The most stupidest thing you ever saw the AI doing

[The Stranger]

yup lets bring it on. every time you see sumthing good enough for this thread post it

[Mikeus Caesar]

How about...attempting to actually play? The AI has never done anything clever, so obviously this is just going to get packed up with people's descriptions of their entire campaigns.

[Brutus]

Hmmm, well, an outstanding example for me would be the time when I put 2 exactly the same Roman armies against each other in custom battle. Instead of advancing in a straight line, my opponents kept wandering from the right to the left and back, constantly exposing their flanks to me. Result: I lost only about 5% of my men, the AI all of them... :dizzy2:

[Atreides]

Any? :charge: ~D

No there NOT always stupid.

But the good old 'charge the general into a phalanx' is nice.

Even more cool was a defence stand of me with a lot of bowman and slingers. The all went for it. When they where finally there they decided victory wasn't an option. So they turned their back and run. Very clever not only was 1/3 of their army killed now I got a very very large cav in their back. ~:eek: ~:cheers:

So that was a 10 killed of me against hundreds of all players actually almost an entire (large) army. ~:cool:

[Slug For A Butt]

Yup, Mikeus. I agree, Most things the AI does aren't too clever. So this is an open invitation to people to spam the thread with things that aren't a) interesting b) unusual c) human-like in their sophistication.

Gotta say EU that in the last few threads that you have started, it just seems like you are out to score cheap shots against the devs of a game you professs to like. Such as the routing units thread, just chill man.
Seems like you feel too big for the game, if thats the case, just play another one. Don't spend all your time flaming a game that people here enjoy, thats the only reason we are here. You dont make constructive criticism, you are just being plain negative.

So the game isn't human-like in its playing? I agree, so go back to MTW which isn't perfect either, take off your rose tinted spectacles and play that which you obviously prefer. 5 years ago I'm sure we'd have found you in those forums complaining too.

All I'm saying is that constructive criticism is good, but you are just flaming the game for the sake of it.

[professorspatula]

The AI is perfect, EVERYONE STOP COMPLAINING.



:tongue2:

[Dutch_guy]

well really hte colosseum is starting to fill up with the ;;I hate threads '' ) see the sticky at the top of colosseum ) but this I don't really classify as a bash thread.

It's not a praise RTW thread either , but there have been other far wors rant threads, search the forums and you shall find them . ~;)

I don't usually participate in these thread, I know the game has flaws, and it has been said lot's and lot's of times before so I just figure why bother.

ANd thread like these do get your post count up ~;)

:balloon2:

[Viking]

No, this is no bash thread, more like a competition.

I think there has been a thread like this before, posted by MC. Can`t find it though ~:)

[Mongoose]

There should be one "This AI SUCKS!" thread and no others. One is fine but i can't stand it when there are 10 of them.

Back to the subject... ~:)


It walked my army into a wall...then the arrows came...the gates of the city i was attacking opened...it sent it's commander by himself...the rest of the army walked into a wall and was killed by arrows. :furious3:


2000 reinforcements went in; 400 came out. I lost a 10 start commander too. They killed maybe 200* gauls. :dizzy2:


i took the city any way though...

*200 hundred at the most. It was probably closer to 50-100.

[jerby]

thats probably teh first post ever in wich the player is dumber than the AI..or i just dont get it...

[Mongoose]

NO. You do not under stand...


It was the AI controlling my army

[CMcMahon]

Anything involving bridges and/or town gates.

[Enderel]

Not sure if this counts or not, probably more route finding rather than AI being stupid..

