Weekend AI work..

Notes

Published on March 18, 2006 By Draginol In GalCiv Journals

Work log on AI for this weekend.

1) Adjust AI strategy for when g_pGalaxy->abGameOptions[GAME_OPTION_DISABLE_TECH_TRADING] == TRUE

2) Regarding speed of ships. Player ignusss writes:

This is now my understanding of how the AI uses his different military shipclasses:
Tiny:
Fighter: No engines. Attacker.
Small:
Defender: No engines. Defending planets.
Heavy Fighter: No engines. Attacker.
Escort: Multiple engines (often see them with two). Defending transports.
Medium:
Frigate: 0-1 engines. Attacker.
Cruiser: 0 engines (at least I don't remember having seen any). Attacker? Defender? Maybe both?
Large:
Battleship: 1 engine (haven't seen any with no engines yet). Attacker.

No engines on defender is IMO fine. I have no opinion on no engines on fighter because I never build those. Heavy fighter would benefit from an engine though since the AI otherwise wouldn't have any fast attack ships before Medium hulls. Cruisers are okay as planetattackers if they have faster attackers screening their advance, would also be good defenders, otherwise probably not much use.
Now frigates should IMO always have one extra engine but they don't.

Here are the Drengins different generations of frigates that I could see in my current game (he has lots of old ships left as you can see):
gen. weapons. defense. speed
M2-2. missile+2.
M2-11. mass+2. 1*warp=+3
M3-4. mass+3
M4-1. beam+6. armor+1. 1*warp=+3
M4-10. mass+4. armor+1,shields+1. 1*warp=+3
M5-3. mass+5,beam+2. shields+2
M6-2. missile+8,beam+4. shields+2
M7-1. missile+12,mass+1. armor+2. 1*warp=+3

Sometimes he skips the extra engine in favour of more weapons/defense which is dumb if I'm correct about cruisers, because then it becomes identical to one.
I've noticed that the Terrans in the same game builds incredible many frigates, almost exclusive. This makes them IMO much more dangerous than the Drengin whom also builds lots of heavy fighters and cruisers. Even though the terrans military is much smaller.
And the terrans frigate M7-2 is so much fun
mass+24 (3 nanorippers) armor+2 speed+3
Almost as good as my best medium hull, the Death Dealer:
beam+24 (2 psyonic beam), armor+2, speed+6

I also noticed something odd with Drengins latest transport M5-3. It has 3 ion drives, 3 adv. troop mods and 1 extended support. It could have had 3 warp drives instead of the ion drives because they are both size 10 on a cargo hull which would have made his transports 6 parsecs faster per turn.

This is a good analysis overall of the AI's typical design desisions. He also notes how different AIs have different strategies. The Terran Alliance tends to go for larger, but fewer, ships.

The issue isn't so much the need for extra engines but better engine technology sot hat the engines aren't so big. That's what I'm going to be testing.

3) Regarding planet use: Brillig writes:

Planet utilization:

The AI should place much higher priority on putting the appropriate building on special tiles. I would argue that nothing, no Galactic Wonder/Trade Good/Super Project is better than having a factory on a 700% bonus production tile, for example. The same for a 700% research tile (although I've never seen one). With regard to 300% tiles, the difference is a little softer. Personally, I would never put anything but the appropriate building on one of these tiles either (except for the food bonus tile).

I think the AI should begin to keep track of a parameter which I call the "state of colonization". This refers to how much of the galaxy has been claimed - it should be possible to come up with an AI estimate for this even without cheating based on using the galaxy map to look at influence.

No manufacturing/economic/research capital should ever be built on a poor (low PQ) world. As Brad said the AI isn't scripted, I believe it should be able to project, based on it's current situation, how the worlds under it's control will look like when fully developed. It should place the capitals based on that projection, with the likelyhood of actually doing the construction based on how close the "state of colonization" is to complete. Once a capital is built, the AI should have a bias toward building the appropriate structures (e.g. factories for a manufacturing capital) on that world. A small bias is probably fine, I don't think we need to see a fourteen factory+manufacturing capital world.

I agree with this. However, I'm constrained by the APIs I have. For instance, if the AI is putting super projects on 700% production tiles, then that's a bug. That should never happen. The only time a super project or whatever might go on a special tile might be on a food tile.

