the same way you could trick a (possibly new) player in a multiplayer game, you can sometimes trick the AI.

Some people say that using exploits is effectively the same as cheating. Others say that "exploit" is a derogatory term for a thought-out angle that took time to find, or comes naturally with a style of play. There's merit to both views on the topic, though I'm not picking sides with either: I know how difficult it is to create a challenging computer opponent that does not cheat, especially in the gigantic problem space the game presents. Developpers have difficulty with developping a good chess engine, and that's on fully dedicated machines.

Stardock could never eliminate all these "exploits", partly because it would mean that they'd have to develop an AI that's smarter than a human, something of which I believe it to currently be impossible.

Summarily, it all depends on your style of play. Play the game as you'd like to, enjoy yourself, and don't take offense when others seem to have an easier time than you. It's the fun factor that counts. Laissez-faire.

Keep on rocking, bro,
Tarbo

i agree with cebuggy i can just barely beat machist and suicide will kill me without fail every time, if those guys think that it is too easy then try goign to that!

An exploit is just a way to manipulate the game in a way the developers didn't think of first.

For example, the trick of using your latest crappy tech to buy tech from every AI, then cross-trade between every race to gather tech so you can cut down on the amount of research you have to do. This is old hat in some games, where very advanced diplomacy and trading has been a key priority for the developers of a second or third sequel in a line of games, but wasn't prioritized in GC2.

An old trick in Civ II was to build up a huge industrial city, let the squares around it become horribly polluted, but use stacks of engineers to continually "fix" the polluted tiles so it never became a problem, and churn out high-cost military units every turn (compare this to one planet churning out a Dreadnought every single turn).

Some people like to play this way, and to be honest there's nothing wrong with it, except that if "comparing scores" is important to you, it unbalances the playing field such that people who do not use every tactic they can discover and exploit (remember, one of the 4 X's is eXploitation ) are at a disadvantage.

Personally, I don't give a rat's rump about "score", I play games to enjoy playing games, to have fun and escape the stress of real life.

I am getting fed up of smart a**es claiming stardock are crap because they can beat the game easily. Are these guys just playing on the kiddie levels?

Yes, alot of people r coming out with this, 'comment', u then find they r only playing on tough level or whatever level it is that the AI is not cheating at. Just increase the difficulty. Suicide level which I do play at is really, really hard. It is also become more difficult from version to version as stardock improve the AI, which is the best I have encountered in a computer game!

I suspect I will after lower the level soon after a couple more patches. The AI beat me, a week ago (20th game or so), which shocked and impressed me as I don't think I have ever been beat by the computer in a turn based strategy game when I am playing seriously to win. Stardock have done an excellent job with the AI and deserve a well done. P.S. I am no fanboy

Yes, alot of people r coming out with this, 'comment', u then find they r only playing on tough level or whatever level it is that the AI is not cheating a

To be fair, Well the problem is one of Stardock's own making. They claimed that the AI without cheating at 'tough' would be unwinnable for all but the top 5 percentile of gamers! That is a claim that didn't pan out I'm afraid.

Personally I haven't yet played at maschostic level (just finished my first painful without problems) , but with a 200% bonus, the game better be hard to win! Even games with brain dead AI, with this amount of bonus are almost impossible to win.

In the classic game master of magic (MOM), "Impossible" setting was pretty much at this level of cheating, and indeed it was impossible for most players. And this was without any self proclaimed smart AI. Not to mention that MOM was well known to be one of the most unbalanced games ever with lots of exploits even then.... most players I know can't beat impossible, besides using the broken 11 book strategy.

I play only at though, because :

1° I want the better AI
2° I don't want cheat (i play just for fun, and i don't have time for cheat).

At Tough, AI is not really strong. Easy to circumvent her. She can beat me only at the beginning, if i do the bad decision. But after the first turns, even if i do bad decisions the AI can't beat me.
I'm not really strong. I'm just not stupid.

I dont know about the AI being too easy but it IS far to easy to achevie a dipomatic victory at this point... just grab the spin control center, put your best attack ships in orbit of the plan with the center, and all the AI's fall in love with you...

To be fair, Well the problem is one of Stardock's own making. They claimed that the AI without cheating at 'tough' would be unwinnable for all but the top 5 percentile of gamers! That is a claim that didn't pan out I'm afraid.

I'll bet that if you looked at the actual numbers, I'm thinking that 5% is pretty accurate. Probably only 5% of the people that have purchased this game actually visit these forums. How many units of GalCiv2 have sold? How many of those players can beat the AI on tough on a regular basis? I'm quite sure much less than 10%.

In my experience, the ones that regularly visit the forums, and every once in a while actually post, are the top 5% of the gamers for any given game genre. We've also all seen the numerous posts by honest folk admitting to not being able to beat the game on Tough setting.

Are there masters of GC2 out there that never visit the forums? I'm sure, just as there are GC2 players that post here regularly that can't fight thier way out of a paper bag. I can only spend maybe an hour a day playing GC2, but I've been gaming since I was 16, which was (grabs abacus) 22 years ago, and this game challenges me at any level above Tough.