Chariots ------ Pikemen--Pikemen---Pikemen---
---------------Archers---------Archers-------Phalanx

I left a unit of scythed chariots on my flank with a nice big open path for them to charge into. It came to the point I needed to have them rush forward, gave them the command, only for half of them go through my ranks of archers and Pikemen. This consequently split the phalanx formations and allowed the enemy to charge into them destroying them, as they weren't in a proper formation. ~:eek:

Highly unimpressed. :furious3:

[Rodion Romanovich]

How about when you bring an army of archers and onagers, and start bombarding. The AI just stands still trying to endure the barrage instead of retreating or attacking, and when I'm nearly out of ammo for the onagers I move my archers forward and use them to kill around 3-5 enemy units. Usually, the clever enemy decides to then launch a full-scale charge - giving them both the disadvatange of ENDURING the fire and ATTACKING my position, instead of them making the more clever decision of either ENDURING then letting me attack, or ATTACKING without enduring the missile fire first... It happens all the time... In a campaign, your first unit of archers put into an army is a milestone in the campaign because you know you have 2-3 free enemy units killed at the start of every battle.

Some other stupid things I've seen AI do:
- Spanish 10-15 units large army consisting almost entirely of war dogs
- An enemy trying to flank me with half his force. The force intended to hit the front of my lines hits and soon routs, but the flanking force just stays on the flank indecisively, neither attacking nor withdrawing. Eventually I just turn around my line of footmen and pin the enemy flankers (most of them routed instantly because they had their back to me), and then charged in with the cavalry I had behind my line.
- Enemy army getting harassed by my cavalry until they've lost 33 percent or more of their army while I've barely lost 2 percent. When they've lost enough men, they withdraw all of their units but one - usually a low-morale unit that they charge heads-on into my lines as a "rear-guard", but because the R:TW morale and battlespeed is so low, this unit routs instantly and doesn't bog me down in my hunt of the withdrawing units. Usually when an enemy withdraws, I can just charge my cavalry into the rear of the nearest unt - it routs instantly - then continue moving right through the routing men in that unit and into the next unit. I can continue that way until around 90 percent of the withdrawing enemies are dead. Quite shocking how bad the AI is at orderly retreat. Sometimes they can turn around a unit to stop me from doing this chain-rout thing, but it happens very seldom and because of their column formation I can quickly go around the flanks of that unit and proceed down the line, then when all others are down turn around and surround the unit that turned around, waiting for the right moment then charging from all sides but the front.
- How in defensive battles you can make an enemy army split up in half to chase my harassing cavalry, then keep moving half their force towards my footmen, only to get pinned and charged to the rear by my cavalry that, faster than the enemy footmen, can get to the position and assist, thus making the one big battle into two smaller ones with much better odds. What disappoints me is that it happens 90 percent of the time an enemy is attacking me.

[PseRamesses]

The only faction that puts up a decent, unified and coordinate resistance is the senate. Therefore I argue that every faction should be applied with their behaviour for better gameplay. Occasionally a 9-10 star general seems to be more "in control" over his troops so modding in higher command levels is a viable approach too.

One of my most baffling encounters was the last king of the Iberians who came at me with a full stack. I had only 6 hast, 4 vel and 2 equ def a hilltop.
He marched his whole army in a nice formation, parked it some 50m from my lines, waited for a while like he was saying goodbye to his men. Then.... he charged will full force into my ranks and got killed instantly. His whole army now got very homesick and ran for the hills. I didn´t even bother to chase them down.

[Conqueror]

Spanish 10-15 units large army consisting almost entirely of war dogs
That's not really stupid, just annoying like hell. When the AI is the attacker in a field battle then massed wardogs work better for them than most other units they could use. Unless you have either HA or phalanx units, then those doggies are going to inflict some real casualties, while any AI army with normal infantry/cavalry can be beaten with barely any casualties to your units.

But if the AI is on defensive then dogs are no problem since you can just missile them to death from a safe distance. But that's the same story with ALL units in that situation...

[The Stranger]

How about...attempting to actually play? The AI has never done anything clever, so obviously this is just going to get packed up with people's descriptions of their entire campaigns.

that's why i said the most stupidest. you got stupid, more stupid and extremely stupid. now thats what i wanna hear. just choose one thing or go to the most cleaverest thing you ever saw the AI doing thread

[The Stranger]

the most stupidest thing i ever saw the AI doing wasnt really the AI it was my army not obeying my orders. those stupid suckers just walked into the damn water and drowned. half an elite army lost. i still hate RTW for that.

