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Author Topic:   Formers run amuck

Ted posted 02-26-99 11:27 AM ET
One of the most irritating AI issues that plagued all of the Civ games and this one two is the automation of Formers during the mid-late game stages. They seem to run around without any purpose. I think it is time to address this issue. Towards the end of the game, I just kill off my auto formers because I don't want to deal with them. Maybe this will be addressed in the "Ascent" sequel because it wasn't addressed in Civ I, Civ II, Fant. Worlds, and SMAC!
StickFigure posted 02-26-99 11:52 AM ET
The best thing to do to avoid Formers running amuck is to use Shift-Ctrl-A to automate them.
For those not in the know, this sets the former to autoimprove its home base only. Once it has completely automated its home base, automation turns of and it blinks like a normal unit.
The player (if he wishes to continue to use the former) should move the former to a base that is still developing its land. Once there, re-home the former and set the former to autoimprove its new home base.
This has worked successfully for me. I never get formers running around in circles like with full automation.
Cheers,
stick
weregamer posted 03-02-99 09:59 PM ET
Unfortunately, if your base is not fully improved and you develop Mag Tubes, even the "autoimprove home base" AI will keep them running in circles instead of doing something.
If you shift-right-click to examine the unit without clearing its orders, you will find that it thinks it is trying to go to a square, generally one that doesn't yet have a magtube but is adjacent to a magtube. It seems that the logic for using magtubes to get to a square is messed up, but only for formers. Odd.
White Tiger posted 03-03-99 12:14 AM ET
I agree. The formers seem to do a good job until around the middle of the game when to me, it looks like they are just sitting there. It's a real pain to see all the fungus they could be fixing just sit there and grow.
PUSH posted 03-03-99 03:30 AM ET
That's right, it seems, that formers now, that they had already transformed the trritorry, why shoud they check it anymore. That's a real problem, I saw that the fungus came up in 5-8 squares, and formers made nothing. The same is when you lose forests, formers doesn't reterraform these squares.
bene4 posted 03-03-99 03:10 PM ET
ctrl-shift-f
Auto-remove fungus. Really cool if there were a autoplant forest!
The whole ctrl-shift aspect of formers rules - a mix between micro-management and efficiency. "m" to get a mine w/ road and farm if not rocky, "r" to get a road going to the right place, "t" for tubes, "a" to get the home base fixed up...
Just wish there were a way to auto plant forests...
slink posted 03-05-99 11:23 PM ET
My discouraging discovery tonight was that a former on auto-improve-own-base will make a bunker from an airbase right out from under the resident aircraft. As best as I could tell the square was not even within the base limits. There isn't any setting for automatic bunkers, is there?
Re the running in circles my exploration foil also did that when it encountered and island, on auto-explore.
My game before this one had an AI city right in the mouth of the volcano on Mt. Planet, but we aren't allowed to build there.
Getting back to auto-formers, has anyone actually seen them raising or lowering the terrain? I have them set to do that but I've played a couple of games that lasted over 12 hours and I never saw them do it where it might have done some good.
Journeyman posted 03-06-99 07:19 PM ET
ok, I have ran into several items in this area...
1) any unit (land/sea) will run in circles (or worse, just sit in one spot) if it's AI targets a square that it cant reach (ie, if a speeder targets either an ocean square or a small island, OR a ship targets a land square on the shore line). This seems to happen alot when there are still pods to find, and only in the / (explore) mode.
I have also run into a similar situation with auto explore option, but this one, if issued inside a city, makes the unit hang out in the city as a defensive unit
Terraformers will, under certain (almost determined) cercumstances, always run in circles. I like weregamer's info (cuz it coincides with mine) and I think somebody at Firaxis should puruse the former's ai code and add a few lines that state "if you cant get there on the tubes, use roads - if you cant get there on roads, go cross country
Now, apparently I am the only one with _this_ problem:
formers with the auto-fungus-removal order will remove _one_ square of fungus, then require new orders, even in a field of fungus several squares to a side...
zkosn posted 03-08-99 06:41 PM ET
Just remember that the manual says that when you put them in auto mode, you are placing the decision of what to do in the hands of the driver of the vehicle.