But since people are seeing this, I'm putting in checks to try to understand why that would happen.

4) Regarding starbase placement.

Different AIs have very very different ways of handling their starbases. Some of them are not nearly as good as others. The Terran Alliance probably has the most sophisticated AI for handling this at this time. I'm going to be improving all this and trying to upgrade the other AI players as well.

Hopefully we'll see a much more effective use of starbases.

5) Tech Researching.

Each AI has its own values on what should be researched. Based on feedback, I'm going to be adjusting these and seeing how much things improve in AI vs. AI games. This is going to be time consuming though to since what is the best techs and what order is tough. Moreover since the AI isn't scripted, there is no "Research this, then this, then this." Ironically, sentient human players are more likely to have scripted "research build orders" than the computer players. Hopefully, human players will start putting their brain SDKs available for download.

6) AI fleet organization and concentration

I'm going to upgrade a couple of the AIs to send their fleets on patrol of their territory. This should spread our their forces a bit and make them less vulnerable to human player tactics.

7) Working on AI to be better at dealing with enemy starbases. One of the things that some people need to recognize about AI development is that it's easy to sit there and say "They AI should take out those military starbases." Well Duh. But in the AI code, I'm dealing with weightings, numbers, priorities, and APIs that have to interpret my preferences. For instance, as the AI designer, I want the AI to go after those starbases. And I want the AI to recognize that it may have to sacrifice ships to wear it down. But at the same time, I don't want a death train of ships uselessly hitting a starbase either. So much of what's been mentioned are things I agree with, it's just a matter of tweaking it so that it does it more.

So if I say if(pShip->IsStarBase) ulAttackPriority*=1.25 and that's not enough to get it to go after starbases effectively then it's a matter of chyanging it to say 1.50 or 2.0.

Now before someone asks, no, we can't just have a file of weightings that people coudl tweak themselves. I mean, yes, we could, but it would take a lot of time and different AI personalities have different methods. You'd end up with a situation where you'd be choosing between getting aI updates from us or relying on modders and my not so humble opinion is that you're probably better off with me doing the updates than relying on modders teaking values on a static AI. After all, if I realize something's amiss, I can create new code to deal with it.

Comments (Page 1)

octaviusviii

on Mar 18, 2006

Looks good Brad, that final 10% of tweaking things so they are juuuust right, can take a bit of time. Looking forward to new improvements.

Perhaps you can set up a system of AI beta's that you release every two weeks or so, that can be played by your best beta testers. Besides, didn't you do something like that for Galciv1? Where you released lots of little beta tweaks for people to test and then release a main patch several weeks down the road?

e-stab

on Mar 18, 2006

Good luck!

Japata

on Mar 18, 2006

About that tile specialization issue
I've just finished a game with bright Ai who placed a manufacture capital on a 100% research tile even though there was still 4 free tiles

Tototot

on Mar 18, 2006

I think you need to change the SPIN CONTROL CENTER to a tech farther out. Even with the low weapon classes the AI wil think your a god, which is the point of the spin control center. I hardly ever see an AI build one till WAY late in the game, which usually does not last that long because i was able to either A) culture victory or

political victory.

TheTrueChaos

on Mar 18, 2006

I would strongly agree that the spin contorl center, as current, is much too powerful is a players hand. A ranger or two, along with psionic beam ships on that planet, make it so that the AIs will NEVER attack you no matter what you do, since they believe your military is many many times as strong as there entire fleet, when you might actually only have a dozen ships.

I think the better solution would be to re-weight how the AI gauges military strenght, as there is also the oppisite of the above, where with much better tech, a single fleet can defend agianst any waves of ships the AI sends at you, taking no to little damage, and yet the AI would consider your military weak, since its small in number of hulls.

But overall, this does have a much better AI overall that most games

Draginol

on Mar 18, 2006

I forgot, what is the spin control center?

Decker22

on Mar 18, 2006

Spincontrol makes the ship station over the planet look some multiple more powerful. So a ranger and a few good ships on the planet makes it look like you have a fleet of Terrorstars if not more powerful in military might. Which brings up dose the ai know enough if it sees that huge fleet and if it got a good espinoage will it check the planet for spin control and try to compensate?