[Revelation]

Wow, I didn't realise there was a problem with the AI.... ~:eek:
I must of missed the 100 or so other threads on the subject.
Talk about done to death :help:
Usually i'm up for a good "AI is sadly lacking" debate, but seems i'm all AI'd out.
sigh.......

[The Stranger]

eh this isnt a debate but kinda an contest

[Rodion Romanovich]

Some new ones:
- City assault, wooden walls: the enemy keep running back and forth, and most of them can be taken out by archers. Then I send in one unit through the gate I've rammed down, and retreat it just as the enemy begins running towards it to charge it. The enemy unit follows it out through the gates, and I surround it and insta-rout it. Some more units follow, but are all killed in the same way. Then I repeat the procedure and get another 3 enemy units. The process is repeated until all AI enemies have routed at least once, then after the last routing I send my cavs inside after the routers and hunt them down. Some rallied troops then come from the town center after my cavs. To keep casualties down even more I send my cavs back to the walls, put half of them on each side of the road leading to the walls. When the enemy units come, I charge them from both directions and insta-rout them. More router-hunting is carried out, then 5 severely damaged enemy units with around 5 men each camp in the town center. I set up my archers, then kill one enemy unit at the time. The unit under fire alone comes charging towards my line but is killed before it reaches me. This process is repeated until all enemies are killed. End-result: full stack of enemies dead, I lost around 10 men. The sad thing is that this isn't just something that happened once, but something that happens almost all the time when I assault wooden walls...
- Sally vs Britannia siege on my germanic wooden wall city. Britannia have 1 head hurler, 1 chariot general, 1 chariot archer, 3 woad warriors, 2 barbarian mercenaries and 12 warband. I have 4 spear warband and 1 general. I move outside through a side gate, and Britannia decide to try and attack me before I get outside with all my men. I move quickly and manage to form a line with 3 germanic spear warband, keeping one along with the general's unit in reserve behind. I move up along the wall to get my right flank covered, then the enemies charge into my wall of spears a few at the time - because they were so spread out in a so thin line when they decided to stop my sally from the side gate that the last units don't get to my position until after all the other Briton units are routed. The spear warband I kept to cover the flanks and rear, together with my general's unit, manage to kill the enemy chariot general after severe casualties (due to the boni given to AI because of the very hard difficulty). End-result: unfortunately the enemy chariots killed most of my general's cavalry (but not the general himself) before dying, so I couldn't hunt down the routers. The enemies also rallied their force and only few of them ventured a second attack on my line of spear warband units, so I couldn't finish them off in that particular battle, but at least I had killed all their chariots, so the same turn I could launch an attack from the force I had outside the city (they were reinforcements in the previous battle but never arrived in battle) and kill them one by one by moving around my 3 barb cavs and isolating them, hitting-routing-killing one enemy unit at the time until all were dead.

[antisocialmunky]

Wow, I didn't realise there was a problem with the AI.... ~:eek:
I must of missed the 100 or so other threads on the subject.
Talk about done to death :help:
Usually i'm up for a good "AI is sadly lacking" debate, but seems i'm all AI'd out.
sigh.......

I'm laughing at the irony that your name is Revelation.

~D

[Revelation]

I'm laughing at the irony that your name is Revelation.

~D


You've lost me ~:confused:
Perhaps it's the 12 or so scotches i've just downed.
It's a name taken from a David Gemmell novel. Sort of an Aruthian historical fiction piece. Very enjoyable read.

[antisocialmunky]

Your name and you just had a revelation about the stupid AI.

[Kekvit Irae]

Parking themselves in front of my walls and letting my archers have a field day sniping his general

[King Arthur]

i am not kidding
this is what happened , playing as Brutii.
near Corinth i faced an army 800 or so strong phalanxes and skirmisher units mostly.with 400 brutii .
the two armies lined up, with me begginng to march upon there amassed phalnxes .

a truly bizarre thing happened, the Ai in control of the Greek Cities decided the best thing to do was: to ammass all of his troops in one big lump all mixed units in a big squashed circle. ~:confused:
ALLowing me to encirlce ,and fire at them so easily with my archers
truly incredible . :dizzy2:

[tibilicus]

Wow. That really is dumb.The A.I's more stupid than i first thought!

