Difficulty Levels

[Cadarn]

Question: do the diffculty levels only relate to the AI's combat performance on the battlefield or does it improve the AI factions' strategy on the campaign map ?

And also are these improvements "cheats" (ie production/combat modifiers) or just better tactics and strategies.

Thanks in advance.

[Spino]

http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum7/HTML/002324.html

Here's what longjohn2 had to say on the matter...

Quote I can't comment on the strat map.
On the battle map, the a.i. gets progressively better up to hard level. On expert level, the only behaviour difference I can think of, is that it gets a bit more leeway to camp near the map edge if a suitable position is available.

The combat strength of the a.i. units is affected by the difficulty level.
On easy its combat effectiveness is reduced by 30-40% (can't remember the exact figure).
On hard it's increased by 10-15%, and on experct its 30%. 30% being around 75% of the increase you'd get from 1 valour upgrade.
Additionally it gets +4 morale on expert, and the player gets +4 on easy.[/QUOTE]




[This message has been edited by Spino (edited 10-03-2002).]

[Inferno]

In broad terms, that means that if you beat the campaign on Hard, you can beat the programmer's best AI.

If you can beat it on Expert, you've beaten the best AI with an unlevel playing field.

------------------
It's getting warm in here...that must be one hell of an INFERNO!

[sidhe]

Well I think I am going back to hard! I'm not giving those guys any free upgrades.. Sheesh!

[Bob the Insane]

I agree with sidhe, it always annoys me when a harder difficulty level in a game just makes the opponents 'superhuman' rather than 'smarter'...

I am going to start playing on hard rather than expert now...

[maroule]

c'mon guys,
of course the computer gets a morale unfair advanatage

but you get the unfair advantage of having a brain. Just picture this : on expert I win 95% of battles BUT if the computer made direct attacks, simple rushes, I would loose at least half of them. More often than not, it sends its general first, which gets killed, and then the multiple waves dance in front of my pavise arb. If it pulled the general behind his lines and charged with most of his units(and since I'm always outnumbered in quantity and quality), I'd get my ass quicked all the time. I don't and I find that frustrating, again not because of masochism, but because when you win without danger, you triumph without glory.

[Cadarn]

Thanks for the info all.

Perhaps I'm a strategic genius after all http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

Don't think I'll play on expert though, I want to play the game as designed not with the scales tipped heavily away from you...sort of like Deity mode in Civ3.

[Cadarn]

Maroule, perhaps the patch will fix the suicidal nature of the AI generals ?

Oh, and when will hardened wargame (note, not RTS) veterans get co-opted onto the design teams for these games ?

Slightly off topic, is there a parameter controlling the expansionism/aggressiveness of the factions ? While I enjoy being able to fight one war at a time it would be very historically accurate for some factions to notice my plans and overwhelm my moderate defences away from the war front. AND it would add to the challenge !

[maroule]

"is there a parameter controlling the expansionism/aggressiveness of the factions ? While I enjoy being able to fight one war at a time it would be very historically accurate for some factions to notice my plans and overwhelm my moderate defences away from the war front. AND it would add to the challenge !"

no parameter, but the AI can be very aggressive in expert, esp I found when playing Bizance (where everybody attacks you anyway), in the end game (general war against you), when provinces are poorly defended (attack of opportunity, even from a much weaker faction than yours, which is slightly suicidal), etc.

I see your point, though, in EU, you could determine the difficulty level AND the aggresivity level, which was a nice touch

[Spino]

Quote Just picture this : on expert I win 95% of battles BUT if the computer made direct attacks, simple rushes, I would loose at least half of them. More often than not, it sends its general first, which gets killed, and then the multiple waves dance in front of my pavise arb. If it pulled the general behind his lines and charged with most of his units(and since I'm always outnumbered in quantity and quality), I'd get my ass quicked all the time. I don't and I find that frustrating, again not because of masochism, but because when you win without danger, you triumph without glory.[/QUOTE]

So sad but true. The AI is impressive at setting up flanking maneuvers but curiously lacking in the ability to wholeheartedly commit to decisive action. There were so many battles that I should have lost simply because the AI was reluctant to engage my entire line or overwhelm a single part of it. This is especially alarming when the AI possesses numerical superiority.

Beyond this I also have a problem with the AI attacking me with a substantially inferior force. Maybe this is just a random dynamic of the strategic & tactical AI; sending successive waves of armies instead of mass rushes while on the battlefield occasionally attacking as the defender instead of defending. However, when an Almo force mix of 400-500 peasants, desert archers and militia invade my province containing a well led, 960 man force of heavy & light cavalry, spearmen, archers and militia sargents and once committed to attacking on the battlefield, march and countermarch in front of my troops while getting pasted with arrows, you have to wonder what in blazes the AI was thinking.

According to the devs the suicidal tendencies of any given enemy general is being addressed in the upcoming patch. We can only hope that the battlefield AI will be given a quick schooling as well.

[sidhe]

I'm glad the AI isn't any smarter because I don't do very well yet! I need to learn how to get my troops organized during a battle before the AI gets much smarter..

But I am sorry to learn that the AI doesn't take advantage of its superiority when it has it. It seems that ought to be something that could be fixed.

I lose my battles, btw, because I insist on trying to launch attacks. If I would just sit up on a hill and bait them, I could whittle them down with my missiles. But that doesn't seem very realistic..

[Inferno]

Quote Originally posted by sidhe:
I'm glad the AI isn't any smarter because I don't do very well yet! I need to learn how to get my troops organized during a battle before the AI gets much smarter..

But I am sorry to learn that the AI doesn't take advantage of its superiority when it has it. It seems that ought to be something that could be fixed.

I lose my battles, btw, because I insist on trying to launch attacks. If I would just sit up on a hill and bait them, I could whittle them down with my missiles. But that doesn't seem very realistic..[/QUOTE]

It's very reallistic if you are the defender...why would you leave the safety of a nice steep hill to fight on even terms?


------------------
It's getting warm in here...that must be one hell of an INFERNO!