AI exploit: the shipyard blockade.

from GalCiv3 Forums

This is a little trick I came up with after one of my capital ships got trapped when several neutral AIs randomly decided to permanently park their ships next to mine. The concept is extremely simple: station a ring of non-military ships around a shipyard, and then the ships inside can't get out unless the owner declares war and breaks the blockade. Unsurprisingly, the AI doesn't know to build a new shipyard in order to counter this ploy. If you block all the race's shipyards, you can build up a force to take out all their worlds in one turn, knowing exactly what defenses you have to beat. If you set up the blockade soon enough, you can prevent them from colonizing more than a couple of worlds, although it's probably not a smart play with more than one opponent, since you'd have to stunt your own growth quite a bit in the process.

 

Here's a picture from my proof-of-concept game: http://i.imgur.com/HBqmp75.jpg. Just one godlike opponent on a tiny map. You can see nine ships stuck on top of the shipyard. I rushed Planetary Invasion, and with all the AI's combat ships stuck on the shipyard, I just waltzed into each of their 3-4 worlds with an unescorted transport. I have this idea that I could use this exploit to pull off a single-world godlike conquest victory on a medium or large map with several opponents (incidentally, the test game itself was a successful single-world challenge, although that's not very impressive on a tiny map).

 

The one thing that can foil this tactic is if the AI randomly decides to leave a ship in a space both next the shipyard and a planet. That ship will create a bridge to the planet which you can't block, allowing it to move defenses to the planet and eliminate the guarantee of a one-turn victory. Your best bet if this happens would be to buy that ship, or possibly to bribe the AI to attack someone, in the hopes that it decides to use it for combat.

27,499 views 9 replies
Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

The AI does it to the player also, not sure if its an accident or not, but I've been blocked in by the AI doing this before. Hopefully it gets fixed on both ends.

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Reply #3 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Oh now that's a good idea ... a single world Godlike challenge ... without using this exploit!  

 

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Icemaniaa, reply 3

Oh now that's a good idea ... a single world Godlike challenge ... without using this exploit!  
End of Icemaniaa's quote

Alliance victory would be pretty much the same, I imagine. Ascension victories should be pretty much the same, except you'd have less buying power to get the crystals you couldn't claim directly. I bet tech would be doable, especially if using the Ancient trait to get ridiculous research bonuses from relic hoarding. Conquest and influence (pseudo-conquest) are where the real challenge would be, I think.

Reply #5 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Agree iangoth.  Since the AI doesn't target a research victory with any true focus there is plenty of time, it's easy to take everything from the AI using trading, with a few artifacts along the way, it should be possible to win a research victory.  I suspect a conquest/influence victory might be possible once you have the Beyond Mortality technologies and go on the rampage.

Reply #6 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

The an doing this is sound as long as their unfriendly or hostile towards you. Now the air needs some if statements to prevent this. If shipyard blocked then if player agreed to remove ships then if player didn't move ships. Then if power rating greater than others power rating then war. Else if player refuses to remove ships if power rating greater then war. Else if player refuses to remove ships power less than if econy = good then build another shipyard and disable other one. Else if economy not equal good then decommission old shipy and then build new one.

Reply #7 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I've given the one world Godlike challenge above a shot this weekend i.e. no colonisation permitted and for fun also no invasions (until later anyway).  I'm currently on Turn 106.

As expected an Alliance Victory remained trivial.  The only hiccup was the Snathi Revenge, since I couldn't produce very much, they saw me as weak earlier than expected, and also I was very exploration focused so had no military, so that took an unusually long 79 turns.  

Around Turn 90 I finished exploring all of the anomalies on the map (including anomaly respawn).  As expected artifacts have helped immensely and I'm now just 5 technologies away from a Research Victory.  Obviously that will take a while with only 1 world but given the AI doesn't beeline to Research Victory technologies, and they are all under control diplomatically, it should be very feasible.

I have most of the Ascension Crystals, and while I'm in the lead the Ascension Victory type will of course be much longer away.  

I just realised the AI only seems to use 1 survey ship!  I explore the map like Distant Worlds, so I build more survey ships ASAP with a big focus on Thulium so can build tiny/small survey ships very early.  With Ship Graveyards any ship found is retrofitted into a tiny/small construction ship or upgraded survey ship, which helps with range/relics/resources.  If Frogboy could get the AI to copy some of this strategy it would make a big difference to the AI's exploration capability (although it should probably only be used on Gifted or above, otherwise the noobs will complain).

So seems on track to be able to get all the victory types.  No reloads beyond reloading on Turn 79 and turning Alliance Victory off.

Reply #8 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Icemaniaa, reply 7

 No reloads beyond reloading on Turn 79 and turning Alliance Victory off.
End of Icemaniaa's quote

 

I think we can probably dispense with the 'no reloads' thing. Save scumming is fairly obviously not required by any player who knows what they're doing and was a bit of a desperate defense anyway, since most players who do use it are unlikely to complain to the forum that the game is too easy.

Reply #9 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

A follow-up on the one world Godlike challenge.

Around Turn 138 the AI literally "gave" me 5 free colonies, including 2 precursor worlds ... they colonised worlds within my influence and so flipped within a couple of turns.

All the AI have considered me weak, ripe for conquest and also have negative diplomatic modifiers because they see me going for an Ascension Victory.  So to be sure everyone stays in an Alliance I built a couple of Diplomatic buildings.  No AI has declared war at any stage.

Research Victory was on Turn 197 and Ascension Victory on Turn 251.

Since I have Beyond Mortality technology (e.g. ships with no maintenance costs, logistics bonuses etc) I've got a bunch of doom fleets around with 100+ movement which can wipe out everything on the map in a few turns.

So all is on track to get all 5 victory types from the same game.  A save game on Turn 250 is below, Ascension victory is on the next turn, just turn on Diplomatic or Research victory to get those.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/obzpibzo00kk5h7/One%20World%20Godlike%20Turn%20250%20Ascension%20Win.GC3Sav?dl=0

The issues that allow this are essentially summarised on the AMA reddit thread:

https://www.reddit.com/r/4Xgaming/comments/43314x/ama_round_2_brad_wardell_of_stardock_on_february/?sort=confidence

Here is a screenshot (with just a little bit of AI fleet hugging) on the eve of declaring war on everybody:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7cr8h2p571e8o0r/Screenshot%202016-02-03%2020.17.08.png?dl=0