some questions about agents

[Servius]

Spies in particular.

I want to fight more cooperative battles with AI allies, but I've had a hell of a time getting them to fight with me. There have been plenty of times where I'll counterattack an enemy who has my allies locked in their castle, and the allied garrison won't even come out to help me kill the besiegers.

Anyway, I know that putting spies in friendly provinces will sometimes result in getting tipoffs about when your ally will attack someone, and sometimes even which province they'll attack and the precise year. Unfortunately, spies cause discontent, and in past efforts to increase cooperatation I've actually caused rebellions in my allies provinces that lead to their defeat.

So, can I eliminate the discontent effect that Spies cause? I know where the code is (in the unit_prod) for the amount of Zeal and Faith your religious agents cause, but I haven't stumbled upon the discontent (or content in friendly provinces) variable.

I'd also like to know if there are ways, other than gaining valor, for spies to be more immune to detection by the Border Forts. Is there a variable I can tweek that determines their chances of being detected by those forts and foreign agents?

Lastly, does anyone know what makes an AI ally decide whether to support you in battle or not? I've often tried to help the Danes grow their empire by taking Norway, but in order for them to have it and not me they have to bring the bigger force to the battle. So I send forces too small to do the job alone (hoping to encourage teamwork) but the Danes don't come so I have to abandon the attack.

[therother]

I want to fight more cooperative battles with AI allies, but I've had a hell of a time getting them to fight with me.

About the only way I know of is to quicksave before the end of turn, and watch who your ally attacks. Then reload and attack them as well. Most of the time, barring any large-scale change in the strategic position, they should still attack. One word of warning: if you are attacking from the sea (and have no land border with the attacked province), and the enemy retreats without a battle, your forces will be ransomed by your ally back to you. Which can be costly if there are any members of the royal family in the stack.

Anyway, I know that putting spies in friendly provinces will sometimes result in getting tipoffs about when your ally will attack someone,

To be honest, I've never really found the information to be of much use.

and sometimes even which province they'll attack and the precise year.

I've seen the year before, but never the exact province.

Unfortunately, spies cause discontent, and in past efforts to increase cooperatation I've actually caused rebellions in my allies provinces that lead to their defeat.

Well, the province would have to be pretty rebellious to begin with, assuming you're not putting a very high valour spy in. If it is a problem, put the spy in one of their home provinces that has a large stack of units, and then it won't really cause much disaffection.

So, can I eliminate the discontent effect that Spies cause?

Not that I know of, I think it may well be hardcoded into the game.

I'd also like to know if there are ways, other than gaining valor, for spies to be more immune to detection by the Border Forts.

Even a valour 12 spy is still not immune to detection. I know, I've tried!

Is there a variable I can tweek that determines their chances of being detected by those forts and foreign agents?

Hmm, well sort of, but you are probably not going to like it. If you go into the unit_prod file, you can make spies (and assassins) visible, which makes them completely immune to border forts. However, it also makes them prime targets for assassination! Other than that, you could simply remove the building requirements for border forts, making them impossible to build.

HTH

[Sinner]

I believe that most of a spy's abilities are hardcoded and tied to the fact they have a unit type (column 2 in the units prod file) of SPY.

One possible solution is to create a second type of spy, call it the agent perhaps, with a unit type of SPY but without the stealth feature (column 44) and make sure you only build them without valour bonuses, thus minimizing the discontent as much as possible. Giving them a negative starting honour handicap (column 6) &/or a honour step value (column 9) of 2 or greater should also reduce the chance of them gaining valour.

The valour handicap might reduce their ability to sniff out invasion plans thought, but at least they shouldn't be causing revolts in your allies' regions.

[Lonewarrior]

I never use spies, and I got acustomed to the AI not helping me, or fighting battles together.

[Servius]

yeah, I'm trying to build more meaning into the game. It's not fun for me to basically be by myself on a map full of idiots where the only thing preventing the whole map from being red is my lack of patience.

I this stuff is improved in RTW. I mean, honestly, Emisaries in your allies' province should be getting messages from your ally telling you where and when your ally is planning on invading. Even better, they could ask for your help and make their decision accordingly. Spies should only be necessary for such info when you're getting it from someone who doesn't want to give it.

Not supporting a neighboring ally's attack should, I think, cancel alliances. What good is an ally if they don't go to war with you?

...[cough] France [cough]...

hehe, didn't mean for this to turn political, the thought just occured to me and I thought it was funny. I guess I'll have to continue saving empires from their own bad decisions, with or without their help.

