View Full Version : AI needs to recruit better unnits
Taiwan Legion
03-06-2007, 13:52
All I see are militias and feudal knights.
[shameless mod promotion]Taken from my LTC mod:
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https://img159.imageshack.us/img159/8510/spain1ej0.jpg[/shameless mod promotion]
HoreTore
03-06-2007, 14:46
Actually, I've seen lots of armies looking like that in my campaigns as of late, lusted.
If you take the campaign just a bit slower, and fight more battles, then you'll get much better armies from the AI.
It seems the problem is that they don't disband and upgrade like a human. If you destroy their cheap armies, but DON'T take their castles, then they will return with a vastly improved army. When I last conquered spain, their armies was made mostly about 15 swordsmen(mostly DFK) and 5 or so crusader knights(the generic one and santiago).
I'm also having some tough fights in my turkish campaign with a crusade called on constantinople. The polish one was particularly nasty(god I hate polish nobles!!), lost near 40% of my army in that battle(odds of 2:1 in my favour), and I wasn't able to destroy them before they withdrew... They'll come back, those buggers...
Furious Mental
03-06-2007, 15:20
I like to play long campaigns at one turn a year (though I shifted the starting date a bit). I'm about 180 years into one and my enemies are using pretty good unit line ups- HRE: dismounted feudal knights, forlorn hope, reiters, pavise crossbowmen, gothic knights, lots of mercenaries of various sorts; England: heavy billmen, armoured swordsmen, dismounted English knights, retinue longbowmen, demi-lancers; Milan: broken lances (mounted and dismounted), pikemen, genoese crossbow militia (no castle units because they have no castles). So I'm not complaining. If you blitz the AI early it will always field pathetic armies. If you want to face the best early on then all I can suggest is that you modify the descr_strat files to give the AI factions all the best buildings and zillions of florins at the very beginning.
If you blitz the AI early it will always field pathetic armies. If you want to face the best early on then all I can suggest is that you modify the descr_strat files to give the AI factions all the best buildings and zillions of florins at the very beginning.
This is a long term problem with the TW series really. Aggression is the way to beat and dominate the games, it always has been. that said, it makes sense for the AI to build as much as it can for the cheapest florin to combat the human onslaught.
Its a cycle thats hard to break given the nature of the game. I do agree, if you dont blitz the Ai and let them get up and running somewhat they can field decent armies. Still in my 3 go arounds thus far with the game I havent seen an army like the one posted by Lusted.
However the Polish do seem to field an impressive line up early on.
Furious Mental
03-06-2007, 15:47
In my opinion the game should really come with late game starting point rather than forcing us to make our own.
LOl @ Lusted's pics because I literally have never seen a lot of those units.
Guess that proves the point.
I don't think there's much room for debate about this one. The basic AI drastically overestimates its ability to compete with crappy troops. Sadly, it seems the AI equates "Very Hard" with ineffectual attacks that leave the cupboad bare for real defense.
"Very Hard" (as it seems many of us play the game with our Human Intelligance) would probably involve more lying back and defending cities with high quality troops, and sending out an occasional offensive stack with troop quality that would give a Mongol kahnzada envy.
Sometimes the AI manages to mix in 5 or 6 feudal knights with a stack of spear militia and these battles are the best ones. I fought one last night where after I took Bern the AI HRE sent a full stack with the Emperor, 5 or 6 DFK's, a couple other heavy cav, and some Trebs and 8 or 9 militia. The AI ranked itself a 3-to-1 favorite (versus my Byz mostly Horse archer army) but after a few anxious moments where I might have actually lost I ended up crushing this army with 300 or so lost. Largely because I managed to kill his general and chain rout his militia at the critical time.
Really I think the issue is most of us recognize this is as a M2TW AI high point. If it only it was always that good!
But after this HRE will crumple like a tin can. There is nothing between me and his lands and women.
HoreTore
03-06-2007, 20:01
But after this HRE will crumple like a tin can. There is nothing between me and his lands and women.
That playing style is why you wont see any good AI armies. If you don't take it slow, the AI can't keep up with you.
Not that I'm criticizing you, it's just how the AI works. However, as a fix, I'm very interested in seeing how the AI will respond if you up every building in every province by a couple of levels... They *should* respond by ignoring the low-end units.
That playing style is why you wont see any good AI armies. If you don't take it slow, the AI can't keep up with you.
Not that I'm criticizing you, it's just how the AI works. However, as a fix, I'm very interested in seeing how the AI will respond if you up every building in every province by a couple of levels... They *should* respond by ignoring the low-end units.