BladeVenom

on Mar 18, 2006

Once the engine situation is fixed there is also a question about sensors. The AI doesn't seem to value them much. Personally I find sensor ships very valuable.

The evaluation for military strength should take into consideration ships speed. Troop transports should also be given some value. The AI will consider his fleet stronger when in reality he's in very bad situation since I have faster ships, fast transports ready to invade, and sensors ships to let me know where all his ships are and were to attack.

cslHaplo

on Mar 18, 2006

This is going to be time consuming though to since what is the best techs and what order is tough. Moreover since the AI isn't scripted, there is no "Research this, then this, then this." Ironically, sentient human players are more likely to have scripted "research build orders" than the computer players. Hopefully, human players will start putting their brain SDKs available for download.

2K sports did this in their football game a few years back, with the "VIP" system, essentially it was a downloadable profile of a players tendencies, which was updated with every game they played. Being a football fanatic, I have to say, playing against a player's VIP was very close to playing that player realtime online (-trash talking)

I know that football is far easier to model, with far fewer parameters, but it seems that something like this could work, and would be far cooler than multiplayer (though not multimonitor) support.

But in the AI code, I'm dealing with weightings, numbers, priorities, and APIs that have to interpret my preferences.

Now before someone asks, no, we can't just have a file of weightings that people coudl tweak themselves. I mean, yes, we could, but it would take a lot of time and different AI personalities have different methods. You'd end up with a situation where you'd be choosing between getting aI updates from us or relying on modders and my not so humble opinion is that you're probably better off with me doing the updates than relying on modders teaking values on a static AI.

I'm not sure if the "take a lot of time" refers to exposing the AI or a modder tweaking the file, but if it could be exposed easily, it seems to me creating the tendency files wouldn't be too hard (though it would require alot of coding I assume to actually complile the data, so in this case maybe its more suited for an expansion). A similar feature to the "VIP" system could be implemented into the metaverse. Each time a person plays their tendencies are collected into a file which could affect the AI within some reasonable range.

-tim

BruntFCA

on Mar 19, 2006

SPEED > All in this game. This is not a whine, I have some constuctive suggestions in here so please if you can take time to read it.

On my first skirmish game ever I beat it on challange, now Iin my only second game, I'm wiping floor in Tough. The ship AI is just *not* very smart.

It seems to build a lot of sloow, 2 speed ships. With 4 speed, or say 5 with racial, it is so easy to get in first shots its not funny.

AI needs to use what I call the AWACS. I long range sensor at front of your fleet. The AI is so predictable atm, that I bait it in with an AWACS, and then get the first hit with my fast ships.

AI does not use ships around planets very well. I often *ParK* a fleet outside an enemy planet. He can have say twice the number of ships as me in orbit around the planet. But they just Sit there! A human player would form fleet, attack, go-back to planet. At least thats what I do.

Instead the AI Parks its fleets there, and without orbit defence, I can attack them one by one, and use them as a "Punch bag" to increase my fleets hit points to 400-500%!

Why do the AI not use *fast Transports* like the Dreadlords do? Nothing worse than a transport zooming out of the dark could.

You could also make the AI build long range "Assasination ships". These are long range small/tiny ships with only say 1 attack. Their sole purpose in life is to scan enemy sectors and take out their new Starbases. I have takeon out sooo many starbases like this. The AI does not seem to leave ships to guard if it has not built the battle stations module even.

When it places some early starbase, it could be an idea to place it within planet hopping range. Therefore if enemy come near it is easy to move ships from planet to nearby starbase.

Some bugs I have found is that the Thalians can make starbase next to each other only one space appart, this should not be possible. I have a saved game showing it if you want to see it.

Hope this helps. I realy enjoy the game, and think the ship designer and the concept behind the AI and different personalities is very cool, hope you can make some tweaks to the early AI ships. I always beat it before I/they get even medium ships it just too easy.

Aside
I have done some basic research into real military tactics. A key thing is "Force Projection", that is no matter how large your army is, it is useless unless you can project a large amount of force at a key points. US army and others use these concepts.

