Strategy games with a clever AI?

[Jeivar]

Strategy games aren't my genre of choice, but I've played a few that I liked. What I DON'T like is that the AI in most such games I've tried tends to be stupid and unchallenging. In skirmish mode it generally doesn't pull anything more clever than putting together a medium-size force and throwing it at me with no particular strategy. Again and again and again.

Can someone recommend a strategy game that actually requires me to, y'know, strategize? I'm mostly interested in pre-industrial setting games, but I'll hear recommendations for something more modern.

Thanks.

[chiasaur11]

Galactic Civilizations II?

[Lost Demiurge]

Try the Battle of Wesnoth. If nothing else, it's free... If you don't like it then it won't set you back anything.

[Tengu_temp]

The Fire Emblem series. The AI loves ganking you, exploiting mistakes you made, sending its mooks on suicide attacks en masse just to kill one of your guys. Because all your characters are unique, and a real Fire Emblem player will not let any of his guys die! And those games do not let you save/load freely during a mission - if something wrong happens, you have to repeat the whole map.

Other than that - yeah, GalCiv 2 has the smartest AI I've seen in a 4X game. Worth a try, especially since it's a very good game.

[factotum]

And another vote for GalCiv2 here. Notable for the fact that the different alien races do actually play differently, which is unusual for a game of this type!

[Maeglin_Dubh]

GalCiv2 is awesome for the AI, and the fact that you can design all your ships from scratch. You don't -have- to, but you can, and it's my favorite part of the game.

I love deploying a single Bulwark-class Escort Frigate and knowing that I just locked down an entire sector's worth of traffic, since nothing the enemy has can punch through a Bulwark's shields. (Custom ship design, I use them as my flagships in my current game.) I only have three of them total, but a single Bulwark can hold a pretty sizable area while the escort fleets conduct raids or cut off particularly important systems.

EDIT: Just loaded up my save again to realize that the Bulwark and the Bulwark II are actually the least of my enemies worries... right before my last save, I successfully completed construction of the Invincible-class Dreadnaught. The biggest face-stomping piece of technology in the galaxy.

For reference, the Bulwark I has 10 shields. This allows it to engage enemy heavy fighters and corvettes with minimal damage, and the repair capabilities top off the massive hull reserve fairly quickly.
The Bulwark II has 27 shields. This allows it to ignore most enemy fleets, period.
The Invincible has 48 shields. Good game.

[houlio]

Another vote for Gal Civ 2, but to be different I've also enjoyed playing the computer in Sword of the Stars a lot too (although the challenge in that game is more from random events than other players usually it seems).

[Seonor]

It is a sci-fi game, but one of the best AI I have played against was the Sorain AI (http://forums.gaspowered.com/viewtopic.php?t=22908) for Supreme Commander. The AI picks (and changes) appropriate strategys and tactics for the map and battle, has economic skills as good as most experienced players and knows how to control a map.

[Volatar]

The entire point of AI War: Fleet Command (http://www.arcengames.com/w/index.php/aiwar-features) is to be a coop game against a super-smart AI. And it really is crazy smart :smalleek:

[Prplcheez]

Starcraft II has some really, really tough AI, especially at Insane. The AI isn't exactly creative or anything, but it is extremely efficient and hard to beat.

Red Alert III and Command and Conquer 3 have pretty good AI, probably not as hard to beat as Starcraft AI, but you can set them to specific modes, such as Guerilla, Steamroller, Rusher, etc.

For the DS, if you have one, Rondo of Swords has pretty decent AI. You'll get attacked from all angles, and the AI is good at planning its moves ahead of time.

[warty goblin]

Until you learn to be mercilessly good at maximizing your damage output, the AI in the various Massive Assault games is tough to beat. Even then it frequently outplays me on maps I cannot reduce to a blitzkrieg. If I can do that, I'll obliterate it, but otherwise it gives me a run for my money.

I'm not sure the AI is particularly great in Fantasy Wars, or its sequel Elven Legacy. They are however brutally hard games nonetheless. Between the mission timers, the large number of enemy units, and the scarcity of replacements and reinforcements, there were a couple missions that chewed me up and spit me out repeatedly. On easy.

[Folytopo]

I think the point is also clever AI. Civ 3 diety is really hard to beat but it builds 50% faster than you. Insane difficulties and tons of enemies does not a clever AI make.

[Spartacus]

Starcraft II has some really, really tough AI, especially at Insane. The AI isn't exactly creative or anything, but it is extremely efficient and hard to beat.