[Ludens]

...[cough] France [cough]...

Please NO political discussion in the main hall. Not even as a joke.

But diplomacy will be much more complex in RTW, so it is very likely that the diplomatic AI will be much more intelligent. Otherwise, what's the point of adding complex diplomacy? Anyway, it can't be much worse than that of MTW :grins sourly:.

[Sinner]

Diplomacy? Is that the lies I tell while preparing to smash their brains in?

MTW has taught me one thing: allies are just enemies that you kill later rather than sooner, preferably while yelling "Suckers!" as your troops pour over the borders.

Seriously, I can live with the historical inaccuracies and fantasy units, the dodgy sea combat system if that hasn't been fixed, the inevitable unbalanced units that will be ruthlessly exploited, but I'm willing to sacrifice everything my neighbours own if the RTW diplomacy is even halfway good.

[katank]

true. commanding of sea combat would be great.

you got diplomacy right.

this just means that they will definitely sit still for the first turn while you destroy them.

This only means that you can separate their land nicely to ransom their king around the place many many times as you can make the perfect surgical strikes.

[Blodrast]

unfortunately, even if you do solve the spy problem, i'm not sure how useful that will prove to be. Most of the time, I don't have allies. And when I do, I sure don't share a border with them, so unless wherever they're fighting is a coastal province, you won't be able to help them anyway (in MTW you can't "pass" through an ally's provinces, which is a great thing that RTW will allow you to do).
Oh well, good luck anyway.

[hotingzilla]

The goal of MTW is conquer anyway. It is sometimes just best you stay neutral with powers you don't want to mess with or keep trading.

[EatYerGreens]

Spies in particular.

I want to fight more cooperative battles with AI allies, but I've had a hell of a time getting them to fight with me.

snip....

Lastly, does anyone know what makes an AI ally decide whether to support you in battle or not? I've often tried to help the Danes grow their empire by taking Norway, but in order for them to have it and not me they have to bring the bigger force to the battle. So I send forces too small to do the job alone (hoping to encourage teamwork) but the Danes don't come so I have to abandon the attack.

I was intrigued by this post because, just the day before, I had an ally join me in a battle for the first ever time, in STW1.11.

The circumstances leading to this were that I'd previously invaded Imagawa's main base in Totomi, smashing his facilities and laying seige. The bulk of his force was in Shinano and I had enough troops in a separate stack to take them on, as the next target. Obligingly, it sent the bulk of those forces south, to lift the siege (I abandoned that province in response) but Oda (ally) responded to the move by bunging 60 cavalry into Shinano, which only had four or five units left in it. It could have been a speculative move, anticipating that the province would be left near-empty and up for grabs. It certainly wasn't enough to have taken the province if that other force had stayed put instead.

In the event, the Oda Cav charged straight up the valley into the enemy but were shot to bits and routed after less than a minute of engaging. I was initially surprised to find myself in a corner of the map but the placement was handy since it saved my forces from having to climb up the hills... through the snow...

I didn't think to experiment with gamesaves, to see if Oda would have made the same move if I hadn't attacked so, for now, it looks like the joint maneuvres are purely coincidental - both sides attempting to grab the same territory on the same turn.

It's a shame you can't march your armies through allied territory so as to help them out (and sneakily gather intelligence), without breaking the treaty and starting a war. Interesting to hear that this will be permitted in RTW but woe betide you if one of your better armies is helping them if/when the alliance breaks down, especially if the 'no retreat path' rule still applies.

The hardest part will be whether or not you will remain in control of the actions of your supporting forces, or if the AI ally will be in control, in which case you could not stop them from using your force as their arrow-fodder. : (But wouldn't you be tempted to do the same thing?)

[katank]

telling me about arrow fodder, it reminds me of several battles in which I took advantage of the allied AI armies.

I love missile heavy armies for forcing enemies out of position etc.

particularly good is when an allied AI joins in.

I just park my missiles with shield wall right behind just outside the enemy missile range.

my foolish AI buddies run up to the enemy and often get their sorry behinds kicked and then rout back towards my army with the enemy in hot pursuit.

the enemy gets mauled by my missiles and makes brief contact with shield wall before turning tail and running.

I would also have no qualms about friendly fire when the allied AI is engaged in melee with the enemy.

thus, the AI buddies saves you meat shield and intentional rout fodder. I love em until I pour across the border to sack their sorry behinds.