Fast ships allow me to have many times the military strength than it appears I have. I literaly defeated a Derengi attack of over 3 times my numbers, since I could move my ships where they needed to be, I aways had *more* ships than he did at the crucial battles...what good did his huge fleets do him in long convoys or different sectors?

Currently I am at war with both the Drath Legion and the Thalians at the same time on tough, it presents no challenge at all due to their slowness, and planet parking (read punch bag free training for my fleets). I know writing AI is hard, but the concepts you have in this game are cool, hope you can pull some stuff off

satasha

on Mar 19, 2006

I think you have made the AI troop transports a little too conservative. At least in my games, i have seen them waiting too far out of range or not built at all while planets sit there for the taking. Also someone needs to look at the quarterly report as it regularly reports someone not being at war (and unpopular) when in fact they are very much at war. Request: war declarations of the AI's reported as a pop-up (minors too).

Japata

on Mar 19, 2006

Another suggestion / comment on AI

On my last game on Bright intelligence, I had a clear diplomacy advantage and a Galactic Bazaar, and I ended up pacifying the AI by keeping it poor.
All I had to do is "selling" money for money. So I sold every 200 bc for about 300-350 bc and every AI accepted this!!! particularly the Korx (who are supposed to be the business race?!) For all the end game, I kept all the AI to less than a 1000 bc in their account. And I upgraded all my fleet with it

Question: Is it normal for a clearly superior diplomatic race to me able to do this? I don't think the AI should accept this.

On the other hand, in the same game, I was never able to exchange Influence Points with AI even if I gave 100 times more, and even though the same races complained about my influence and their planets were rebelling... I mean it was obviously a good deal

IztokBitenc

on Mar 19, 2006

Hi!

Hopefully, human players will start putting their brain SDKs available for download.

Long ago Jason Cawley, the biggest Stars! guru, wrote a formula for a successfull play of Stars! multiplayer BBEM games. It consists of 3 words:
economy -> technology -> ships

The formula has been proven to work many many times against live opponents in our games of Stars! I use it here against AI with big success. So let me explain it.

Economy
You need decent economy to be able to get proper tech and to build enough ships when you need them. So with it it all starts and ends.

Economy starts with decent planet grab. The goal is to settle as many planets as you can, taking good planets in direction to neighbour(s) first, and then backfill the rest.

The next part of building better economy is building planetary infrastructure. My usuall slider settings in this phase are 0/50-80/20-50. The first thing to build are factories - the bigger the planet, the more needed to build other stuff faster. I use about 1/5 to 1/4 of free tiles for them. Next to follow are research installations - about 1/4 - 1/3 of tiles. First techs to research are techs that add to production. On planets with research bonus tiles I sometimes build labs before last factories are finished. When those two types are finished, is an average planet close to 5B pop cap, and the mid-game starts.

At that time planets usually got the farm, first trade center, the starport, and econ/research/manufacturing capital upgrades. Where I built a farm, I put also a "morale" building, and if the farm is on 100% bonus tile, then two. I use 300% food tile only on really big planets (15+), as there I can build enough morale buildings too keep pop growing and not rebelling. Then some "trade" building (1/5), and on border planets, where neighbour's influence is stronger than mine, one or two "influence" buildings. Late-game Stock Markets are used also as morale boosters, but I don't replace existing morale buildings. Stock-markets are also the buildings I build when I don't know what else to build there.

Early "wonders"... I avoid quite some of them. If my manufacturing capital is big enough to allow me building them, and the rest or planets is stil in development phase, I take
Xantinium Plating (not sure, if I'll continue with that - 15% more hitpoints means 3 more hitpoints on a medium hull - that's what it gets with 3-5 kills).
Diplomatic translators also come handy in early game, when other players have lots of tech I want. In late game I'm a tech leader and almost don't need them anymore.
What I find necessary are Eyes of the universe. No sensor needed until the end of the game.
Aphrodisiacs can help you when you need pop for invasions, but I usually don't take them, because there'd be no room for other, more important ones.
One of the best would be Galactic Privateer, but currently (ver. 1.0X) it doesn't work. My ships on trade routes still got attacked and destroyed.
Galactic guide is pointless. At the time one gets it, is the universe sweept clean of anomalies.
Omega defense system works only on a single planet - pointless, as is Hyperion fleet defense. How the h... will I know that exactly this one planet will be attacked?
Orbital Terraformer is useless, even if my race is not neutral. For just 100sp I can have an average planet fully terraformed, and to the time I can build it, most planets are already 2/3 done with the terra.
Micro Repair Bots IMO not usefull enough to use a slot. To get a seriously damaged ship repaired, you still need to park it in orbit of your planet. With this wonder it will be repaired 1-2 turns faster.
Various morale wonders are usefull, but they don't have exactly the stated effect on the morale.

