View Full Version : Creative Assembly FAO GilJaysmith - Campaign AI.
Hi GilJaysmith,
Been getting some feedback from DD and Piper on campaign AI and it sounds like it might have some areas that could be improved upon to make the game that much better without too much effort.
I don't know if you are a developer or not, but if you could let us know if the AI will be accessible in text files like the unit stats etc.. or if there will be some other way for us to tweak it?
What I would really want is a full run down on the AI campaign rules that have been implemented but it's probably asking a bit much. I'll put it in a letter to Santa http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
My thinking behind this is that I know that alot of effort has been put into the battlefield AI and it does look like it's much better. But it will only really show up if the campaign AI makes sure the Battlefield AI has the right troops to use at the various stages of a campaign.
In STW we were able to mod the starting positions etc.. and give the AI a helping hand, but what I am really interested in is making sure the AI is competetive on the battlefield all the way through, particulalry on expert level.
Also was there any issues with performance when creating the campaign AI. i.e. code got a little long making the PC's chug to sort through all the rules and calc's?
I never thought STW was slow in this area so I expect that the code could be made much more involved, before performance becomes an issue.
Anything you can post will be greatly appreciated and I hope once the game is out we can all have some 'constructive' discussions on how to improve this area of the game.
One thing I intend to do when I get MTW is try to formulate how I decide what campaign moves to make, and see just how complicated it becomes. Would be great if we could create our own AI personalities.
GilJaysmith
08-16-2002, 14:30
Quote Originally posted by DrNo:
Hi GilJaysmith,
I don't know if you are a developer or not, but if you could let us know if the AI will be accessible in text files like the unit stats etc.. or if there will be some other way for us to tweak it?
[/QUOTE]
Greetings,
Your friendly neighbourhood Panda is indeed one of the developers. But I had next to nothing to do with the stratmap. Target knows infinitely more about that than me, but he didn't do the AI.
There are some stats you can tweak in the production spreadsheets which influence how AI factions decide which units to purchase. I don't know what else there is that's accessible. Sorry...
AI thinking speed: well, there are nearly three times as many AI factions thinking about what to do with four times as many buildings and five times as many units, on a map three times the size, with extra considerations to, er, consider, such as religion, trade and glorious achievements... so I suspect that in the later stages of the game you'll see it run a little more slowly than it does at the start! However, you see a very nice gallery of the faction leaders along the bottom of the screen at the end of each turn, each portrait lighting up as that faction finishes thinking, so it won't seem like very long.
Gil ~ CA
Ok, what is it with developers and Pandas anyway? Blizzard has a Panda fetish too especially their art guy, Samwise.
GilJaysmith, thanks for your reply, it's great to have info direct from developers.
I like the sound of the gallery of leaders and not heard that feature mentioned so far. Should help identify which factions are doing well by the length of time each one takes.
Onto the serious stuff of the campaign AI, from what you said it sounds promising and that we will be able to do more modding than in STW. I look forward to delving into it when I get the game.
Thanks again.
Hi Gil,
Would you know if the AI turns in MTW are simultaneous in the sense that the AI does not use info from other clans that have moved beforehand in the current turn? I assume it does use info from the human's move, who always goes first, just as it did in Shogun. In Shogun, the AI moves were made clan by clan from left to right across the map. I've never been able to tell if, for instance, Mori made its moves based on what Shimazu did on the current turn.
MagyarKhans Cham
08-16-2002, 20:22
i know our Khan was always charmed by the way the boardgame handle this
invest money (koku/florin) to get the initiative in the next turn
the more u invest the bigger your chance
GilJaysmith
08-16-2002, 22:09
Quote Originally posted by Puzz3D:
Would you know if the AI turns in MTW are simultaneous in the sense that the AI does not use info from other clans that have moved beforehand in the current turn? I assume it does use info from the human's move, who always goes first, just as it did in Shogun. In Shogun, the AI moves were made clan by clan from left to right across the map. I've never been able to tell if, for instance, Mori made its moves based on what Shimazu did on the current turn.
