AI Progress Charts

[x4000]

The numbers in this spreadsheet are pretty accurate (this is an old spreadsheet), but the AI progress you will need to mentally adjust up by 10x.  So when it says AI Progress Level 1, that means 10, 40 is 400, etc.

The Waves tab includes info on the size of waves based on the AI Progress level and the Difficulty level.  Of course, this does not account for larger/smaller waves based on the time between waves (so this is basically the 1.00 number)

The Reinforcement tab refers to just the command stations at a planet.  So that's how many would get reinforced to the command station in each reinforcement event (which could happen 2X at one planet in a single event if the AI decides to burn two planets' worth of reinforcements at one planet).

The Posts tab also refers to reinforcements, but these are the numbers for each individual command post (including specops posts) in a reinforcement event.

The Reinforce# tab combines data from the Reinforcement and Posts tab to look at how many ships are added to a planet in a single reinforcement event.  Actually, at this stage there are a number of things wrong with that tab, so you should probably just ignore it because it's not at all correct.

[Haagenti]

Thanks, I was looking for this.

How often does the AI reinforce?

[x4000]

Oh, another good question.  The AI reinforcements are done based on when an internal counter reaches 2400, not based on any actual timers.  Each of the two AIs has their own wave and reinforcement timers and counters, and they each have their own reinforcement events, so the other thing to remember is that everything is essentially 2X in aggregate between the two, although there is no guarantee that the reinforcements and waves of the two AIs will happen at all in conjunction with one another.

So, for reinforcement timing, that's based on a counter that must reach to 2400.  The counter increases once per second as follows:  AIDifficulty + Random( 2, 4 ).  So mostly it increases on a fixed amount per AI difficulty level, but there is a small random component in there, too (the lower bound is inclusive, the upper is exclusive, so you really can only have the values 2 and 3 from that random there).  So for a difficulty 7 AI, you will get reinforcement events somewhere between every 266.67 and 240 seconds (assuming no handicap).

When a reinforcement event occurs, it reinforces 1/2 the number of planets that the human players control, up to a cap of 15.  It can't get less than 1 planet.  On difficulty 8 it gets 1 extra planet always (even above the cap of 15, making the cap 16 there), and on 9 it gets an extra 2 planets above the norm, and on 10 it gets an extra 4 planets above the norm.

Also of note is that if the AI has a handicap, its cap of 2400 is reduced by whatever the handicap is * the total.  For example, with a handicap of 30%, the actual cap is ( 2400 - ( 2400 * .3 ) ) = 1680.  The cap can never be driven below 800.

[eRe4s3r]

So if one gives an DIF 1 Ai a handicap of +300%

That basically means 2400 * 3 = 7200 Unit cap per planet?
And instead of 250 per each post 750 per each post?

I am asking because i am playing a DIF 10 and Dif 1 Ai (yes, you read that right) and find it very much a different experience than anything ever before. But i don't like the dif 1 ai only has so few ships, so wold a dif 1 ai with 300% handicap basically be a dif 3 ai with more units?

I actually would even like to disable 1 AI completely and have these planets "uninhabited" , a Dif 10 ai has even alone no problem against the player. But the player now has less of a chance to hit 3 IV worlds in a row next to their homeworld.

(Its a nice training map!)

[x4000]

The 2400 is an internal counter cap, not a cap of the number of units, sorry.  So with a diff 1 AI on 300% handicap, it would get the same number of ships per reinforcement event, but it would get reinforcements every 800 internal counter points instead of every 2400 internal counter points.

Of course, a diff 1 AI is going to have between 2 and 3 counter points per second, so that still means it would only get its paltry ships every 400 to 266 seconds, which is still vastly less than even an AI difficulty 7 with no handicap.  And then if you look at the chart, they will then be getting so incredibly few ships each time, it's still not going to be a challenge in the same sense.

[eRe4s3r]

But they make for a nice buffer zone between the trillion of Super Fortified IV worlds a DIF 10 has

The Perfect training session to see 1) AI tactics of a DIF 10 but still have some expansion options with the DIF1 planets. Also feels more fun and faster paced (some worlds are not defended at all, which is a nice change and a needed advantage against the dif 10 superiority

Actually, just for giggles in my next game i am going to set a dif 1 ai with -300% Handicap and a dif 10 ai with +300 handicap, and myself +150% handicap

Essentially that should make for some interesting happenings

Thanks for the table too, i never thought small progression has such a impact after all, makes keeping it at 0 really worthwhile

[x4000]

But they make for a nice buffer zone between the trillion of Super Fortified IV worlds a DIF 10 has

The Perfect training session to see 1) AI tactics of a DIF 10 but still have some expansion options with the DIF1 planets. Also feels more fun and faster paced (some worlds are not defended at all, which is a nice change and a needed advantage against the dif 10 superiority

Yeah, that sounds like that would be cool.

Actually, just for giggles in my next game i am going to set a dif 1 ai with -300% Handicap and a dif 10 ai with +300 handicap, and myself +150% handicap

That is going to be a super fast-paced game, let me tell you.  Everyone is going to have ships out their ears except the AI 1.

Thanks for the table too, i never thought small progression has such a impact after all, makes keeping it at 0 really worthwhile

Don't forget that it's scale is 10x off.  So you need to mentally adjust up by 10x when you look at those charts.  So a change of one on that chart is equivalent to a change of 10 in the real game.  The smaller increments don't really change all that much overall, it's just in aggregate that they can really start piling up...