Is your experience the same?

[brekehan]

Having played several games now, I've noticed a trend.

1) Much like other Paradox games. The game is most challenging at the very start. Your nation is usually no where near what the player would consider optimal condition. The largest challenge in the entire game seems to be getting our initial economy to function and preparing a worthy military.

2) After 1 is competed, the game continues on easy mode. There is not much to bring your economy back down to shambles after you get it initially set up. There are some silly mistakes the player can make yes, but not much to combat. A war may well deplete your military, but you usually have tons and tons of cash to easily replace your units.

3) All the other nations decline while you incline. All other nations have their economy deteriate while your grows better. This is mostly due to the fact that they don't build facilities, or units. They never get any better, but they do lose facilties and units in war. If the AI has a shortcoming in its economy it is incapable of repairing it. They just fall into the red.

1 is contrary to how I'd think a game should flow. It should start off somewhat easy and increase in challenge as time progresses giving a player time to learn whats what. The AI should build up and at a rate that attempts to keep ahead of the player. While this is impossible I know, it should maximize its "I know the state of everything while the silly human has to spend time looking and reading. It should build up even if it can't do it well. Arrange for itself trade aggreements that fill the shortages, build facilities to fill shortages, look for and actively engage in war for resources that it needs or resources it was refused. etc.

The market floods with goods. At first I thought maybe a game with less resources would be better, but then it would be too hard to start and still easy afterward. Instead, I think resources should diminish as they are used (perhaps replenishing in other areas). This would make the game more and more challenging and impose a need to constantly search, build, and trade.

The player ends up having complete control over world supply and demand. Because the AI doesn't build. The player always has complete control over supply and demand and a global level in a matter of a few years. This would be fixed simply by allowing the AI to build. However, one must be careful that there is some demand factor that counters the supply. with the AI building and the human building, there will be too many goods and they will be worthless. Perhaps the resource cost of final goods such as military idustrial and consumer goods should be increased? The only good consumer of goods I can think of is the construction and repair of military units. Their cost in raw materials should largely increase to counter all the increase in supply. That way war REALLY costs you something. There has to be some kind of sink.

Of course all this would probably take away from the "realism" factor everyone keeps talking about. However, realism is never balanced or makes for "good" gameplay IMO.




What do you others think? Have you noticed the same trends? Do you like them or hate them? Any ideas on how you would suggest fixing them?

[llsoth]

1. Yes the start is the worst.
2. Main problem with war is how long it takes to build units and manpower shortages (if you are a smaller nation).
3. In a word no. In my current game there are several nations with multi trillion dollar treasuries and no debt. Both Russia and China who are both at war with everyone around them (and winning except against each other) are among them. But yes nations are gimped by not being able to build facilities.

On the other hand Japan always tanks and HARD after about a year it is a 3rd world nation and sinking fast.

[Ashbery76]

The A.I is not pro active at all because the player should only be the supreme ruler by design according to the devs.

[2Coats]

A lot of games suffer (if thats the correct word) from a lack of mid/late game imagination. I suspect that the trying to develop an AI that can turn its hand to a realistic plan of action given x^ (insert your own factor here) number of possible future situations is nigh on impossible.

It would be easier to develop a computer program that could develop the AI itself as the game situation changes! ... well ok maybe not, but I cant see how any company could spare the resources to essentially create what is a 250+ multiplayer enivronment, because that is essentially what is needed - an AI that can replicate closely the working processes of 250 people who are playing at the same time.

[supremesaffgee]

A lot of games suffer (if thats the correct word) from a lack of mid/late game imagination. I suspect that the trying to develop an AI that can turn its hand to a realistic plan of action given x^ (insert your own factor here) number of possible future situations is nigh on impossible.

It would be easier to develop a computer program that could develop the AI itself as the game situation changes! ... well ok maybe not, but I cant see how any company could spare the resources to essentially create what is a 250+ multiplayer enivronment, because that is essentially what is needed - an AI that can replicate closely the working processes of 250 people who are playing at the same time.

I disagree, simply by adding variables now you increase the amount of possible ulimate outcomes in the future.
Take the current AI for instance - it builds so many garrisons that it doesn't have enough manpower to build other units; dead end. It won't initiate overseas invasions, therefore it stays at home - dead end. It strives to be peaceful with every nation on the planet, and makes alliances (that can't be broken) with everyone - dead end. And so on.
Its behaviour is not unreasonable, because it has no variables with which to continue along any of these paths. No alternatives.
I read in the 2010 forum that the AI exhibits 9 or 10 different core 'desires' - like conquest, profit, etc...I'm not seeing any of this in 2020 - specifically in the real world scenarios. My feeling is that the AI for ALL countries is the same. Everything is completely linear - 10 years from the beginning of the scenario, all countries hate me the exact same amount, and have exactly the same amount of CB against me....thats just linear and uncreative.
Maybe its just me, but I think the root of all current evil in this game IS the diplomatic system...this is what is influencing every decision that the AI makes, and what is causing the AI to become boringly inactive. It quite simply has no reasonable options within the confines of that system (just like us actually, I mean how much can we actually really DO there aside from buy lots of tech and unit designs - which is what most do). So no, its not really necessary to create 250 individual AI's, just giving the AI 10 core characteristics and 10 non-core characteristics already gives you 100 possible AI personas - and then allowing each to perform 10 tasks with 5 options in each gives you already 50 different outcomes, that might then require a choice between 10 other options, and so on. The AI just simply has to have more options and less restrictions.