[/QUOTE]
Our stratmap AI guru is registering at the .org right now, but apparently there are problems with the server mail at the moment, so I'll post what he's just told me:
The AI factions base their decisions on the state of the board at the start of each turn - they're in exactly the same boat as you. There's no cheating.
He's also pretty sure that the same was true in MI, although maybe not in the original STW.
Gil ~ CA
Funky Phantom
08-16-2002, 22:25
Good to hear, i hated it in STW when you moved your troops into an un-manned enemy province only to have them reinforce it when you ended the turn, leaving you with a fight on your hands...
Well a big welcome to the 'stratmap AI guru'.
It will be great to pick your brains if their not too tired from all the work over the past months. The relief of MTW finally going gold must be imense for the whole team. You have only about 1-2 weeks though before the floodgates of public feedback are thrown wide open http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif.
Perhaps as a first post you could do a rough overview of the AI with problems, limitations etc.. and any ideas perhaps for patches. It will probably answer a whole host of questions that people would want to ask ( well me anyway http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif ).
Big thank you in advance for any info you post and welcome once again.
Wavesword
08-16-2002, 22:59
Good to hear fromyou GilJaysmith. I'd like to know if the AI cheats in any way on the strategy map (or indeed the tactical) in this version of TW, or is the difficulty solely determined by its relative intelligence? If the latter then one would expect the AI to take slightly less time over its moves on a lower level. I like the portrait idea btw.
MagyarKhans Cham
08-17-2002, 00:26
Gilyasmith ur close in being the most valuable 1st party (developers and accompagnies) visitors. keep up your visits and i am sure our Khan will sent u the Empires finest fermented horsemilk....
Thanks GilJaysmith. I didn't play WE/MI sp campaign enough to notice that change from STW. Although it makes the game more difficult for the AI, simultaneous moves removes what many players perceived as a blatant AI cheat in STW.
GilJaysmith
08-17-2002, 03:57
Quote Originally posted by Wavesword:
Good to hear fromyou GilJaysmith. I'd like to know if the AI cheats in any way on the strategy map (or indeed the tactical) in this version of TW
[/QUOTE]
Stratmap: don't know but doubt it.
Battlemap: there are a couple of minor cheats, but they're for gameplay purposes and you won't notice them. I won't tell you what they are. But believe me, without them the AI would act more 'realistically' but make the game less fun.
Certainly every major aspect of battles is above board and according to Hoyle. The AI suffers from line-of-sight problems, fatigue, morale, ammunition, inaccuracy, troop disordering, and so forth just like you do.
Gil ~ CA
Quote Originally posted by GilJaysmith:
Our stratmap AI guru is registering at the .org right now, but apparently there are problems with the server mail at the moment, [/QUOTE]
Has he managed to register yet?
What's his user name?
Papewaio
08-17-2002, 16:34
Quote Originally posted by Funky Phantom:
Good to hear, i hated it in STW when you moved your troops into an un-manned enemy province only to have them reinforce it when you ended the turn, leaving you with a fight on your hands...[/QUOTE]
If you look carefully at the AI's turn it juggles/rotates troops between provinces instead of just keeping them stationary in a single province. I notice it most when I see a Daimyo piece in two provinces at the same time just before the battle sequences start.
This means that if it is attacked the ones who are going out stay and the ones coming in reinforce... well at least that is what I think is happening.
Papewaio, I noticed that too and it works out great as long as you don't get attacked in multiple provinces at once.
i.e. the troop rotation fails.
So as a human player against the AI you can launch your main attack, but then order just single units to attack the other provinces, to stop the troop movement into the province you are attacking, but call off the attacks.
Wavesword
08-17-2002, 23:30
If the AI isn't using cheats, does this mean the difficulty level is solely determined by its intelligence?
eat cold steel
08-19-2002, 15:24
Hi all, gather round and hear what the so called "stratmap AI guru" has to say:
On modding:
Each faction has a default behaviour, easily edited in one of the text files, the AI will stay in that behaviour unless certain condidtions are met, eg when he is low on money he'll switch to "close to support limit" or when he's doing will he'll switch to the aggressive behaviour for his religion/culture.