Technology
My usuall motto is "Tech brings victory". In most games I know it really does.

When the plant grab is over, I'm usually 10 techs behind the AIs. That just doesn't matter, as in next 20-30 turns I easily catch up, and overtake them. Remember, my planets are building research facilities immediately after factories, so very soon I'm the biggest researcher in the universe. My usual research setting is 60-70%, in my current game was for most of the time quite above 50% - I realized I needed more installations and ships to utilize the big tech lead I already had.

My goal in this early phase of the game is to get techs for decent planetary installations, but not the best one, as it will take too long ot build those (they're usually damn expensive

)
So I check, what AIs are researching, and take something else, what can be sold for good "price": basic logistic, basic miniaturization, general life support, xeno farms, soil enhancement... or improvements one of them already has. I trade my research to one civ for one item, to the other civ for another one etc., so pretty soon I have almost everything they have, with some exceptions they almost never sell to any other civ.

My next goal are some non-expensive empire-wide improving techs: morale, trade, economics, diplomacy. Those (but diplomatic ones) are also used as trade goods.

At about that time other civs start building first warships. I try to delay my building for as long as I can, investing money in my infrastructure, and tech for better ships. When I'm forced to build them (diplo relations decreasing), they are usually meant strictly as defenders: only the best weapons I can put on them, nothing else. They give me quite hight mil score, so AIs start looking at other targets. And while the are investing in ships, I'm still investing in even more infrastructure, and even better tech, while still buying tech from one and selling it to all others. But my exclusive tech is not sold, until one civ gets really close to it. And I'll never repeat my mistake from previous game, where I've been vielding beams, selling (fairly low) shield tech, and then faced frigates witn 13 shields 8( .

So finaly I've come to warfaring tech. Since I know what tech others have, I can easily chose my path with weapons and defenses. My first goal is better weapons (attack 2+), my second defenses against weapons others are using (also def. 2+), my third medium hull, then better engines (preferably warp), and last (if I can afford) enhanced miniaturization. Then I try to build my attacker on medium hull with one warp engine, 5-8 attack, and 2-4 defense. I usually research a level or two more in some fields, just to get all space on the hull used. On bigger planets I put in production those warships.

Next is better invasion tech - I need an edge over my prey, to minimize losses of my precious money-producing pop on those soon-to-happen invasions. My smaller planets are already producing transports while I research those tech levels.

Last warfaring tech before I go to war is logistics - usually advanced level. I need that level when I actually start the war, not sooner.

While the war lasts, I'm still pumping resources into research (final levels of invasion tree), but am also looking at the ships and tech my next victim has, to be prepared to adjust my research properly. If no investmenst are needed, my research turns to planetary-improvement techs (terra, better facilities), better starbase defenses/offenses, or sensors. But here I need just the final level to build "Eyes of the universe". After that wonder not a single sensor is nedded anymore.

To be able to trade with others for their more expensive techs I also research lower levels of some other weapons/defense trees. However after the last game I'm very reluctant to actually sell them.

After the second (third) victim is down, I go for a next level in miniaturization, weapons, defenses and engines for my now highly experienced ships. I check what other neighbours are using, and adjust research accordingly. It usually takes 20-40 turns to consolidate my new gain, fortify new resource-mining starbases, get proper tech and enough money for the first upgrade of my attack ships. But now my empire is twice or three times as big as was at the start, and its research output probably matches all other races together, so no problem to adjust to anything.

Ships
The main motto I have here is "quality over quantity".

In the early game I build only what I must. Every BC, that is wasted on an early warship means 1 or 2 installations less built, or a tech level less researched. After the planet-grab what I build are constructors to improve mining starbase(s), trade ships to get me more money, and some sensor ships (cargo hull, 8-9 sensors, two impulse engines, life support or two), to quickly explore universe, and lately to patrol my borders and keep an eye over distant opponents.