[Lancome]

The dumbest thing the A.I did to me was in my Julii Campaign Against the Gauls. I was Defending a Bridge w/ a general, 2 Mercenary Hoplites, 4 Hastai, 3 Archers, & 1 ornager. For 2 years my General and the Gauls just stood there Facing each other ,but eventually the Gauls left. 3 years Later I found out that the Gauls left just to go around me and attack me from behind and therefore getting the same Results which was their Death.

[Azi Tohak]

The Ptolemaics not squashing my tiny little armies of Armenians when they had the chance in RTR. All the Ptolemaics had to do was ignore what was left fo the Seleucids, and move north, and I was dead. And they knew it too. They had spies *@#$* everywhere, including my homeland, but the best they ever did was break army after army against my one real field army holding Susa.

But you know...that was a fun campaign (:

Azi

[fireblade]

The ai was commanding a group of reinforcements when he rode his general forth and stoped just in face of a unit of spartan hoplites. Half my 20 men strong bodyguard with 2 gold chevrons lay dead untill he decided to fight back!

Fireblade

[sieve]

My favorite is when the AI takes their armies and charges a few feet - stops - turns to one side - stops - turns back to face me - stops - then charges forward another ten feet, etc, etc. They do this several times before they simply decide to charge at me. All the while being cut down by my archers. Makes me laugh every time.

[Rodion Romanovich]

Not to mention when they charge towards me, then stop right in front of me without attacking. Very much appreciated by my pila-throwing roman units. Also I've seen the AI send a general's cavalry unit forward towards my line, then instead of suicide charging - which can actually sometimes be a quite effective way for them to break lines of hastati and principes (but not spears, where they also often like to suicide charge) thanks to their very hard difficulty boni - he just stopped. Then, slowly, he turned to one side, and rode along my entire line without attacking (not until he reached the unit I had furthest out on the flank), while getting decimated by pila, until finally the entire unit was gone and the enemy general was dead. He had one or two men left when he hit the unit he had targetted on my flank...

[pezhetairoi]

I still say it's the frontal cavalry charges into phalanxes. Gets me everytime, except when it's my general under AI control that's doing the charging.

[nee]

turning their backs on my phalanx?

[professorspatula]

I saw a new bit of AI stupidity the other day.

I set up a silly custom battle. Loads of scorpions, repeating ballistae and normal ballistae on a steep hill. The AI had 2 units of Urban Cohorts. The Urban Cohorts had to climb down a steep hill, then climb up to the steep hill where my artillery was. The result: a long journey where they were getting slaughtered and knocked miles backwards before even getting close to my men. One unit decided the only course of action to take was to form a Testudo and stand there and absorb the lethal bolts. ~:eek: Standing still in tight formation? Genius. I had them flung 40 feet back in the air within seconds.

The other Urban cohort engaged one of my ballista units, but the general was speared by a bolt and knocked at least 100 yards away, where he picked himself up, dusted down his clothes and rejoined the battle. Quite how he survived the initial bolt is beyond me, but anyway, having one of his units form the easiest possible formation to destroy with artillery is the stupidest thing I've seen in a long time.

[Shadar]

the stupidest thing i've ever seen the AI do was in RTR... Parthians decided to assault my stone-walled town... At this stage, i had nothing but two units of basic pikemen and 1 general's unit. they capture the walls with a unit of infantry, which they leave outside with the other infantry unit, and then the cavalry rush to the centre of my town. They decide to rush their horse archers to the FRONT of my phalanx troops (who were at the entrance of the plaza), they shoot a few volleys of arrows before rushing madly at the spears and piling dead bodies up. My rear got attacked by cataphracts who had sneaked behind, who charged my general's rear (they got massacred nonetheless). All was chaos. by then the much depleted pikemen had turned around and were attacking the cataphracts.. they broke around this time though and the cataphracts proceeded to massacre them all. although by this time the cataphracts were almost all dead anyways.