You cannot add new behaviour nor change the rules of when the AI switches behaviour but you can edit what the AI decide to buy, and most other AI decisions depend on what troops and building you and your enemy have so you can fine tune how the AI acts.
On cheating:
There are far less cheating in MI than in STW, and MTW is based on the MI AI. The cheat where the AI move troops just in time to defend that annoyed people has been removed for MI and MTW. Again there are still cheats, but they are put in for gameplay reasons. The AI have an idea of how all other factions are doing even if they are not "visible" to them. AI works together to keep the larger factions in check. The strongest/richest faction gets minus in auto resolve battles (this also work for the player if you are not doing so well.) These are the things that help keep the game challenging in the later part of the game.
Other minor cheats include keeping all pieces on the move to minimise contact with enemy agents, and knowing where your king is even when they are not visible. The biggest advantage the AI get is the fact that a computer is an expert book keeper, it'll never forget to move a piece, change the tax, it always assign new missions to agents when they have finished that last one.
On difficulty:
Basically the AI behave the same on all level (except on easy,) on difficulty levels above normal, the AI get extra cash depending on how well the player is doing. Auto resolve always work in the favour of the AI to encourage you to command battle personally.
On myself:
I joinned CA over a year ago and worked on MI, I actually played STW myself before CA and was lucky enough to get to work on the addon pack for a game I enjoyed playing. I've probabbly played STW more than any other programmer in the company. There was a major AI overhual for MI, and MTW has many addition on top of that. I hope I have generated more interest in the game by posting here. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
AKA eat[Lead] ~ CA
Papewaio
08-19-2002, 16:21
Quote Originally posted by DrNo:
Papewaio, I noticed that too and it works out great as long as you don't get attacked in multiple provinces at once.
i.e. the troop rotation fails.
So as a human player against the AI you can launch your main attack, but then order just single units to attack the other provinces, to stop the troop movement into the province you are attacking, but call off the attacks.[/QUOTE]
http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif Which is what I do when I attack (except I normally send 3 to 5 units). My idea is to go through with only the attacks I still think I can win... normally there is a primary fighting force and flanking units in other provinces.
Papewaio
08-19-2002, 16:26
Quote Originally posted by eat cold steel:
On difficulty:
Basically the AI behave the same on all level (except on easy,) on difficulty levels above normal, the AI get extra cash depending on how well the player is doing. Auto resolve always work in the favour of the AI to encourage you to command battle personally.
On myself:
I joinned CA over a year ago and worked on MI, I actually played STW myself before CA and was lucky enough to get to work on the addon pack for a game I enjoyed playing. I've probabbly played STW more than any other programmer in the company. There was a major AI overhual for MI, and MTW has many addition on top of that. I hope I have generated more interest in the game by posting here. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
AKA eat[Lead] ~ CA[/QUOTE]
Nice to see a gamer getting inside the code. Thanks for the data.
Just a question in MI you get told if you are the richest clan. In MTW are you told if you are the richest clan? and if so is this before or after the AI bonus?
Big thanks for the info ECS.
The modding posibilities sound good, and I like the idea of the 3 different behaviours based on money level.
An area where the AI was very weak in STW was in piecing it's best individual units into good armies. All to often it would attack with very strong units mixed with very weak and depleted units and a poor general.
Has this been changed in MTW so it will sort it's troops and generals out and create very strong armies?
One thing DD said was that he saw the AI building Balistas in Wales and turning out Longbows elsewhere.
So how much attention does the AI play to the region bonuses when building units or buildings?
This leads to the other area I think that would make a big difference, is how the AI decides what building path to go down.
e.g. A human player would designate one province to build archers in, another to build spear troops, another to build cavalry etc..
And so for archer province the human player would only build the necessary buildings to be able to build the next level of archers/valour level. Once the province was building the best archers it could, you would not build anything else here and only ever build archers at any time.
Does the AI behave in this way, if not would you say it's possible to get it to do this within modding posibilites?
One last thing, were you limited by AI thinking time having to keep it down to a reasonably quick game turn, or would you say given development time you could make it think much more deeply without much slow down?
Oh and are you looking at doing any tweaks/changes to the AI for patches and can you post what they are or are they secret?