I agree with horetore here that given the starting circumstance for the AI they cant produce quality troops right off. Number 1 is the land grab so along with you they are running to grab open provinces, number 2 the Ai dosent seem to specialize cities and castles and goes for a more balanced approach.
The latter item cripples them against an aggressive human who has specialized his troop output and maximized his income.
That playing style is why you wont see any good AI armies. If you don't take it slow, the AI can't keep up with you.
Not that I'm criticizing you, it's just how the AI works. However, as a fix, I'm very interested in seeing how the AI will respond if you up every building in every province by a couple of levels... They *should* respond by ignoring the low-end units.
*slaps head*
My problem seems to be I'm trying to win!
Maybe Lusted could fix it so I can gift my best troops to my enemies!
Chaos Cornelius lucius
03-06-2007, 21:32
From my experience I would agree that not going on an all out aggressive campaign right from the start, gives the AI time to field stronger armies. With the games that I have played where I have tried to take a slow build approach, I have come up against some very strong AI armies. The ones that spring to mind are when I was playing as Spain, and after a while securing the Iberian peninsular I started to expand north and repeatedly came up against 'classic' english medieval armies ie: retinue longbows, lots of armoured swords, foot knights and heavy bills with some feudal knights thrown in on top.
I think it may also have to do with the amount of wars the AI faction is involved in as well. If they are fighting lots of battles and taking casualties, they replace there losses with stronger units.
(I agree about the Polish Nobles, those damn things are a royal pain in the butt. I found blitzing them with 3 or 4 units of fast HA worked, but took a lot of casualties in the process)
If you play LTC 2.1 on VH/VH, and dont put generals in command of your armies (makes the battles hard enough, try it), and wait 5 turns at the beginning of the game before doing ANYTHING, you will not be able to blitz very easily. At least in my experience.
HoreTore
03-06-2007, 21:54
Powergamers are the bane of every game...
There's a very simple answer to the rush issue. The game features you, against a whole slew of other factions, right? The best solution then is for the AI to be better at opportunistically attacking the player. If the player starts blitzing like crazy, other AI factions could jump on that and simply beat the player down - blitzing in general means you are overextended and ill-prepared for a war with numerous aggressors on multiple fronts. If for instance you're playing France, and begin steam-rolling Milan, then maybe the HRE, Spain, and England should all come knocking on your door. It would help a lot here if the AI's opportunistic attacks could be seaborne and actually threatening at the same time. For instance if Spain and Portugal landed 3/4 or full stack armies when they invaded by sea, we'd all be much more scared to leave any provinces too lightly guarded (something typically caused by blitzing). So I guess overall what I'm saying is that blitzing typically means you've left multiple weak points in your faction's holdings in order to flood troops to the front lines, and all that should be necessary to eradicate the tactic is for the AI to better recognize where those weak points are, and exploit them quickly and brutally. If expanding too quickly meant the AI would land large stacks behind your front lines and carve up the entire interior part of your empire where all the good economic development is, then suddenly blitzing wouldn't look like a winning tactic at all.
Maybe Lusted could fix it so I can gift my best troops to my enemies!
Funny.
With my mod i say to people that a blitzing play style does not provide the best challenge. As soon as you start a war with the ai it diverts most its cash into troop production and not buildings, so if you starts wars from the off and conquer nations quickly, your enver giving the ai a chance to build up.
There's a very simple answer to the rush issue. The game features you, against a whole slew of other factions, right? The best solution then is for the AI to be better at opportunistically attacking the player. If the player starts blitzing like crazy, other AI factions could jump on that and simply beat the player down - blitzing in general means you are overextended and ill-prepared for a war with numerous aggressors on multiple fronts. If for instance you're playing France, and begin steam-rolling Milan, then maybe the HRE, Spain, and England should all come knocking on your door. It would help a lot here if the AI's opportunistic attacks could be seaborne and actually threatening at the same time. For instance if Spain and Portugal landed 3/4 or full stack armies when they invaded by sea, we'd all be much more scared to leave any provinces too lightly guarded (something typically caused by blitzing). So I guess overall what I'm saying is that blitzing typically means you've left multiple weak points in your faction's holdings in order to flood troops to the front lines, and all that should be necessary to eradicate the tactic is for the AI to better recognize where those weak points are, and exploit them quickly and brutally. If expanding too quickly meant the AI would land large stacks behind your front lines and carve up the entire interior part of your empire where all the good economic development is, then suddenly blitzing wouldn't look like a winning tactic at all.