Im thinking that folks who say that the AI is easy are also playing on huge/gigantic maps. For whatever reason, the AI is not as agressive on very large map sizes, giving you the time needed to build up a decent defense, what mostlikely needs to occur is the proximity code (or what ever code it is that defines thier attitude twards you based on how far away they are) needs to be adjusted to take into account the acctual size of the map - ie have the ai's respond as if it was a medium map. Add to that the extra planets involved and it could very well be to the players advantage, AI cheating or no.

Even with abundant planets/stars, the differance between a medium sized map on masochistic and a giant map on masochistic is stunning.

First, I think the 5% is close.

Second, I do play at suicide alot and will be finishing my first one on a metaverse game soon. I played some before I started posting on metaverse. I found back then that I need to re-load alot so did not want to play on metaverse until I could play a game without re-loading because of a problem. I think it is a form of cheating to load old saves because things are not going as you like. So I think I can say that my opinion should count. I do not think anyone should complain about how easy a game is unless you play at the highest level. Most complaining are not at suicide.

I can tell you suicide can be beaten if you use your diplomcay, or finance options properly. However, it is not EASY. If you turn off tech trading it is even more difficult. Each patch is more difficult. I think even the ones who say it is easy at suicide might be forgetting how difficult the early and early mid-game sections are. After the middle of the game it does become easy if you are dominanting. Then you spend half the game just mopping up what eventually will be your win. They forget the work the put in the beginning (micromanaging) to get the upper hand.

Ive seen this type of attitude a lot with people commenting on games, its like using a cheat and then complaining that the games too easy for them. Its rediculous if they complain a games too easy when theyre not playing it on the most difficult of levels available.

On the other hand "the game's too easy" could also refer not to the game as a whole but to parts of the whole, the AI and its strategic meneuverings being unsatisfactorarily challenging from the players perspective (whilst playing on a level where the Ai is fully engaged). For example the player amasses a large fleet of powerfull ships and to counter this fleet the AI attacks with several equally as powerful ships but in several small fleets, one at a time. Now that is a warranted critique, the player just isnt expressing themselves properly. Which considering the demographics is not suprising that some players cant express themselves clearly.

I play the highest level. The game is not that easy. I win about half the time. On Gigantic galaxies it would probably be lower, but the game crashes too much and the turns take too long, so I play on medium galaxies.

That said, there are any number of really stupid things that the AI does. First, is that they only design ships once a year. Second, is their building queues for planets, no factories, poor use of bonus tiles. Third, is building too many colony ships early (plus their exploit of knowing where the habitable planets are before their scouts arrive). Fourth is their mediocre military strategy. If GC2 were a chess program, it is sometimes makes moves that are about as sound as starting a chess game with a2a4 (pawn to rook four).

I believe that a smarter AI is not something that the majority of players want. I think it would actually turn off 20% of potential customers and only gain maybe 5%. However, I don't like gaping holes like a Manufacturing Capital on a Class-4 planet (better not to build it at all), or a planet with no factories and ten other improvements, half of them embassies. There are unintended side effects with each programming change and it is impossible to test the game thoroughly on all difficulty levels and all map sizes, however, there are some gapping holes that are really, really annoying.

I do wish the programmers would stop trying to be so fancy sometimes and just hard code some things. Examples might be the number of colony ships built early. Just hard code it based on total number of planets on the map (the AI already knows this anyway), divide by number of players and add or subtract a random plus number. As is, virtually every AI on the highest level ends up with 5 to 10 to 15 extra wasted colony ships. Another example might be build queues, hard code and script them. Always build factories first to fill 20% or more of the planet. The only exceptions would be Class-4 or lower planets.

There is lot to the game, and a lot can be done to make it better or at least mimick intelligence. Like I said, in my opinion a really better AI would actually translate into less revenue because it would turn off 20% of the target audience.

plus their exploit of knowing where the habitable planets are before their scouts arrive

Has it been conclusively proven? It seems like this is one of those urban legends of GalCiv2 that never dies. If it has been proven I'd appreciate a link to the discussion, as I can't find it on the forums. There's just pages and pages of back and forth conjecture and no one sharing saved games to back up their statements.

I will say that it's opposite of my experience...even in my current game, the AI didn't settle a system with a class 22 and 16. I got my colony ships there at about the same time as their scout. About 6 turns later an AI colony ship appeared and moved on.

So far I had two diplomatic victory, which seems easy to win...Maybe I will turn diplomatic victory off. Do you guys have a lot of diplomatic victories?

The spin control center to me is an exploit. After I set that and keep my home planet making weaponized ships, I proceed as I wish without getting hassled from the AI. I max my taxes out in the beginning to keep in the green and quick research the diplomacy tree and BAM! Spin control center, then I reset to production and fast build a fleet. After that no one screws with me.