Result: 1 maximum size Parthian army lost ~90% of its horsemen. my losses - 2 levy pikemen and 1 general's unit (not replaceable, but still satisfactory to have worn down an attacking army so much i rolled over them when i took the town back...)

[Armandus]

1 - One time, im attacking a city, and the computer make to attack me. Well, i run, after my army be almost crushed,only left archers and cavalary, and only my general without bodyguards, and as always, i killed the enemy general and all of yours cavalary. He has left only 8 powerful phalanx, and i have started to killed one by one (he started to persuit me, and spread out). When stay some units, i take the walls (i have built 2 towers), and captured all gates. The computer stay out of your onw city, and trying to back inside. He died simple by the arrows and by the oil.

2 - When the computer attacks, i put the archers (or skimirshes) in front. The computer always send his cavalary and his archers(archers!!?) to pursuit my archers. Well, i retreat my archers between my phalanx (or any else footman), and the cavalary and archers come straight to death.

3 - its nothing more annoying than friendly fire. In the defense of a bridge, i have lost 180 mens, but 50 healed. The computer have killed 5, the rest was my archers. This was the extreme, but he does this always.

But, not everything was stupid. I really hate when he has archer cavalary and chariots archers. Normally, he wont attack me, just stay away and firing arrows.

[Megas Alexandros]

I understand that weak AI also origins out of low processor free-time.

However, can this silly thing somehow be avoided:

My best son was getting a sun-tan in Athens, with 2 Hoplita units. It was in the beginning. Anyway, a Greek army out of nowhere laid a siege on Athens. They had around 300 men in the army. No problem here - I thought - I ushered my 600 men army from Corinth and attacked the intruders, meanwhile the small force inside Athens also sallied. - what an easy victory we will have now, I thought -

Okay, the battle begins, and I am surprised that the little sallying force is commanded by the AI. Damn, I said. I was at the foot of the hill with the grand army, the Greeks halfway up, and the my son's little host at the top. And they marched down against the Greeks! :furious2: :jawdrop: I ordered all of my troops to rush up the hill in a forced march, but they could not do anything before my son was laying dead among the healp of his fellow guards. :bigcry: :shocked:

All right, one heir less. I performed a heroic victory btw, so Athens was free again. However, next round there came an other Greek army, with my other heir in Athens, and the grand army back in Corinth.... :furious3:
All I could do was to save the game and replay the siege-lifting battle until my only heir survived...

Is there any way to stop the besieged army to do this stupid thing in?

[Armandus]

In the new version 1.2, u can choice to your son not participate as reinforcement, so he cant die if he dont fight.

[Krauser]

The AI sent my General Cavarly head first into a sea of spears. Now, I make sure and pause a lot to see all aspects of the battle and make sure the AI is cooperating. I really wish it worked better.

1. AI making your units auto-attack even against their counter.
2. Units not following your orders. Walking instead of charging, just stopping completely, ignoring orders, etc. I understand some of this is intended but some of it just seems like poor AI.

[Taurus]

Stupid AI, I was playing as Macedon in the campaign and from the off the Greeks just kept sieging my cities with full stacks (or nearly full stacks) of Peltasts. :dizzy2:

[Krauser]

Stupid AI, I was playing as Macedon in the campaign and from the off the Greeks just kept sieging my cities with full stacks (or nearly full stacks) of Peltasts. :dizzy2:

1. In a quick battle the AI sent full stacks of cavalry into the gate where my phalanxes were waiting it was so funny. 50% of their force gone in a few seconds.

2. I find the AI really stupid at sea too. I blockade their port and one of their ships is just sitting there. They don't even care that I blockaded it.

3. Sometimes they siege my cities and start building up rams and stuff but just leave in a few turns. Other times they try to starve me out but on the last turn they just walk away. Then my armies come and crush them.