I wouldn't describe myself as a blitzer, more of a turtler. But when I do choose to go to war with another faction or go on the offensive, I tend to mass assault several cities at a time, blitzkrieg style. The upshot of this, and why I love playing as Britain, is that I always prefer to work from a corner or defensible location and work my way outward in a controlled directed fashion.
So what's the surprise? Well I was at peace with most factions except France whom I'd taken several cities as a beachhead, Scotland whom I'd eliminated early on, and the HRE who really really wanted Antwerp and kept wandering onto my land. After building up several good stacks and getting my Pope-o-meter up to 10 crosses, I blitz the hell out of France's 3 lower cities, Paris and the other two I forget. Take them with ease, get the Pope's favor back up to 10 next turn, so I'm happy. I get ready to move on again, and HOLY CRAP! Denmark decides to land 2 full stacks right on my back porch in Northumbria! That turn I had to scramble big time, I sent one of my forward stacks all the way back home (they made it because I mod the movement points big time upward, I think the vanilla stinks hardcore) and queue up all the best, most powerful units I can from all of the mainland English cities. The Danes end up sieging with one stack next turn, and I made it back and took them out next turn. Ended up leaving Northumbria full of the best Militia units I could make just in case, but they never came back as I suspect that loss had cost them big time.
Point being that I was pleasantly surprised that the AI did this, it caught me completely off guard. I never would have expected this in the previous TW games.
Another fundamental problem with the AI is its bad use of generals. It doesnt put generals in all its armies, and the general has a huge effect on the outcome of the battle, besides his bodyguards are super-warriors. For a big challenge in the form of a hard-and-fast rule that isnt in a gray area like blitzing, dont put generals in your armies. And make sure you comment out the line in your descr strat that says: rebelling armies true or somesuch.
Meh, I tend to run around most of the time without generals at the heads of my army stacks. Used to try and put 2, no more no less, in each stack in RTW and that worked great. If you wanted to rotate to give one more experience just separate the one guy out into another stack and have him come in as a reinforcement under your control. In M2TW I tend to ferret my generals away on boats to avoid the overpowered Inquisitorial boot ( :grin: to anyone who gets this reference), just got tired of losing them hand over fist.
HoreTore
03-07-2007, 01:35
Hmmm...I think I can number the generals I have lost to inquisitions post-patch on one hand...
I have fixed the ReligionStarter(change characters general to family) trait though, that might be it?
Even 5ish is too many in my view, ended up resorting to the "box of 8" trick to kill them. It's incredibly cheap and lame, but it gets the job done where my gimpy assassins can't kill their way out of a wet paper bag. I guess I justify the use of "box of 8" to myself by imagining that the army in question finds the individual and decides to execute them... /shrug
HoreTore
03-07-2007, 02:21
That would be 5 generals from all of the campaigns I have played since the patch came out...
I've lost more diplomats to bribery than generals to the inquisition.
TevashSzat
03-07-2007, 03:48
Another reason for the poor recruitment is that the ai is simply too poor to build the higher level upgrades for buildings and notice that most militia and feudal knights come from walls. This is particularly noticable when i take a large ai city like antioch or iconmium and is severely dissapointed by the lack of any good buildings in it
reclaimer
03-07-2007, 04:45
Even if you don't blitz, they can still send stupid armies at you. Milan once attacked one of my cities with 4 units of catapults and 12 units of Genoese Crossbowmen/Militia and it was about 50 turns into the game, I had lots of calvary so I easily won the battle... lol.
Nebuchadnezzar
03-07-2007, 05:18
Even if you don't blitz, they can still send stupid armies at you. Milan once attacked one of my cities with 4 units of catapults and 12 units of Genoese Crossbowmen/Militia and it was about 50 turns into the game, I had lots of calvary so I easily won the battle... lol.
Pardon me but I don't consider that as a stupid army. As Milan this is a good basic army and in my current campaign as Milan I always use 6-8 units of Genoese Crossbow Militia even when fighting Mongols. They are a good economical unit thats available in almost all cities and give quite a big punch. Maybe you're spamming cav which is more of an exploit and will always win against anything in the game in its current state.
Besides 50 turns is still early game.
I never blitz and more often than not I see the AI with good army composition. The game AI just can't cope with blitzing or cav spamming or any number of other exploits.
Heh, having played Milan I thought that army looked pretty decent too. They get GOOD militia. But the artillery is another matter. Darned AI loves those silly things and doesn't use them worth drek in the field. Don't think I've taken a casualty to a cat yet. I just send the cav in at the run to run off the crews. :smash:
The AI problem with that army is probably that it left all the missile units on skirmish. That's not a good idea with those guys. They do just fine in melee, and they get off a nice shot at point blank if they aren't skirmishing often as not. And that one HURTS.