Further more, I don't worry about colonization because I get back on the starbase tree and max that out and just influence grab the planets I want. My games used to take 8 hours, now it's down to three on a large galaxy.

plus their exploit of knowing where the habitable planets are before their scouts arrive

I am 99% sure this is incorrect. The proof I have is a couple of times I have been heading towards a juciy planet to colonize and spotted a AI colony ship, checked out the spd stats and thought ahh.... its going to beat me to the planet. Most of the time this is true, but a few times I have noticed it head towards another star system, one close to me that I have already colonised. Obviously it did not know about the uncolonised planet or the fact I had already colonised all planets in the system it was heading for. Proof the AI is not cheating, its just taking pot luck with hordes of colony ships!

Third, is building too many colony ships early

I think this, is a very, very good strategy by the AI to build hordes of colony ships early on to grab as many planets as possible. Think about it, a couple of extra planets easily repays the early cost of colony ships.

If you turn off tech trading it is even more difficult

Very true, that was the game I lost when tech trading was off at suicidal level.

If there is a problem with the AI being too easy, and you are not "exploiting," then I suggest you make a mod or have someone else make one to make there be more enemies or a higher difficulty. I personally can't even come close to lasting more than 2 hours on suicide. I get killed quick. But if you really are better than the game, then just make the game better.

PS: I'm not good at modding AI things, so ask someone with more abilities in that area.

Yeah, I turned off tech trading and pretty soon had both the Yor and the Drengin knocking at the doors, NOT a pretty sight, of course, I gave them a fight to remember, had my own "battle of the line" defending Earth against a HUGE amount of ships and transports, finally razed my own planet (destroyed buildings) and sent my last fighting ship in a suicidal battle against the Drengin fleet.

Now ask me if I had fun. TONS!

Yeah, I turned off tech trading and pretty soon had both the Yor and the Drengin knocking at the doors, NOT a pretty sight, of course, I gave them a fight to remember, had my own "battle of the line" defending Earth against a HUGE amount of ships and transports, finally razed my own planet (destroyed buildings) and sent my last fighting ship in a suicidal battle against the Drengin fleet.

Edit: she even took out a Drengin heavy fighter before being blown to dust by the concentrated fire of their fleet, what a way to go!
Now ask me if I had fun. TONS!

I suggest you make a mod or have someone else make one to make there be more enemies or a higher difficulty.

The game cannot be modded in such a way.

I play on anywhere between Painful and Suicidal and almost always win. It just depends on if I want to work at it or just roll thru a game on what level I play at. I don't use any exploits but I will start a new game if I am in an untenable position at the start. I don't think the AI is too easy, I think the AI needs to get better at some things, most of which have been detailed by Tiger8 above and others that have been discussed elsewhere. I certainly appreciate the game as it is, but I see so much more potential if the developers can just fix some of the holes in the AI. I mean, wouldn't we all rather get challenged by an AI that doesn't need bonus' than one that needs 200% in order to win? I sure would!

I'll bet that if you looked at the actual numbers, I'm thinking that 5% is pretty accurate. Probably only 5% of the people that have purchased this game actually visit these forums. How many units of GalCiv2 have sold? How many of those players can beat the AI on tough on a regular basis? I'm quite sure much less than 10%.

You make it sound like the people who visit this forum are like some strategic geniuses lol. I can tell you that a lot people play and win games and they don't go to forums either!

Besides I don't think you can hide behind the numbers and say because sales are X (which is a big number), that means logically there are lot of dumb players and hence 95% can't beat it. Using the same flawed argument games with even bigger sales would look even better !

Do you think then 99% of players who purchased civilization can't beat it then?

And of course, the claim was made, long before it was known that Galciv could sell a big deal, so the comment was directed at die hard fans and your excuse doesn't hold anyway.

I do agree though that if you can consistently win at sucidal medium 9 opponents, you probably are doing something cheesy....

I can tell you suicide can be beaten if you use your diplomcay, or finance options properly. However, it is not EASY.

That's about the same as any other game really. At the highest difficulty level, the AI gets so much bonuses that even for the best players winning is touch and go. So I wouldn't say the game is easy, not easier or harder for that matter than any other game anyway.

The problem as i said before is that because of all the hype about the Ai from Stardock, on challenging players without cheating etc, people expect more from the AI...
If they didn't hype the AI so much, I bet you there would have far fewer people talking about how the game is easy after having played only at tough, since it clearly isn't any easier than other games at the highest difficulty levels.

It would be akin to someone winning civilization at king level (or whatever the default is) and then claiming civilization is too easy. We all tactly accept that AI needs to cheat to provide a challenge.. All except Galciv's AI thanks to the hype...


For most other computer games at the default normal setting, the AI cheats a little, but most players can win easily.

In Galcvi2, at tough level the AI doesn't cheat, but provides roughly the same level of difficulty as other games where the Ai cheats a little. First couple of times, it seems to put up a fight, but after a while it's weaknesses become apparent.

I would agree the Galciv2 AI is pretty good compared to others, so it can provide similar level of challenges that other AI can only provide with a little cheating, but this level is still far too weak to challenge any decent player.

It's probably not realistic to expect otherwise but SD bears some of the responsibility for building the hype....

I'm sorry about the mod thing. I wan't paying attention and I'm not good enough at mods to know anyway.