So many questions, questions, questions http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif
Thanks for visiting our forums ECS...I hope we see you more frequently in touch with the guys that play the games you make!
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Clan Kenchikuka (http://www.totalwar.org/kenchikuka)
evil is within us... http://www.totalwar.org/site/emomalta.gif
Toda Nebuchadnezzar
08-19-2002, 19:35
DN u ask so many questions. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif Like my cousin he is only 5.
He asked me how many people in the UK eat turkey on christmas day lunch... what exactly was i suposed to say. He thinks i know everything. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/rolleyes.gif
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Jaguara-Spoken like a TRUE SPAMMER Toda!
No Fear Legend.
Quote Originally posted by Toda Nebuchadnezzar:
DN u ask so many questions. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif Like my cousin he is only 5.
He asked me how many people in the UK eat turkey on christmas day lunch... what exactly was i suposed to say. He thinks i know everything. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/rolleyes.gif
[/QUOTE]
Well that's easy Toda, about 23,567,00. Now you can go back and tell him. He will grow up to be wise indeed if he follows in my footsteps of asking many questions http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
Couldn't finish this post without a question so here goes:
Over at FBZ Bandit posted this info:
Hideous Scars V&V gives
-5 Health
+3 Dread
-3 Valour
- His hideous scars make him terrible to behold, and have given him a matching temperament. He also is almost crippled by several old wounds, making combat difficult.
Rocket_boy answered intelligently with this:
I think that a characteristic such as this can be a virtue or a vice. This general is no longer as good on the battlefield as he was previously.
However put him in charge of an unruly province and his high dread score will aid in the prevention of uprisings.
Its all swings and roundabouts really.
So with my obvious inquisitive nature about the AI, I would like to know if the AI can make the decision to move this general from a front line army, and use it to simply garrison a province like a human player would do?
eat cold steel
08-19-2002, 22:08
> My idea is to go through with only the attacks I still think I can win
Not too often mind you, else your generals will pick up bad vices pretty quick.
> In MTW are you told if you are the richest clan?
Yes, the richest/strongest/most advanced clan is just a quick report on how everyone is doing. They come up every now and then to keep you up to date; where as the bonus are calculated per turn.
> AI building Balistas in Wales and turning out Longbows elsewhere.
The training and building decision are based on a score system, with many factor determining what the final results including: cost/discounts, enemy and own troop composition, AI personality, tech tree combination for high tech units, regional advantage, distance to front line etc. When the score have been calculated, we roll a dice and pick randomly weighted by their score. So there are situation where the AI decided it wanted an artillery and decided Wales is a good place to build it, then when he wants a missile troop, Wales is already taken up.
> how much attention does the AI play to the region bonuses.
Region bonuses counts an extra point of valour, same an any building upgrade, the AI will always pick the best place available for any unit type.
> how the AI decides what building path to go down.
This is one of the weak point of the budget decision, in STW there wasn't much focus at all, MI was much better - you see many more high tech units and agents (geishas and battlefield ninjas are buried deep in the tech tree,) but the rules were hard coded, this is not possible for MTW as units and buildings info are read in from a file. There are numbers in the files that help nudge the AI in the right direction but it's not perfect.
> one province to build archers in, another to build spear troops... Does the AI behave in this way
Yes in some ways. The number of troop types available is taken into account. If for example I can already build X kinds of troops here in this one region, the AI would not open new branches of the tech tree, instead he would improved the buildings here with upgrades, or start new production centres on another province. Again this is all done by randomly weighted by score of each option.
> were you limited by AI thinking time having to keep it down to a reasonably quick game turn
Nop, the AI can take as long as he wants for the turn. This is different to chess simulation where the longer the AI has, the further it looks into all possible futures and thus make the better move. In TW there are many options available, too many the expect a PC to predict the outcome of any move, instead it breaks down the game into lots of different parts and let each part decide what is best, with top level AI deciding an overall strategy. All the different parts interact together giving you a more interesting (is seeming random at some points as DD pointed out) opponent and some stone cold calculating AI of said chess programs. As for how long it takes, it is quick enough not to be annoying. It is quicker when there are less troops on the map, but it generally takes the same time regardless of how many factions is left on the map. We made the AI behave as well as possible first then took steps to speed it up.