Just when neighbours start getting angry, then I field my first small hull ship (defender) with as much firepower I can put on it (usually att.3), to present me stronger. I keep them on my planets all the time, to have even larger sum of attacks.

I used to convert those early small defenders to raiders (two engines, 1 weapon, life support) to harras opponents' unarmed starbases, trade lines, unescorted transports or constructors, but in two recent games one of the first decisions the UP brought up was protecting trade routes, and in my last game just when that ban would run out, they renewed it.

So pretty much no use for raiders.

My first serious warships for an attack are built when I have proper tech for them, and when I know who will be my first target. So far I've been using medium hulls with one (warp) engine, single type weapon for attack 5-8, and single type defense 2-4, that matches best opponents' warships. I usally build 10-12 such ships, accompany them with 3-5 sensor ships and 5-10 transports (two troop modules, rest engines - speed ~7 for starting design). When they're all on (or close to) the border, only then I start the war.

Since my ships are pretty much shielded against opponents' attacks, can they take on many of his fleets without accumulating much damage. I avoid hard targets (armed/armored non-mil starbases), and go straight for their planets. IMO planets need something more to defend them - taking them with such an approach is far to easy. I also move a constructor to every mining starbase they have. After they surrender or are conquered, those resources became free for taking.

When the first victim falls, I just heal my ships, and immediattely turn to the next one. My ships are now much more experienced (up to 100% more hitpoints), and the next victim probably still has not proper defenses to my attacks, so I need to use those advantages to full extent. And if I can, I repeat the proces (attack another one), until the current opponent fields proper ships I can not beat easily.

But I'm already prepared for that, as I'm watching closely every design my neighbours/opponents field. With my conquests my empire became BIG. So big that the victory just becames a matter of execution, as AIs are matching their medium ships with att.5-10/def.5-10 to my large hulls with att.20-30/def.20-30, and to my survived 2nd upgrade mediums with 400% hitpoints and att.20/def.15. The only problem I have is growing enough pop for invasions, and to actually collect the will to do the mop-up.

Conclusion
If I would have to put the AI it the GalCiv 2 game into a scale of experience Stars! players are measured, I'd rate it as an intermediate. It knows how to put up a good econ, it can adjust to opponent's designs, it can organize a good attack. But currently it lacks the focus to continue from good economy to better technology to better ships to be better at a..-kicking. I can claim that pretty accurately, as I'm two levels above intermediates, according to last few Stars! games I won a bit above advanced.

As far as AI stands, and being for most part a work of a single person, it is exceptional, and if Brad would have any wishes to enter academic sphere, I can easily say a work for a M.Sc. or even Ph.D. But I hope he hasn't, or else we'll not see much upgrades to AI anytime soon.

Anyway, there's still lots of room for AI improvements. If we players keep reporting and sugesting, thus feeding Brad with new ideas, I have no doubt he will come to good solutions. Solutions, that will result in making even the best of us sometimes stop playing and start yelling bad words at that devilish GalCiv AI.

BR, Iztok

Veblen

on Mar 19, 2006

Draginol,

I entreat you to consider making a full AI interface exposed to modders down the road--2.0, 3.0, whenever. Not simply a list of weightings, but the whole logic. There are some of us out there who can program and who have AI experience who would love to sink our teeth into GalCiv2. An AI testing mode, where computer plays computer (with an option for human observation), would be a natural complement to this.

Please keep your mind open to how much value this would add for some of us! Your assertion that we're "better off with [you] doing the updates than relying on modders" was pretty disheartening. I think you may be on the wrong side of that old cathedral-and-bazaar analogy... although I completely understand that in the short term you have higher priorities.

As a kid, I first experienced and fell in love with the creative rush of programming while hacking away at Core Wars until the wee hours and watching my creations compete with others from around the world. Kids today, those poor, deprived kids, with their Doom IIIs and their XBox 360s, they don't have it as good as we did. Won't someone think of the children?

Skelton42

on Mar 20, 2006

d/l game Friday night, so am playing the updated version.

