AI builds troop ships

[xXxBo$$Pr0xXx666]

why is the AI building so many troop ships and then just sending them to die?

the game just feels too easy.

[Sloth]

It would be helpful if you could post the version you are using.

Screenshots or savegames would make it easier to find a problem.

[xXxBo$$Pr0xXx666]

FreeOrion_v0.4.5_2015-09-01.f203162_Test_Win32_Setup.exe (150.0 MB)

AI just wastes resources on troop ships that get shot down, might as well just be making cannon fodder ships instead.

they do that every game. not a lot. but it feels like 30% of their production is wasted on them.

[Dilvish]

why is the AI building so many troop ships and then just sending them to die?

The AI tries to be careful about not sending unarmed ships to their doom, but yes, as you've noticed, it needs more work on that.

[Nexus]

I can confirm that the AI is often extremely stupid about troop ships. I've found that it often sends a battle fleet to one of my planets and then just leaves it parked there for many turns, without making any attempt to invade with troops. All that happens is that the fleet gets slowly whittled away by mines. Meanwhile the AI sends its troops somewhere else entirely, without support, and they get instantly vaporised.

[Atarlost]

Would it be possible to make the AI mark an armed ship as not to be given combat tasks? Spending one slot on a kinetic weapon on troop transports greater than a certain size would prevent them from being walled by shields if the war fleet gets called elsewhere before the troops arrive but after reducing the defenses, but obviously not if having that planetary bombardment pea shooter caused the troop ship itself to be retasked to a space combat mission somewhere else.

On a related note, the AI seems to build way too many troop ships during stalemates at the default aggression level (in 4.5 b2015-09-01). If aggression isn't directly supposed to be difficulty the AI should probably not build lots of troop ships when it won't be waging a war of aggression and instead use that production on armed ships that can also be used defensively as more than decoys, or at least make cheaper decoys that don't have troops on them if decoys are still a thing the AI writing people think the AIs should be using their troopships for.

[Kassiopeija]

problem is that weapons are expensive, so this will greatly reduce the amount of produced troopships, which will also suffer in efficiency to take a planet because one slot is used for a weapons. secondly, it's probably better if troopships don't initiate combat with planets because they will will be lost. one weapon isn't enough to degrade shields & defenses before being killed.

[Atarlost]

problem is that weapons are expensive, so this will greatly reduce the amount of produced troopships, which will also suffer in efficiency to take a planet because one slot is used for a weapons. secondly, it's probably better if troopships don't initiate combat with planets because they will will be lost. one weapon isn't enough to degrade shields & defenses before being killed.

I could have sworn someone had reported the AI moving a war fleet out just before a troop fleet arrived, letting the shields regenerate and a some developer chatter about why the AI might be doing things like that. Are there two threads complaining about troop ships and I responded to the wrong one by mistake?

Weapons are not nearly as expensive as whole ships that die for nothing because the AI doesn't retask them properly when it retasks the war fleets they're following. One weapon per ship is enough to keep already suppressed defenses suppressed for one turn so the invasion can happen if the war fleet is called elsewhere or even to knock back down defenses that have had a couple turns to recover and AI troopships can't get much less efficient than suiciding for no gain at all or sitting around acting as overpriced decoys because the AI builds them when not on the offense.

[Kassiopeija]

generally speaking, a weapon is 10* more expensive than a ground troop pod, so if you take cheap hull for invaders, that single weapon could mean more costs than the pure-invader ship...

costs:
ground troop pod #1: 3
ground troop pod #2: 6

md: 20
laser: 30
plasma: 40
death ray: 60

spatial flux hull: 6
organic hull: 14

perhaps if you build heavy troopers with sufficient hitpoints, eg. taking asteroid hulls it might become reasonable as they'll have sufficient hitpoints to survive planetary defense reactions. still, your ships will increase in costs by ~50%.

[Atarlost]

I find that if I don't use something like an asteroid hull my troopships die way too easily to mines and defense network regeneration. An unarmored flux hull only has 8 HP with reinforced hull. Mines 2 will kill 6 and defense network regeneration 1 will regen a minimum of 2 defense a turn. Against a system with multiple planets that's one flux hull destroyed per colony. Planetary defense network 3 adds another 2.5 regen. defense network regen 2 at least doubles the regen. These aren't particularly expensive techs. Mines 3 is more expensive but completely no-sells flux hull troopships and reduces static multicellular troopships to the same 2 structure remaining.

Outside the rushing game I find cheap hulls used for any aggressive purpose are a false economy.

Actually I have a game running. Let me look at the AI's troopships I can see.