[AssasinsShadow]

I gave up trying to win help from allies, or help them myself, when I was playing a campaign with the English. It was Mid to Late Game, and The Italians, me, and the Byz had split the world in 3, literally. I was fighting the Byz and allied with the Italians, and I launched a huge attack, against over 10 territories, the Italians, who had always been my allies (over 100yrs) turn around and attack me in every territory they can. I lost the game in no time. I had garrisons in all my border providences, Italians or Byz.

[EatYerGreens]

I gave up trying to win help from allies, or help them myself, when I was playing a campaign with the English. It was Mid to Late Game, and The Italians, me, and the Byz had split the world in 3, literally. I was fighting the Byz and allied with the Italians, and I launched a huge attack, against over 10 territories, the Italians, who had always been my allies (over 100yrs) turn around and attack me in every territory they can. I lost the game in no time. I had garrisons in all my border providences, Italians or Byz.

Hi AssasinsShadow,

"Garrisons" in your border provinces? As opposed to serious defensive forces? No wonder they attacked!

I'm curious as to whether the AI did this in the same move as your multi-attack, or was it the following season/year while your outbound armies were still assuring loyalty in the won provinces?

It just goes to show that there are alliances and there are alliances.

1. "I see that XXXX is your enemy. They are also my enemy, let's work together on dealing with them".
SUBTEXT: - None.
(Just make sure you do your share of the task if you want a share of the spoils, or risk being out-developed).

2. "I would be obliged if you would consent to forming an alliance".
SUBTEXT: - You've got a bigger army than I have, please don't attack me.

3. "I wonder if you would be interested in an alliance?"
SUBTEXT: - I could beat you right now, if I wanted to but first I want to grab some territory off another neighbour which is worth more to me than yours. Then I'm going to tech-up and beat everyone. Do me a favour and leave me alone for the time being.


Curiosity once led me to the Sound folder within STW and the filenames given to each of the emissary speeches were a complete giveaway as to whether they were approaching you from a position of weakness, strength, or parity. I found that very handy in future games...

[CherryDanish]

Another point that might be of merit is the suicide factor. As more and more factions fall and the survivors grab more and more of the existing map, the AI seems to feel compelled to suicide charge you. As the danes holding most of England and facing a loads of royal knight units from varying medieval ages, I felt compelled to use the English as a trade partner and as a buffer against their allies 2 stacks of Almo troops in Scotland (don't ask, I couldn't figure it out, apparently the Almos felt they liked kilts). I liked the buffer idea because it allowed me to keep a fairly small and inexpensive army guarding Mercia and I got huge money from trading with the English. Considering I owned the sea, this worked out well for the English as well (they made 20% of what I did which counted in the thousands for me). I was at war with the Almos though and owned most of the map. Well, in a totally suprise move, the English descended on me like a pack of dogs on an injured lamb. Fortunatlely, a crash to desktop forced me to load the year again and I added a couple units to my holding force figuring they'd shy away and I could keep my equitable arangement peacefull. They attacked! I won easily forcing them to attack my strong point, saved the game and out of curiousity I reloaded the previous year moving a whole stack to Mercia. They STILL attacked when I ended the year! Proceeding from my previous savegame, they attacked 3 years in a row, suffering more and more losses until the last year when they ran away as soon I charged them and neither side took losses. I should have reloaded and tried with putting one of my 9 star generals in Mercia to see if they attacked, but at the time I was so stunned the experiment hadn't occured to me. I sent envoy after envoy, offered a daughter, wiped out all their allies (then resending emissaries) I was at war with at the time, everything to preserve the happy arrangement I had, but they shot everything down.

Near the end of the same campaign, after being stalwart allies, the papacy attacked me when I left my border practically undefended. This time however I reloaded the game because I didn't want to kill the papacy (they had been awesome allies) and but 1.5 stacks on every border I had with them and unlike the English, they didn't attack.

In short, I don't know what provokes the suicide reflex in a faction, but it's something to consider when dealing with allies. Even your best ally will attack you near the end of the game or if you leave your borders too undefended for too long.

[katank]

if owning 20% of provinces or below, they don't feel much of a suicide factor.

if 40% or so, AI factions start to feel the itch and your govs act up.

60%+, govs are venal and the AI is rabid.

80%+ gives random rebellions, better to not have a gov due to crazy unhappiness and also plain suicidal AIs.

you should always minimize your borders and never have to really defend more than 6-8 borders which you can do.

As the Brits, you should have an especially nice time as your longbows can mow down tons of attackers.

Even if you lost a bunch of provinces and suffered civil war or whatever, I don't see the game as being lost. keep fighting!