[George Geczy]

While some of your points are valid, I do have to take exception with a few of them. For example, let's take a look at two of your points, and how they interrelate with each other: 1) That the AI builds Garrisons and doesn't leave reserves available for units, and 2) That all the AIs act the same.

With regard to Garrisons, different AI regions will approach the building of Garrisons in entirely different ways - some WILL prefer Garrisons, others will minimize Garrisons and build units instead. The factors that go in to their decision on which course to take are varied, from units available, threat assessments, reserves available, and game difficulty settings, but the AI will definitely act differently from each other on this (and many other). In fact I'm playing a world campaign game right now (taking over the world from Ontario where I've encountered two US states that deal with Garrisons in an entirely different way.

Of course, one problem we have is that when an AI does do an extreme, people automatically call it buggy - point in fact is that you just fell in to this trap (some AI's build too may Garrisons - bug!) Though as it turns out, points like this have caused some other areas of the engine to become more 'monotone' so that strange AI behaviors (AI rulers making 'mistakes') are not simply considered bugs.

I have run decade-long games and seen AIs be great economic leaders, and also crappy ones. (Though Japan always seems to take a dive ) I would dispute that all AI regions decline over time.

However, one must be careful that there is some demand factor that counters the supply. with the AI building and the human building, there will be too many goods and they will be worthless.

You mention this point almost in passing, but in fact this is a major linchpin of the world design and the debate over whether AI's should actively build facilities instead of using trade. The fact is that, primarily for gameplay reasons, the human can embark on a building spree that simply would not be possible in the real world. This is because players like building things, improving their economies, striving for self-sufficiency, etc. But if the AI's also used this ability to free themselves of the demands of a global market, the entire (in game) world economy would collapse. This has been discussed in other threads as well, and I'm sure will get even more discussion as we look to update the game with some of the most demanded features and add some forms of AI facility construction, but the fact is that when you add your vote into this pot you're destabilizing elements of the game that work very well. The 'world market' for commodities tends to function pretty much under the hood for most players, but it is in reality a very elegant system that is very well tuned for supply/demand issues (with one exception, which is that at the start of a game regions are purposefully given stockpiles of goods that mess with the system; but as those stockpiles are used or sold off, the market really starts to kick in to gear).

I would tend to think the answer to this may be that the AI will do very minimal facility construction, but this is just window-dressing to say 'see, it builds facilities' - if the construction is minimal, it doesn't have any real effect either to the regions or the world markets. If the construction is not minimal, then the world market balance is destroyed.

After 1 is competed, the game continues on easy mode. There is not much to bring your economy back down to shambles after you get it initially set up.

This point is quite valid. Many players ( myself included ) see this as the ideal time to kick the armour into gear and start taking over the world If that isn't your tact, then you are right, things can get a bit 'automatic' - especially with the Ministers taking care of things as well.

A suggested solution to this has been 'random events' (earthquakes, hurricanes, political events, etc), and while Supreme Ruler 2010 and 2020 have avoided 'random events' in their designs to date, this is one element that may need to be seriously considered for those 'in between' gameplay moments.

-- George.

[gouldjg]

A suggested solution to this has been 'random events' (earthquakes, hurricanes, political events, etc), and while Supreme Ruler 2010 and 2020 have avoided 'random events' in their designs to date, this is one element that may need to be seriously considered for those 'in between' gameplay moments.

-- George.

Does that mean you are thinking about random events in this game via patches or a future release.

I have read another thread where a player found some files relating to WM and the basic descriptions within it which would have vamped up Dip and trade a lot. Legend then refered to it ideally being a UN kinda setup.

The unfortunate part was that Legend then stated that this would most likely not see the light of day till next release. A little disconcerting for me to be honest.

Out of interest, what exactly can you guys, fix/improve via patches and what can we really not expect to see.

I would like to see some form of Dev (it is, it may and it aint gonna happen thread)

That way I can decide whether or not to even try the full campaign or just pack the game in as a non starter. I am a fan of this game since its release but only if it gets better and not in its current form.

When I say better, I mean better as in enhanced and not better as in game bugs fixed.

Please dont give me the "should have tried the demo longer" line. The game is good but dies a death in its current form. The game can be much better.

These things that wont see the light of day,

Can anything be released to see if the community can improve it or do the grind work. I am sure there are those of us whom will gladly work on element of the game that are certain to enhance gameplay.