> tweaks/changes to the AI for patches
The only thing I am not happy about with the AI is the lack of focus on the tech tree mentioned above, but we are not going to change anything major for the patch. The patch will just be bug fixes, unless you can find major flaws with the AI that you can exploit (which counts as bugs). Expect more changes for the add-on pack.
> move this general from a front line army
The dread ration will still only when he is a governor of the region, if this guy have good acumen as well, the AI would make him a governor. He is not a very good fighter, the AI may decide to kill him off by throwing him in battle, or by making him into garrison. Like I said, there are many many factors that needs to be taken into account.
AKA eat[Lead] ~ CA
Nice to know ur here.... http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif
Wavesword
08-19-2002, 23:36
Good to hear from you ECS. A modding question about the AI for any of our oracles. In its deployment and use of a unit that has had its stats modded, does the AI determine how to use the unit by type- as a spearman, an archer etc. or by stats? In other words if I were to alter a shock troop unit to a defensive unit would the AI use it differently?
turken00
08-19-2002, 23:53
One thing that really annoyed me with the Mongol Invasion add-on was that I could not buy it! lol, what I mean is that there were only two ways which I could purchase it. One way was to buy the Warlord Edition which contained both STW and MI. Since I already had a copy of STW it was useless to buy another just to get the expansion. The only other way that I was aware of was to order it from the internet. I couldn't do this either because I live in the United Arab Emirates and not many sites I know would ship it here, and even if they did, there would be tremendous shipping costs. So what I'm asking is, if there ever is an expansion to Medieval: Total War, would it be available in the same way that Mongol Invasion was? Or would it be sold separately in stores? I hope that it will be the latter because otherwise I don't think I can ever buy it.
KampfBar Ritter
08-20-2002, 07:51
Once again i hope all this info is saved somewhere and not pruned. Pretty good stuff, thank you for posting here.
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All my actions are dedicated to the memory of my great Lord Frederick I who one day knighted a poor woodsman and man-at-arms. Ich der Salut der mutig Barbarossa
eat cold steel
08-20-2002, 14:11
> shock troop unit to a defensive unit would the AI use it differently
Unit type like defender/attacker etc is included in the stats.
Yes some great stuff in this thread that should never be lost.
ECS, It all sounds very good, with so many extra features for the AI to take into account I wouldn't be suprised to find it struggle in 1 or 2 areas, in fact I would be amazed if it didn't.
People have been trying for years to program Chess comps to beat the best human players and still havn't managed it totally.
MTW is far more complicated!
Looking forward to playing MTW immensly and then having a mod of the AI to see what a mess I can make http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif.
You mention an expansion, is there an estimated date CA are aiming for on this?
Hi all,
This is absolutely brilliant, hats off to GilJaysmith and eat cold steel for sparing a little of their precious time to answer some very pertinent questions. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
Hats off to the very inquisitive DrNo who always asks very good questions in a polite and constructive manner.
I also have a very important question relating to one of the most debated aspects of the TW series, which also relates in part to AI behaviour....:
Throughout STW, MI and now it appears MTW to... why was the decision made to have tech improvements downgraded when the province was captured by another faction?
I can understand that religious and faction specific improvements would be destroyed, but why other generic improvements? In STW and MI this lead to tech regression rather than progression as the AI failed to recognise the importance of defending such valuable provinces with its warlike tendencies usually resulting in province ownership trading hands on a regular basis; each time reducing the tech level.
The outcome of this was the various surviving AI clans owning provinces with only simple improvements (standard archery/spear dojos) whilst the human player produced maximum upgraded units from various specialised provinces. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/frown.gif
The reason why i am concerned about this in MTW is becasue DD also mentioned the same concern in his preview when he found he was fighting mostly technologically inferior opponents in the late game...!
The human player, on the other hand, understands more clearly the value of such important technologically advanced provinces and will defend them accordingly, protecting them at all costs.
