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AI's Lack of Interest in Sensors Places it at a Huge Disadvantage!

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AI's Lack of Interest in Sensors Places it at a Huge Disadvantage!

from GalCiv2 Forums
When the sensor limit of 15 was imposed Brad said it was for performance reasons.
With "Eyes of the Universe", all your ships and starbases get 15 sensor range. However, planets remain limited to a range of around 4, even those with ships in orbit! This makes no sense!

A much bigger issue is the AI's lack of interest in senors! The AI will not research sensors, not even the inexpensive first one which gives all ships a +1 boost to their sensor range! This places the AI at a large disadvantage, as a skilled human player will quickly research this branch and build "Eyes of the Universe".

In v1.0 the AI did not value speed and that was corrected. Brad has said the AI continues to ignore sensors, for performance reasons.

Paul D.
28,643 views 28 replies
Reply #26 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Man- I can't live with out the Eye of the Universe... It saves me time in having to send AWAC ships out to safe gaurd and coordinate the fleet- I don't need it at the lower levels, (Under Masochistic) But anything above that, if I don't have it, the AI just is able to get to many ships past my defensive nets
Reply #27 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Since the AI does not research sensors (and thus does not get the +1 sensor bonus from the first sensor tech) and thus does not place them on its ships, so depending on the hull size the AI players' ships will have sensor range 2-4 (with the bonus 4-8). So the AI players’ ships will still have shorter sensor range than my ships with "Eyes of the Universe". Planets get a sensor range of 4; I wonder if the AI planets get a sensor bonus.


Your argument is very rational, however, you're pretty much guessing as to how "at 200 bonus" applies to sensor range. It may be a reasonable guess but it's a guess nonetheless. I simply took the statement on its face value to mean that at the incredible level the AI probably has no real fog of war.

Like a lot of others who've responded to this post I look at the EoTU as a player convenience. The player “pays” for this convenience by having to spend time researching the tech. Perhaps it is a disadvantage to the AI, however, it’s not totally one sided. While the player is researching these techs and building the wonder, the AI can use the time to gain an advantage researching some other tech and use the production that would be spent on the wonder to build more ships. Either way, I don’t consider this to be a game breaker.
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Reply #28 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Your argument is very rational, however, you're pretty much guessing as to how "at 200 bonus" applies to sensor range. It may be a reasonable guess but it's a guess nonetheless.

In the absense of facts all we have are eduated guesses. As I stated in Galactic Civilizations II v1.3 Change Log, the GalCiv2 Wiki - Difficulty Levels needs to be updated for the new levels in v1.3 and the old ones clarified.


In my original post I did not say EotU places the AI at a huge disadvantage but its lack of interest in sensors. As already stated, Fog of War can be removed via EotU or a network of sensor ships, but the AI does neither. Fast, powerful fleets are ineffective if they can't see the enemy. If I can evade the AI player's killer fleets and capture all its planets in 1 or 2 turns then I don't need to engage his fleets. I need only take out its planetary defenders; when I capture all its planets or it surrenders, then those fleets disappear!