AI Surrender issues
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2018 5:56 am
Several months ago, Morlic proposed a PR to allow a near-dead AI to surrender. It would seem in keeping with our vision of the game, a number of players have explicitly requested it, plus it would let us simplify some AI code. We seemed to agree that the AI should surrender after it lost its last actual colony, and that it should gift its last ships and outposts. The big question we did not get resolved, though, was how to decide which empire would receive those gifts. It doesn't really seem that we disagreed, just that we decided we should talk about it more here, but never did. So...
For reference, here are what look to me to be the substantive posts on this remaining issue:
What say ye?
For reference, here are what look to me to be the substantive posts on this remaining issue:
Dilvish wrote:And just to clarify/expand a bit more on the gifting idea, there are at least a few ways I can think of for the AI to decide which player to decide which player to surrender to. My preference would probably be that when the AI realizes it lost its last colony it checks its sitreps to see which players conquered colonies from it that last turn and then if there were multiple it would choose among them (if it had a Capital colony that was conquered that last turn then whoever got it should probable be the chosen one, otherwise it could be a random choice or eventually based on influence).
Other possible ways could be the the AI to keep track of its major colony (independent of the empire.CapitalID property since that depends on a palace) and then surrender to whoever took that. Or the selection could be based on influence or even totally random regardless of whether that empire even captured a colony from the surrendering one could be OK.
I agree with Vezzra that Influence, once implemented, should at least be a very significant part of the decision. In the meantime, his proposal to surrender to the enemy that captured the most colonies in the past 10-20 turns sounds totally fine to me.Vezzra wrote:IMO surrendering to the enemy that conquered the last colony is somewhat problematic. This might, in situations where several empires conquer another one, encourage tactics where everyone tries to isolate one small colony within the portion they conquered, and only finally conquers it once they think all the other empires have wiped out the rest.
Leading to a situation where everyone waits on everyone else. Doesn't sound like fun.
The best approach IMO is the one taking influence into account. However, until that's implemented, how about surrendering to the enemy that took the most colonies (maybe within the last 10-20 turns)?
What say ye?