Of course, with a lot of cav coming at you it's pretty hard not to get swarmed. :)
SnowlyWhite
03-07-2007, 06:00
foz - what you're saying would be true if the ai would be even remotely able to conduct a siege; even when I did poor blitz... when he got his shot at my cities, he lost dramatically.
and the issue with his missile troops is that he doesn't bother to support them at all.
reclaimer
03-07-2007, 07:28
Pardon me but I don't consider that as a stupid army. As Milan this is a good basic army and in my current campaign as Milan I always use 6-8 units of Genoese Crossbow Militia even when fighting Mongols. They are a good economical unit thats available in almost all cities and give quite a big punch. Maybe you're spamming cav which is more of an exploit and will always win against anything in the game in its current state.
Besides 50 turns is still early game.
I never blitz and more often than not I see the AI with good army composition. The game AI just can't cope with blitzing or cav spamming or any number of other exploits.
You're right, it's not really a stupid army... It is risky to use too much of the same unit type, though. It was pretty surprising to see them attacking a city with just siege weapons and crossbow militia as those units need support from infantry and spearmen, which is why I thought it was stupid.
foz - what you're saying would be true if the ai would be even remotely able to conduct a siege; even when I did poor blitz... when he got his shot at my cities, he lost dramatically.
Yeah. The AI isn't really in a position that it can do this at the moment - I was just suggesting that with a bit of work, this would probably become an easy and effective deterrent to mad rushing by players. You wouldn't think it should be too hard to make the AI play sieges a bit better. After all, what goes into planning a siege really? A few tricks can come into play, but largely just beating the door in and running for the square is pretty decent. The AI's only real fault that I've seen there is that it sits on its laurels too much and will commonly ignore threats while doing so. Outside of that it doesn't show any real tactical genius in assaulting cities, but one doesn't have to - making a hole and rushing through it is what most of us probably do anyway, since fighting on the walls often seems to degenerate into a bloodbath. If I've managed to miss anything truly horrible that the AI does in assaults, let me know - I stay pretty well garrisoned so I'm not defending from attacks very often.
If I've managed to miss anything truly horrible that the AI does in assaults, let me know - I stay pretty well garrisoned so I'm not defending from attacks very often.
I tend to have minimal garrisons and have often had to defend. I usually lose. The siege AI is pretty decent, IMO. I've learnt from it. It's not a matter of just making a hole and barrelling through - the AI is cleverer than that. For example, it will usually bring artillery (usually too slow for me) and/or multiple siege machines, so the loss of any one to fire arrows is not a big deal (redundancy - a neat idea). With artillery, it expends all its ammo breaking down multiple holes in the wall (and then taking down adjacent towers) before rushing in. With my depleted garrisons, I can plug a few holes but not all and soon things fall apart.
I've also not noticed a big problem with the AI picking bad army compositions, although "all crossbowmen" Milanese armies are an exception.
My problem with the AI is that it lacks a "killer instinct". It should mass an enormous multi-stack army and just barrel through your settlements[1]. It tends to dither, so if one settlement falls, it's no big deal - you have time to organise an expedition to recapture it; it's not the start of a proper invasion.
[1]That's what the AI does in games like Homm3 and Civ4.
I tend to have minimal garrisons and have often had to defend. I usually lose. The siege AI is pretty decent, IMO. I've learnt from it. It's not a matter of just making a hole and barrelling through - the AI is cleverer than that. For example, it will usually bring artillery (usually too slow for me) and/or multiple siege machines, so the loss of any one to fire arrows is not a big deal (redundancy - a neat idea). With artillery, it expends all its ammo breaking down multiple holes in the wall (and then taking down adjacent towers) before rushing in. With my depleted garrisons, I can plug a few holes but not all and soon things fall apart.
Agreed here. Often have 4 holes in the walls and few if any in-range towers by the time the AI is done working things over with arty. And then they often come to batter the gate down TOO while you're trying to plug holes in the walls. You prolly need at least 6 units to have any chance of getting the job done. I didn't think the assault AI was bad either, but I wanted to leave chance to explore the issue since some people seem to think it's awful.
HoreTore
03-08-2007, 13:43
My problem with the AI is that it lacks a "killer instinct". It should mass an enormous multi-stack army and just barrel through your settlements[1]. It tends to dither, so if one settlement falls, it's no big deal - you have time to organise an expedition to recapture it; it's not the start of a proper invasion.
[1]That's what the AI does in games like Homm3 and Civ4.
