[freeciv-ai] Re: (PR#6567) AI has too many boats.

["Jason Short" <jdorje@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Mark Metson wrote:
> 
> On Sun, 19 Oct 2003, Per I. Mathisen wrote:
> 
> 
>>>But if there are many inland cities and only one coastal city which for
>>>some reason prefers coinage to overseas warfare and therefore doesn't
>>>build boats of its own accord, we are stuck.
>>
>>That is a hard problem either way you do it.
> 
> 
> Maybe you could track not just the number of available boats but also the
> relative demand and the number of potential boat-building cities compared
> to the number of inland cities and have coastal cities always keep on the
> back burner the idea that maybe they should consider building a boat for 
> the benefit of the inland cities.

Coastal cities need to not just look at their demand for a boat, but the 
overall demand.  If enough units exist or are in production to demand 
the construction of a new boat, it should be built.

> Like maybe if an inland city wants to build a boat but cannot because it 
> is inland, it could add itself to a lobby list saying hey here is one more 
> inland city that wishes it could build a boat.

Something like that.

> Maybe you might need to balance with with also a list saying hey here is 
> one more coastal city that whishes it could build a defnder or attacker 
> but instead is busy building a boat. So a tradeoff could happen, inland 
> cities that want boats could instead send units to coastal cities that 
> would prefer other units...

Indeed.  Perhaps the need for military units could be computed on a 
continent-wide basis?  Similarly it would make sense for the need for 
boats to be computed on an ocean-wide basis, except that different 
oceans are currently undistinguishable (all have continent==0).

jason