Static Multicellular Hull. Obsolete at mines 3 and any defense network regeneration.
Ravenous Hull. HP adequate but it needs to ripen for 40 turns.
Fractal Energy Hull.
Titanic Hull.
Colony Base Hull. They must have overbuilt fighting natives, but they really should have scrapped these after taking all the planets in the system. Or actually calculated how many they needed and not built more than they needed.

The smallest mobile hull in use is for troops is a 5 slot.

Most planets have 55 defense fully teched for 9 regen. If it takes 2 troop ships to take each planet a mass driver 3 should keep that suppressed and a 4 will make some progress against defenses that received a turn to recover. That's a meaningful expense on the SMH, but small on the Ravenous and trivial on the Fractal or Titanic. But even putting full bombardment loads on troop ships with all the waste that implies is an improvement if the AI can't keep troop and war fleets properly coordinated.

[MatGB]

I could have sworn someone had reported the AI moving a war fleet out just before a troop fleet arrived, letting the shields regenerate and a some developer chatter about why the AI might be doing things like that. Are there two threads complaining about troop ships and I responded to the wrong one by mistake?

Probably, there are several threads on similar subjects going back, but if it's not this thread it's definitely something that is happening.

Weapons are not nearly as expensive as whole ships that die for nothing because the AI doesn't retask them properly when it retasks the war fleets they're following. One weapon per ship is enough to keep already suppressed defenses suppressed for one turn so the invasion can happen if the war fleet is called elsewhere or even to knock back down defenses that have had a couple turns to recover and AI troopships can't get much less efficient than suiciding for no gain at all or sitting around acting as overpriced decoys because the AI builds them when not on the offense.

For what it's worth, the AI used to always put a gun on its troop ships but that was changed at approximately the time the code letting them design their own ships reactively came in (actively a month or two before, I think). Having some with guns probably makes some sense but not all, but it would be better to fix the actual problem rather than paper it in a way that would disadvantage the AI production wise.

[Atarlost]

Having some with guns probably makes some sense but not all, but it would be better to fix the actual problem rather than paper it in a way that would disadvantage the AI production wise.

It really depends on how hard the actual problem is to fix. I sort of get the impression that if it were easy it would have been fixed already. Unless it only appears at low and standard aggression and the AI dev(s) only play(s) high aggression or something.

[Kassiopeija]

What I would wish is that the AI shys away from battle with his troopships, and leaves, at least, 2 nodes of defended/neutral space between his troopers & potential hostile attackers.

Because, in a lot of incidents, they just sit 1 node away and if you've got just speedy enough ships, you can send them in to destroy + the AI never sees it coming.

Next, try to have standard military fleets gather one node ahead and only advance the troopships further if the aimed space is secured. That way, normal military craft would automatically arrive one turn more early at potential enemy systems that could be invaded.

But if met with excessive force, the AI should consider to join both fleets together in order to even be able to come to a positive outcome of a major fight.

[Angular]

What I would wish is that the AI shys away from battle with his troopships, and leaves, at least, 2 nodes of defended/neutral space between his troopers & potential hostile attackers.

Because, in a lot of incidents, they just sit 1 node away and if you've got just speedy enough ships, you can send them in to destroy + the AI never sees it coming.

Next, try to have standard military fleets gather one node ahead and only advance the troopships further if the aimed space is secured. That way, normal military craft would automatically arrive one turn more early at potential enemy systems that could be invaded.

But if met with excessive force, the AI should consider to join both fleets together in order to even be able to come to a positive outcome of a major fight.

Agreed. If your suggestions could be implemented, that might help. Oftentimes the AI troop fleets sit in empty space with no escorts. I don't know what advantage that would bring. I leave my troop ships in systems with planetary defenses, that way they are somewhat protected and even help with defending the system in case of an attack.

In multi player games the human players complained that the AI didn't properly protect the troop ships and thus they could hold planets even against overwhelming odds just by killing the troop ships before they could attack. The AI loses plenty of production that way, too. Slaughtering helpless enemy ships is fun, if it rarely works, but is frustrating when it's the norm. Often the attacked ships don't even flee if they survive the first turn.

I played only one single player game (multi player is so much fun and works so well compared to many other games). In this game I placed scout ships in every system just to see what AI fights look like. Even AI vs AI fights consist mainly of armed ships destroying helpless transport vessels(at least in this game, granted it was over by that point).

That's not to say the AI is bad, it works quite well in some areas. I have seen much worse and I realize there are limitations.

[Cjkjvfnby]

In this game I placed scout ships in every system just to see what AI fights look like. Even AI vs AI fights consist mainly of armed ships destroying helpless transport vessels(at least in this game, granted it was over by that point).

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