[pezhetairoi]

Weird AI. I like the part where I sally once I get besieged, and lure the entire enemy army towards me. Then I retreat back into my city but leave the gates open, and when the enter they find themselves in a deathtrap semicircle of hoplites/infantry/peasants that soon gets them a mass rout, especially when the bottleneck at the gate is fired upon by archers/peltasts. Awesome casualties because of mass stupidity.

[CMcMahon]

The fact that they're totally inept against skirmishing Rhodian slingers. I did a battle today as the Greeks against the Ptolemaics, with 600 on my side and two armies of about 650 on theirs.

I lined up my hoplites in semicircle with the ends facing out, with Illyrian peltasts on the ends, with skirmish off and guard on, and two groups of Cretan archers set the same way in the center, with my general behind as a reserve. I sent my two groups of Rhodian slingers off the right flank of the closer army, a bit away from each other, and my podromoi on the left flank, and took out their general with my slingers as he ran towards my skirmishing cavalry. I then nailed half of their units from behind with missile fire, routing several of them. By the time they reached my lines, only one unit of infantry got close enough to actually hit the line without being routed by the missile cav and slingers in the back, and the peltasts and archers behind my line. And the one unit? They hit dead center, right into my mass of Athenian hoplites. Routed.

So I had my out-of-ammo cavalry chase down all the routers, and sent my now bingo peltasts and archers, and my general, out to my left flank, where I figured (correctly) that the enemy would attempt to come around from behind. My slingers went after the second army's general, routing him and killing him. They then proceeded to devastate the army, splitting it in half, and ended up taking out three groups of Macedonian mercenaries before running out of ammo and sprinting back to my lines, where my general had led two groups of Greek mercenaries into a trap, with my archers and peltasts coming in to charge from behind. And, of course, my lines held.

End result: My units had about 40 casualties, while they had about 1100. Stupid tactics.

[Megas Alexandros]

In the new version 1.2, u can choice to your son not participate as reinforcement, so he cant die if he dont fight.

Where is this option? I got the latest 1.2 version, and found no buttons connected to the reinfrocements.

[Puzz3D]

You only get the checkbox for computer or manual controlled reinforcements if the total number of units on the field will exceed 20. I thought reinforcements were always manually controlled in v1.2 if the total number of units was going to be less than 20, but maybe it's different for sallying reinforcements.

Off the top of my head, the AI sallying and attacking you with one unit at a time is as dumb as a brick, but the breaking up of its spear line while trying to maneuver to attack UNEXPOSED flanks of your units as though the covering unit didn't exist is pretty bad as well. However, the suicide generals is a real killer to the AI.

[sunsmountain]

Without a doubt, sallying forth battles. Fought Numidia, a 20 stack army lay siege to Carthage. Had about 13 units in Carthage so i thought: Let's sally forth.

3 of which were archer auxilia (i was roman). Placed them on my Epic Stone Walls (level 5), and let the battle commence. They didnt have any siege equipment.

To my amazement, the AI rushed its entire army forward in order to get 1 kill on one of my archers, who even healed after the battle was over. Their entire army was decimated.

Now to be fair those were a lot of skirmish troops, so maybe its just that skirmish AI that's bugged, but still, i lmao ~D

[bubbanator]

As the Brutii, I was just finishing up my campaign against the Egyptians. They had 2 cities left. The campaign had been costly and what was left of my 2 full stack armies were going to take their last cities. Out of nowhere, this half stack of Egyptians with a full stack right next to them. Both of them were led by generals.

(this was my expiditionary campaign to finish them off early, i had histati and mercs)

I had spies in the 2 cities so i knew that both of their remaining family members were in the armies that was coming to kill me and ruin my hopes of crushing Egypt and saving the Selucids.

I set up the few men I had in a defensive cresent. The enemy full stack army was coming from the NE and the half stack from the north. Both armies were about 1/3 chariots so i thought i was screwed. But as they got near, both sent out a detachment to flank me on my left flank. I take a closer look and see that it is both of the generals and one other chariot group. I send all of my men, cav and inf, charging at them. Both of the generals were killed and the entire faction died with them.