They're actually kinda stupid. Insane gets free resources or builds faster, I forget which. Regardless, it cheats, and even then a fairly competent player can still stomp it. By comparison, most Bronze League players (the lowest League) can beat a Very Hard AI, which does not cheat.

[Winterwind]

I'll cast my vote in favour of The Battle for Wesnoth as well. And provide a link (http://www.wesnoth.org/), too!
Firstly, as already mentioned, it's free, so you can just download it and start playing and be just fine, even if you should not like it.
Secondly, it comes with a plethora of fairly interesting campaigns, on top of a pretty good random map generator for single battles.
Thirdly, the AI is pretty decent. It's far from perfect, but it adjusts well enough to what you build, it doesn't cheat (as far as I can tell), and does the tactics pretty well, too - it knows when to retreat units, when to make a pincer movement, what enemy units are weak and vulnerable, etc.

It's a turn-based fantasy strategy game, by the way.

[Triaxx]

Total Annihliation has an AI certainly capable of grinding you into terribly small pieces if you can't go defensive enough to survive, and quick. Even on easy and normal, particuarly in some of the missions.

[LansXero]

Cossacks: European Wars (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeVuMiv_Q3w) and its expansions have one of the hardest AIs to beat Ive found. Missions are really, really, really tough (but possible), and in random map Hard and Very Hard AIs are really relentless and pretty good at exploiting whatever weakness or mistake you make.

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/cossackseuropeanwars/index.html

[Volatar]

Total Annihliation has an AI certainly capable of grinding you into terribly small pieces if you can't go defensive enough to survive, and quick. Even on easy and normal, particuarly in some of the missions.

Ok, this right here proves that you have missed the point. The total Annihilation AI is not clever by any stretch. All it does is slowly expand with no strategy, ryhme or reason.

Give us clever AI's, not hard ones. Clever and hard are not the same thing!

[shadow_archmagi]

I remembered being so angry when I played dawn of war and discovered that Hard mode was the exact same game, but your enemies had double HP

[Triaxx]

That's why it's so clever. It's got no strategy, so there's no specific thing you can prepare for. Sometimes blunt force is a sufficient substitute for cleverness. Besides, aren't you looking for an AI that'll force you to be clever as much as one that is?

AOE has a pretty clever one as well.

[GungHo]

That's like saying the smelly dude who mashed the buttons to hell playing E. Honda on SF2T was being clever.

[Gaius Marius]

That's like saying the smelly dude who mashed the buttons to hell playing E. Honda on SF2T was being clever.

But at least, he was winning and provided a challenge.

[Triaxx]

Precisely. You could beat him by turning button mashing against him, but it was much more fun to use timing and strategy against him.

Of course button mashing with E. Honda seems to be one of the better techniques.

I must say that Supreme Commander could also be very clever in it's stupidity, though it's also a serious contender for being a completely retarded cheater.

[Gaius Marius]

I must say that Supreme Commander could also be very clever in it's stupidity, though it's also a serious contender for being a completely retarded cheater.

I'll be honest, I think I'll give a shot to that Sorain AI. See how clever it is. I loved Supreme Commander's strategical layers, but I always felt that the computer was too reactive to me, and not trying ennough to clash strongly through the progressive encirclement/harassing strategy I was chocking it.


It was quite fun to install advanced artillery outposts to hammer their base constantly, raiding their energy supplies with gunships, and finding the way to disable their Nuke-defense swiftly.

[Martok]

I too will second Galactic Civilizations 2. It's long been known for (among other things) the quality of its AI.


However, even more than GalCiv2, I would recommend Armada 2526 (http://www.ntronium.com/Supernova%20Home.html). It too is a 4x space strategy game with good AI, but it's a heck of a lot easier to learn how to play and understand. And with the newly-released Supernova expansion, Armada has only been improved that much more.

[Zen Monkey]

X-Com had amazing strategy for it's time. Even back then, the AI would set up ambushes, hide and fire from cover, and use all sorts of clever tactics that most enemies still can't seem to manage today.

[Abemad]

X-Com had amazing strategy for it's time. Even back then, the AI would set up ambushes, hide and fire from cover, and use all sorts of clever tactics that most enemies still can't seem to manage today.

And if the first game isn't hard enough, just skip ahead to the second :smallwink:

Oh, and be sure to get xcomutil, it fixes a lot of bugs

[Triaxx]

Speaking of 4x games, Alpha Centauri also has quite a good AI.