So,
1. Why was this kept in MTW?
2. How does the AI cope with the downgrading of improvements upon province capture?
Many thanks if you can spare a little more time to answer these questions. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
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=MizuDoc Otomo=
[This message has been edited by +DOC+ (edited 08-20-2002).]
eat cold steel
08-20-2002, 19:22
> why was tech improvements downgraded kept in MTW?
Gameplay reasons, firstly we want to stop the player stomping over the map in the later stages of the game, we wanted to stop the situration where the player concentrate on just trainning troops and let the enemy AI build buildings and stealing them. This also simulate the looting and pillaging that goes on in those times. This is not somthing that was under the control of the king.
> How does the AI cope with the downgrading of improvements upon province capture?
Well apparaently not well enough. I'll do something about it for the patch.
Quote Originally posted by eat cold steel:
> why was tech improvements downgraded kept in MTW?
Gameplay reasons, firstly we want to stop the player stomping over the map in the later stages of the game, we wanted to stop the situration where the player concentrate on just trainning troops and let the enemy AI build buildings and stealing them. This also simulate the looting and pillaging that goes on in those times. This is not somthing that was under the control of the king.
> How does the AI cope with the downgrading of improvements upon province capture?
Well apparaently not well enough. I'll do something about it for the patch.[/QUOTE]
Many thanks for answsering. In reply, i agree with your first answer in that it could become an exploit for the human player to wait until the AI builds up and then just acquire the AI's hard-earned holdings. However, for factions not directly involved with the human this wouldn't necessarily be the case. I guess neither is absolutely ideal. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
I'm also very encouraged to hear that the issue that DD raised is being listened to by the developers and that you'll address it in a patch.
http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
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=MizuDoc Otomo=
Quote Originally posted by eat cold steel:
>
> How does the AI cope with the downgrading of improvements upon province capture?
Well apparaently not well enough. I'll do something about it for the patch.[/QUOTE]
Excellent, but could this be something tweaked by us as well?
I guess you have implemented a system whereby each province has a defense score based on it's current buildings, enemy threat levels, complicted stuff, etc.. and then the AI spreads it's troops accordingly.
So each building has a a defense score which we could then modify to increase likelyhood of AI defending higher tech buildings.
Is it something like this?
Also are there any plans for CA to release a document explaining all things that can be modded by us in txt files etc.. or are you going to leave us to find out what damage we can do?
I'm thinking about the unit stats file in particular as there are many columns in there which may or may not be used. And you posted this earlier:
> shock troop unit to a defensive unit would the AI use it differently
Unit type like defender/attacker etc is included in the stats.
eat cold steel
08-21-2002, 15:44
> but could this be something tweaked by us as well?
Nop, when and where to attack, what troops are used to attack and defend, which region is more important are all calcuation done internally, you guys will not have access to those. All you can tweak is the budget decision, but many aspect of the AI base his calculation on the make up of the his own and enemy troops, and the desirability of regions (buildings, income, trading possibilties.) And those you can mess with.
> any plans for CA to release a document
Plans? Documents? What are those? If there are anything you are not sure of just ask. Yes there are columns that are not used anymore, but most have an comments to help you decode them.
With respect to the destruction of improvements in captured provinces, I'd go for a "cheat" where the destruction continues when humans capture a province (to keep us from exploiting them), but less or no destruction when an AI faction takes a province from another AI faction. That would prevent the impoverishment of the AI's, keep the human from exploiting them, but something that would mostly be hidden - I don't mind cheats like that.
Grifman
Azmogeddon
08-21-2002, 16:39
I'll second Grifman's idea as worth considering, but what about reducing or removing the downgrade on re-taking a province that has been yours in the past.
This would fit in with realism as troops would be less likely to pillage an area they consider to be part of their country, and would have less effect on the player than on AI's continously fighting back and forth.
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Azmo
[long-time lurker]
the Count of Flanders
08-21-2002, 17:20
What really bugged me in STW was that Takeda was a really useless clan in the game if you don't play them yourself: they keep building masses of really expensive troops (ie cavalry) which can be really easily killed by very cheap and basic troops (ie yaris). Same happened for Uesegi, but that was less worse: lotsa archers (not so expensive) so I build yari cav (expensive).
Do factions still build lots of their specialist troops?