Having an AI with the extreme killer instinct of the Civ4 AI at the higher levels, now THAT would be a challenge! Emperor diff AI rushes are simply insane. And the barbarians(like rebels in TW) are a huge threat as well if you don't pump up armies right from the start... For those unfamiliar with civ4, what the AI does is usually sending about a stack of troops a higher level than yours before you've started building an army, so that they both outnumber you, and out-tech you...which means you die.
Funny.
With my mod i say to people that a blitzing play style does not provide the best challenge. As soon as you start a war with the ai it diverts most its cash into troop production and not buildings, so if you starts wars from the off and conquer nations quickly, your enver giving the ai a chance to build up.
I canned my vanilla danish game last night and applied your mod. I started as the Danish mainly because I wanted to see what the differences will be. I can say absolutely that the AI is harder because it gets better units. I have a rebel army running around in sweden right now that I dont have the troops to beat.
I am at the stage now where I was going to expand into the flanders area, but for game play purposes I cant allow a rebel army to move around my lands (although I dont think they will attack they havent yet).
My point with this post is to let those who are intrested know that Lusted mod the AI recruits better units, as the title of the thread asks for.
For those unfamiliar with civ4, what the AI does is usually sending about a stack of troops a higher level than yours before you've started building an army, so that they both outnumber you, and out-tech you...which means you die.
Reading the Civfanatics boards, there is a comment attributed to the Civ4 devs that they could have made the AI harder, but then it would not have been as much fun for the human. It is pretty horrible, seeing those lumbering hordes of AI troops suddenly appear next to your cities - after having marched half way around the wall just to visit you. On Prince, I can usually survive because they lack enough siege engines, but I can imagine tweaking the AI just a little more would allow them to roll over me. I don't want to play higher difficulty levels as - like the devs said - I don't think it would be much fun for me (I like to turtle).
Shogun could do a similar thing - those Hojo hordes in the east could just crush your beautifully balanced veteran armies from the west. Quantity has a quality all of its own.
HoreTore
03-08-2007, 15:05
Reading the Civfanatics boards, there is a comment attributed to the Civ4 devs that they could have made the AI harder, but then it would not have been as much fun for the human. It is pretty horrible, seeing those lumbering hordes of AI troops suddenly appear next to your cities - after having marched half way around the wall just to visit you. On Prince, I can usually survive because they lack enough siege engines, but I can imagine tweaking the AI just a little more would allow them to roll over me. I don't want to play higher difficulty levels as - like the devs said - I don't think it would be much fun for me (I like to turtle).
Shogun could do a similar thing - those Hojo hordes in the east could just crush your beautifully balanced veteran armies from the west. Quantity has a quality all of its own.
Haven't played it in half a year or so, but when I did, I had just "mastered" the monarch level, and was going up to emperor... At those levels, you have to do virtually everything right, or else you will get stomped to death very very quickly. And it's not just the beginning that's hard, even when you reach the point were you dominate, you still have to be VERY careful, a badly planned attack can utterly cripple you and allow the AI to stomp you to death...
BTW, the reason why the civ AI is so hard, isn't just because it's aggressive, it's because it's combined with HUGE bonuses to the AI faction(ie. "ai cheating"). It still doesn't exploit resources like a human does on the higher levels and still does stupid stuff, but they've got enough bonuses to cover for it. And it's not really any smarter either, the higher the difficulty, the more aggresive they get, which a lot of people here complain about. But it's actually needed to make the game harder, the AI factions have to ally against you to make it hard.
Off topic, I really recommend giving the higher diffs a shot, econ21. It's very enjoyable, even though you're very likely to be completely smashed a long time before you begin to survive, as the tactics you are using at one level won't work on the level above...
TevashSzat
03-09-2007, 01:00
Horetore is right, I only have Civ 3 but I remember at higher difficulty ratings, you might only start off with a settler and a worker, but the ai can start with multiple settlers and workers along with warriors too
Chaos Cornelius lucius
03-09-2007, 01:37
X-Deathfire, save some money and get a Civ 4 and the warlords expansion. It knocks Civ 3 into a cocked hat, much, much better.
Maybe CA should give the AI more bonuses on harder levels on MTW2. I can play that at VH/VH and win the game relatively easily 9 times out of 10, but with civ I usually need a good start (nice city sites, resources etc), to be able to have a chance on monarch and above levels.
Didi'nt think there were so many civ players on this forum:beam:
HoreTore
03-09-2007, 01:41
Didi'nt think there were so many civ players on this forum:beam:
Actually, the whole reason why I ever played civ in the first place, was because player1 talked so much about it on the RTW boards here :laugh4:
But I guess the games appeal to much of the same players...
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