But, I'm sure the best and the brightest citizens aren't allocated to former driving duty.
They're probably just joyriding when they're going around in circles. When the cat's away the mice will play.
Unless there are just too many of them to keep track of, I handle formers myself with an iron fist approach to management.
Jonathan posted 03-31-99 05:11 PM ET
Found the thread at last!!
Has anyone from Firaxis responded to this problem yet? It's annoying that once you get 20 or 30 formers on the go they stop working and just rush around doing nothing, even when their home base needs improving. I built a new former at a base with no improvements, set it to auto, and it just moved back and forth without trying to form anything. Does V2/V3 fix this bug ? ...
DanS posted 04-01-99 12:02 PM ET
Jonathan: perhaps the former algorithm is too smart for its own good. Perhaps it does nothing because you aren't utilizing the square. Have you tried reassigning a worker to the square you want to improve? Just a hunch... Also, what kind of auto did you make these 20 or 30 formers? If it was auto-auto, change it to auto-road or auto-sensors or something.
axe posted 04-01-99 03:39 PM ET
I've had a similiar FormerOnCrack problem. On auto-improve homebase mode, it will build sensors outside of the city limits...Cool, I like that...But puting the farm, under it..Is that really needed? Or even with automate, building farms or mines outside of all city limits? I'm not sure if it expects you to build a city there, and is kinda hinting.. =] ..But it seems to waste a few turns while the silly crackbaby could be doing something else...More often then not I like controlling my formers though...As I usually build, no kill...I leave that to my bloodlusting girlfriend..
Dim Cat posted 04-01-99 06:24 PM ET
Talking about raising/lowering terrain. I didn't see this with land formers, but my sea formers raise the ocean bottom at deep-level squares all the time in Auto-improve home base mode (usually after they built mines/solars and kelp in all shelf squares). In general, sea formers seem to be a bit smarter than land formers. But then they don't have to build mag tubes
Saganaga posted 04-02-99 06:19 PM ET
Re. auto-formers raising/lowering terrain. I believe the default is for this type of terraforming to NOT be allowed. However, this can be changed under the Preferences dialog, I think (don't have the game in front of me).
Knight_Errant posted 04-02-99 10:57 PM ET
One thing I have noted with the Terraformer AI is that it will sometimes go in circles on a mag tube. This, of course, means you can never get to the end of a turn as the terraformer never uses any of its move points. I have just downloaded the new smac and hope it is less prominent. Civ II would ask if you wanted to stop a unit that had moved in the same location several times in a row.
Naf posted 04-03-99 04:24 PM ET
I know the solution so that you'll never this problem again. Dont automate your formers. Automated formers like to smoke crack or something. They'll start building mines when u need farms and solar collectors, and feel the need to put a road on every single square imaginable. And they never optimize a square how it should be. If you've got some basic civ or civ2 settler development skills, your far better off manually working them yourself.
Cohen posted 04-06-99 03:17 AM ET
While playing a multiplayer game this past weekend I had to kill a former belonging to my buddy because it had gone nuts. It was set on 'auto improve home base' but had decided to go back and forth over two mag tubed squares. The only way we could regain control of the game was for me to take some troops, declare vendetta, and blow it up. Luckly it worked. I don't let my formers auto-anything anymore.
Cohen the barbarian
Spencer Olson posted 04-06-99 11:40 AM ET
It's funny.. I actually consider this a blessing in disguise. When I first started playing, I had no idea what any squares would produce under almost any circumstances, so I would always automate formers. However, once I saw some of my formers going crazy, I started to deal with some of them individually. It has progressed to the point where, in the PBeM game I'm winning, I do all the terraforming manually, for optimum production.
YMMV,
--sko
ballpark posted 04-20-99 12:45 PM ET
What I hate about this bug is that the formers will sit and move back & forth on the MAG Tube, using up all of their movement. So when you click on them to activate them, they have "ALREADY MOVED", loosing the current turns activity, forcing you to deal with them next turn.
ballpark posted 04-20-99 12:49 PM ET
By the way, Stick. My Formers "Go Nuts" on ANY Auto-magic Setting, not just "Fully-Automate". It's quite annoying...