Konnichiwa,
The real pain for Takeda is that it is split. The sengoku jidai campaign is sad as a game and feels also quite unrealistic.
The 1550 campaign looks much better: more realistic starting positions, better clanspecialisation, better starting development (only 1 or 2 provinces).
The cheat .matteosartori. reveils a very interesting development for all clans.
This is just a personal opinion of course.
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Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi
http://www.takiyama.cjb.net
DarknScaly
08-21-2002, 19:07
The AI has a fasciantion with building ballista's (in particular) and also tends to hold onto to out-dated units (especially peasants) where it probably should have gotten rid of them.
This is particularly noticeable where a faction is being pressed back into reduced territory and obvious when a faction has exhausted it finances. A "player" would disband the crappier "old and useless" units (especially the 13 odd peasant units) to free up some income and allow for the building of more effective units and even buildings.
I think its this element of managing its own "support costs" that the AI really cannot do when not expanding its empire. This is often exacerbated by normal player actions - its often uneccesary toe ven kill peasant hordes as they are routed off the battles so easily - so when pressuring AI factions their best units tend to get killed and captured and the peasants often survive - which results in fewer AI provinces being garrisoned by "realtively" larger numbers of peasants as you go through..indeed the player can force the AI into this situation by allowing peasants to escape and not capturing them.
Ironically this is one of the reasons why I am not so sure that the AI does actually chose its attacking units "that badly" as I first imagined (Where it doesnt attack with its best troops first wherever it has more than 16 units available) - otherwise all such battles would end wwth a "peasant wave" at the end who would almost inevitably loose or not even make it onto the map due to poor morale. (So in a way its a work around?)... prooblem still exists though.
Is there anyway to force the AI into checking the proportion of its amry that is low-tech and getting it to disband units in appropriate circumstances?
Quote Originally posted by Azmogeddon:
I'll second Grifman's idea as worth considering, but what about reducing or removing the downgrade on re-taking a province that has been yours in the past.
This would fit in with realism as troops would be less likely to pillage an area they consider to be part of their country, and would have less effect on the player than on AI's continously fighting back and forth.
[/QUOTE]
Well I wouldn't mind anything that made the campaign and hence the battles harder, I even didn't mind the Hojo horde so much.
The downgrading of buildings isn't just about what damage your troops would do on capturing the province but also what damage the losing troops would do on leaving, but I would prefer no downgrading at all.
I think even manually levelling buildings is a bad thing.
Something I would do with STW, send a raiding party through the AI lines destroying everything on my way, and just letting each province be recaptured minus it's buildings http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif. A nice neat way to beat the Hojo horde.
It should only be a possible tatic if the AI can and does do it.
I would really like to see enemy building destruction being special missions for Assassins etc.. and there is no other way for buildings to be destroyed, even your own, unless they are from opposing religion. Think of it as population resistance to you doing so.
In fact how about simply having a switchable option to suit individual preferences?
[This message has been edited by DrNo (edited 08-21-2002).]
DnS, to get rid of unwanted peasent units etc..I would actually send them into battle for fun to see what damage I could do to the AI rather than disbanding them.
Sometimes it worked out quite well.
On occasion you can amass 16 units of Ashi and actually have the AI retreat with an army that would trash your Ashi's because it sees the numbers and runs.
Also a bit disappointing when your looking forward to a right good scrap with inferior troops.
DarknScaly
08-21-2002, 21:23
I dont, as the player, have the problem of what to do with them - they can often be used as garrison troops for one - but the AI doesnt seem to do this very well (again part of the problem).
I used to use them as Garrison troops too, but the upkeep is a pain as you mentioned before.So I used the mass Shinobi strategy, works wonders.
Interesting to see what becomes best unit for keeping popularity up in MTW.
Wavesword
08-21-2002, 23:27
Question: After the turn is over and the cycle of battles begin, is there an option to save the game inbetween battles? I used to get frustrated when I had 6 big battles and had to fight all of them (never ever auto resolve!) at once. Soooo tiring! This goes triple for when the timer is off.
No Wavesword, according to DD/D&S, we can't and it hurts for all the reasons you mentioned.
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