Burning bridges (one by one)

[Prince Cobra]

I have seen the AI attacking the both bridges. It is true it concetrated most of the soldiers on the one, but there was a bit of a fighting on the other one too.

[RRMike]

I have seen the AI attacking the both bridges. It is true it concetrated most of the soldiers on the one, but there was a bit of a fighting on the other one too.

Ditto. Despite reading that the ai rarely or never attacks both bridges I've had to fight at both before. It was in my recent Russia high campaign. The horde sent one of the 8-10 waves attacking Kiev to the second bridge after having no success at the first bridge they attacked.

[Gilrandir]

The horde sent one of the 8-10 waves attacking Kiev to the second bridge after having no success at the first bridge they attacked.

Did they attack both bridges simultaneously, or did they just switch the direction of their offensive from one bridge to the other? And did you survive the heart... oops! the horde attack in this case?

[Axalon]

- A

[Gilrandir]

Axalon, as far as I can assume your screenshot is from a modded game, so probably the AI's bridge battle management is different from that of vanilla MTW/VI. I may guess that you modded the game to enable the AI to use both bridges, am I right?

[Prince Cobra]

Axalon, as far as I can assume your screenshot is from a modded game, so probably the AI's bridge battle management is different from that of vanilla MTW/VI. I may guess that you modded the game to enable the AI to use both bridges, am I right?

Vanilla MTW/VI is just fine to see that. Have in mind I always leave people on the both bridges (that would be more realistic), though I still can guess most of the time which bridge would be attacked and have most of my troops there.

[Axalon]

Axalon, as far as I can assume your screenshot is from a modded game,

Yup.... Redux....

...so probably the AI's bridge battle management is different from that of vanilla MTW/VI.

Nope, it is not...

I may guess that you modded the game to enable the AI to use both bridges, am I right?

Nope... That stuff is regrettably enough hardcoded by CA and as a result that stuff is also possible in raw MTW, just as Cobra points out in his post (which I can further confirm btw). Anyhow, in my previous post, the AI is shown as the attacker of two bridges and the player as defender. Here is another pic, now illustrating the player as attacker and the AI-defending two bridges - at start up...




This pic shows that the AI can defend two bridges, and in this case it obviously does just that.... The frequency of such
occurrences is wide-open for debate - the AI-capacity to do it, is not...


- A

[RRMike]

Did they attack both bridges simultaneously, or did they just switch the direction of their offensive from one bridge to the other? And did you survive the heart... oops! the horde attack in this case?

The battle at the first bridge was still happening and they sent some of the reinforcement troops to the second bridge. They didn't "attack" both bridges at the same time, but attacked a second bridge while there was still a battle going at the first.

It was long enough into the battle that the reinforcements aren't really coming in waves anymore, but more like a steady stream of guys.

[Gilrandir]

The battle at the first bridge was still happening and they sent some of the reinforcement troops to the second bridge. They didn't "attack" both bridges at the same time, but attacked a second bridge while there was still a battle going at the first.

It was long enough into the battle that the reinforcements aren't really coming in waves anymore, but more like a steady stream of guys.

And? Any luck in repelling them?

[RRMike]

Oh yeah, they never got Kiev. In fact, I was struggling to replace losses at Kiev so I just moved in against kazhar with my armies from Volga, prev, rhyzan, Chernigov and Kiev and beat them soundly against 3-1 odds. The horde simply has no answer for halberds and pavise arbs.

You should try Russia high. I think it's way easier than byz high.

[Gilrandir]

An interesting (and illogical) thing that I noticed in my last campaign: the river borders between two provinces are not river borders either way. For example if you move from Serbia into Hungary you will cross the river, but if the opposite way - no river in the offing. I didn't actually fight those two battles. The province info parchments show there is and there is no river respectively on the army's way. Perhaps there are some more strange borders with a disappearing river. I spotted one more - between Denmark and Saxony. Did anyone make a similar observation? It beats all comprehension.

[caravel]

I have seen the AI attacking the both bridges. It is true it concetrated most of the soldiers on the one, but there was a bit of a fighting on the other one too.

That's pretty much how it works, i.e. there is no coordinated attack or defence on twin bridges from the AI, it just happens sometimes, often by accident.

If you divide your forces from the start and send them across both bridges, which is usually the case in some form or other, then depending on their size, placement and composition, the AI is likely to chase those units, or target them with missiles, but it will be deployed from the start to defend either one bridge or the other, not both.

If instead you deploy against the first bridge and then send e.g. cavalry around to the second bridge after deployment, the AI is likely to ignore them, until they've crossed and come into range.

What the AI cannot do is deploy intelligently in twin bridge situations, either in attack or defence, but the AI is actually quite good with single bridge maps however and uses good tactics and every advantage. When I say that it cannot "deploy intelligently", I mean that it is unable to divide it's forces and attack/defend bridges in a coordinated manner from the deployment stage. When attacking the AI usually just crosses one bridge, unless the force is sufficiently large that some of the units positioned on the wings are closer to the second bridge. Again the positioning of your units, particularly the general, is a big factor also.