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Author	Topic: Formers run amuck
Ted	posted 02-26-99 11:27 AM ET One of the most irritating AI issues that plagued all of the Civ games and this one two is the automation of Formers during the mid-late game stages. They seem to run around without any purpose. I think it is time to address this issue. Towards the end of the game, I just kill off my auto formers because I don't want to deal with them. Maybe this will be addressed in the "Ascent" sequel because it wasn't addressed in Civ I, Civ II, Fant. Worlds, and SMAC!
StickFigure	posted 02-26-99 11:52 AM ET The best thing to do to avoid Formers running amuck is to use Shift-Ctrl-A to automate them. For those not in the know, this sets the former to autoimprove its home base only. Once it has completely automated its home base, automation turns of and it blinks like a normal unit. The player (if he wishes to continue to use the former) should move the former to a base that is still developing its land. Once there, re-home the former and set the former to autoimprove its new home base. This has worked successfully for me. I never get formers running around in circles like with full automation. Cheers, stick
weregamer	posted 03-02-99 09:59 PM ET Unfortunately, if your base is not fully improved and you develop Mag Tubes, even the "autoimprove home base" AI will keep them running in circles instead of doing something. If you shift-right-click to examine the unit without clearing its orders, you will find that it thinks it is trying to go to a square, generally one that doesn't yet have a magtube but is adjacent to a magtube. It seems that the logic for using magtubes to get to a square is messed up, but only for formers. Odd.
White Tiger	posted 03-03-99 12:14 AM ET I agree. The formers seem to do a good job until around the middle of the game when to me, it looks like they are just sitting there. It's a real pain to see all the fungus they could be fixing just sit there and grow.
PUSH	posted 03-03-99 03:30 AM ET That's right, it seems, that formers now, that they had already transformed the trritorry, why shoud they check it anymore. That's a real problem, I saw that the fungus came up in 5-8 squares, and formers made nothing. The same is when you lose forests, formers doesn't reterraform these squares.
bene4	posted 03-03-99 03:10 PM ET ctrl-shift-f Auto-remove fungus. Really cool if there were a autoplant forest! The whole ctrl-shift aspect of formers rules - a mix between micro-management and efficiency. "m" to get a mine w/ road and farm if not rocky, "r" to get a road going to the right place, "t" for tubes, "a" to get the home base fixed up... Just wish there were a way to auto plant forests...
slink	posted 03-05-99 11:23 PM ET My discouraging discovery tonight was that a former on auto-improve-own-base will make a bunker from an airbase right out from under the resident aircraft. As best as I could tell the square was not even within the base limits. There isn't any setting for automatic bunkers, is there? Re the running in circles my exploration foil also did that when it encountered and island, on auto-explore. My game before this one had an AI city right in the mouth of the volcano on Mt. Planet, but we aren't allowed to build there. Getting back to auto-formers, has anyone actually seen them raising or lowering the terrain? I have them set to do that but I've played a couple of games that lasted over 12 hours and I never saw them do it where it might have done some good.
Journeyman	posted 03-06-99 07:19 PM ET ok, I have ran into several items in this area... 1) any unit (land/sea) will run in circles (or worse, just sit in one spot) if it's AI targets a square that it cant reach (ie, if a speeder targets either an ocean square or a small island, OR a ship targets a land square on the shore line). This seems to happen alot when there are still pods to find, and only in the / (explore) mode. I have also run into a similar situation with auto explore option, but this one, if issued inside a city, makes the unit hang out in the city as a defensive unit Terraformers will, under certain (almost determined) cercumstances, always run in circles. I like weregamer's info (cuz it coincides with mine) and I think somebody at Firaxis should puruse the former's ai code and add a few lines that state "if you cant get there on the tubes, use roads - if you cant get there on roads, go cross country Now, apparently I am the only one with _this_ problem: formers with the auto-fungus-removal order will remove _one_ square of fungus, then require new orders, even in a field of fungus several squares to a side...
zkosn	posted 03-08-99 06:41 PM ET Just remember that the manual says that when you put them in auto mode, you are placing the decision of what to do in the hands of the driver of the vehicle. But, I'm sure the best and the brightest citizens aren't allocated to former driving duty. They're probably just joyriding when they're going around in circles. When the cat's away the mice will play. Unless there are just too many of them to keep track of, I handle formers myself with an iron fist approach to management.