3rd game, now playing a normal difficulty game on a gigantic map w/6 other races. I made long range scouts to scout out my attack area on the other side of the galaxy (literally corner to corner). I noticed the AI (Torian) had several systems with multiple 10+ planets (no wonder they didn't need to expand!) and started building an attack fleet w/transports to handle the population. When I get there (there's just something to be said about a 9 movment convoy streaking across the bottom of the map), even the 18 planets only have a population of 5B, which made my conquest fairly easy.

My points are:

1) with a 9 movment there is no way they saw me coming and even if they did there's no excuse for getting rid of 10-15 billion people, per planet. They could have limited me to 1, or two, systems...instead I took 4 and have plenty transports left over.

2) They definately used a scorched earth tactic...leaving their galactic event items for me. How nice!

3) The Arceans. Being the only two civilizations (out of 6) on our half of the galaxy it was a while before we interacted and a very long time (ie: at least 4-5 years afterwards) before there was more than the two of us in the annual meetings. At the time of our first meeting, (during planet grab) my custom civ was the most influential. I was able to keep colonizing my quarter of the galaxy right along with them. Then they vote to give all less evolved civ's 3 technologies to help them along. They gave me at least a dozen, which initially had me very happy.

However, I had my governors set to automatically upgrade. They started upgrading before they even finished the build queue. It takes me a while to realize what's going on, but my economy essentially came to a standstill because all of my new colonies were trying to upgrade a couple jumps up the tech tree with only one factory since they never built the other 3. I had to stop planet grabbing because the social improvement costs were going to bankrupt me.

Can the governor AI please finish a build queue before begining any upgrades? Also, can we please elect to stop an improvment tile upgrade without losing the improvement? I lost my only factory on a planet because I tried to remove the upgrade from the queue...it removed the improvement along with the upgrade.

4) One of my biggest gripes about previous 4x games was having to start at the bottom and upgrade through the tech tree in each and every planet. However, while I initially thought it was nice that GC2 doesn't make us do that, it severly limits our ability to expand after exterminating because all the tile improvements are several advances up the tree and it takes an eternity for anything to be built. Simply requesting that we have the availability of the lower tech-tree tile improvements throughout the game.

5) Keep in mind this is a gigantic map. I'm in the lower left corner, the Arceans have the upper left corner and have expanded down to my borders, 1/2 way over and almost all the way to the bottom of the map, absorbing another race (humans) and completely isolating me from the rest of the galaxy. The Torians are on the far right side of the galaxy. I got bogged down with my infrastructure and fell to the bottom of the military pool. The Torians demand tribute. I refuse. There is no possible way they can back up their resulting threat, none. However, they do park a handful of scouts in my territory...for years. There is no way those scouts don't deserve to be destroyed and the Torians receive a heartfelt "interstellar storm" unfortunate accident message from me....without causing a war. Is there any chance the "instant war" setting can be tweaked? It might be near impossible to establish conditions the AI won't declare war, but thought I'd mention it.

6) I have a good chance of being able to conquer the Torians with my 18 photonic torp cruisers as long as I can keep supplied with long range transports. The Arceans have been at war with the Torians for most of the game and have managed to strain them, but not really do any damage. Jumping from last to 2nd militarily in about two years, I still have about 1/3 the military of the Arceans. Is it a function of "normal" AI difficulty that the Arceans did less in 5 years of war than I have in 4 turns?

7) The Arceans have conquered 4 Yor worlds through cultural influence, yet the planets taken from other races in the same way have gone back and forth. Looks like the Yor are 100% loyal until they change their mind.

8) When I attacked the Torians, the Altarians were (still are) allied with them. After taking the initial worlds targeted, I sued the Altarians for peace. Nothing else, just a peace treaty. They very hapily accepted. Some ally!

9) I noticed the journal comment about having the AI set up patrols. Is there any way a patrol command (and waypoints) will be available for the player?

The Arceans have me boxed in, even though I've now the best ships in the galaxy, I'm nowhere near ready to attack them. Any game that allows me the flexibility to sneak an entire 9 speed convoy across the bottom of the map (20 turn trip), conquer the lower section of the third most powerful civilization and leave me in a position to offer a meaningful alliance with the Arceans is ok in my book.

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