Jonathan	posted 03-31-99 05:11 PM ET Found the thread at last!! Has anyone from Firaxis responded to this problem yet? It's annoying that once you get 20 or 30 formers on the go they stop working and just rush around doing nothing, even when their home base needs improving. I built a new former at a base with no improvements, set it to auto, and it just moved back and forth without trying to form anything. Does V2/V3 fix this bug ? ...
DanS	posted 04-01-99 12:02 PM ET Jonathan: perhaps the former algorithm is too smart for its own good. Perhaps it does nothing because you aren't utilizing the square. Have you tried reassigning a worker to the square you want to improve? Just a hunch... Also, what kind of auto did you make these 20 or 30 formers? If it was auto-auto, change it to auto-road or auto-sensors or something.
axe	posted 04-01-99 03:39 PM ET I've had a similiar FormerOnCrack problem. On auto-improve homebase mode, it will build sensors outside of the city limits...Cool, I like that...But puting the farm, under it..Is that really needed? Or even with automate, building farms or mines outside of all city limits? I'm not sure if it expects you to build a city there, and is kinda hinting.. =] ..But it seems to waste a few turns while the silly crackbaby could be doing something else...More often then not I like controlling my formers though...As I usually build, no kill...I leave that to my bloodlusting girlfriend..
Dim Cat	posted 04-01-99 06:24 PM ET Talking about raising/lowering terrain. I didn't see this with land formers, but my sea formers raise the ocean bottom at deep-level squares all the time in Auto-improve home base mode (usually after they built mines/solars and kelp in all shelf squares). In general, sea formers seem to be a bit smarter than land formers. But then they don't have to build mag tubes
Saganaga	posted 04-02-99 06:19 PM ET Re. auto-formers raising/lowering terrain. I believe the default is for this type of terraforming to NOT be allowed. However, this can be changed under the Preferences dialog, I think (don't have the game in front of me).
Knight_Errant	posted 04-02-99 10:57 PM ET One thing I have noted with the Terraformer AI is that it will sometimes go in circles on a mag tube. This, of course, means you can never get to the end of a turn as the terraformer never uses any of its move points. I have just downloaded the new smac and hope it is less prominent. Civ II would ask if you wanted to stop a unit that had moved in the same location several times in a row.
Naf	posted 04-03-99 04:24 PM ET I know the solution so that you'll never this problem again. Dont automate your formers. Automated formers like to smoke crack or something. They'll start building mines when u need farms and solar collectors, and feel the need to put a road on every single square imaginable. And they never optimize a square how it should be. If you've got some basic civ or civ2 settler development skills, your far better off manually working them yourself.
Cohen	posted 04-06-99 03:17 AM ET While playing a multiplayer game this past weekend I had to kill a former belonging to my buddy because it had gone nuts. It was set on 'auto improve home base' but had decided to go back and forth over two mag tubed squares. The only way we could regain control of the game was for me to take some troops, declare vendetta, and blow it up. Luckly it worked. I don't let my formers auto-anything anymore. Cohen the barbarian
Spencer Olson	posted 04-06-99 11:40 AM ET It's funny.. I actually consider this a blessing in disguise. When I first started playing, I had no idea what any squares would produce under almost any circumstances, so I would always automate formers. However, once I saw some of my formers going crazy, I started to deal with some of them individually. It has progressed to the point where, in the PBeM game I'm winning, I do all the terraforming manually, for optimum production. YMMV, --sko
ballpark	posted 04-20-99 12:45 PM ET What I hate about this bug is that the formers will sit and move back & forth on the MAG Tube, using up all of their movement. So when you click on them to activate them, they have "ALREADY MOVED", loosing the current turns activity, forcing you to deal with them next turn.
ballpark	posted 04-20-99 12:49 PM ET By the way, Stick. My Formers "Go Nuts" on ANY Auto-magic Setting, not just "Fully-Automate". It's quite annoying...