What's the smartest/coolest thing your AI has done?

[antisocialmunky]

Yup, Mikeus. I agree, Most things the AI does aren't too clever. So this is an open invitation to people to spam the thread with things that aren't a) interesting b) unusual c) human-like in their sophistication.

Gotta say EU that in the last few threads that you have started, it just seems like you are out to score cheap shots against the devs of a game you professs to like. Such as the routing units thread, just chill man.
Seems like you feel too big for the game, if thats the case, just play another one. Don't spend all your time flaming a game that people here enjoy, thats the only reason we are here. You dont make constructive criticism, you are just being plain negative.

So the game isn't human-like in its playing? I agree, so go back to MTW which isn't perfect either, take off your rose tinted spectacles and play that which you obviously prefer. 5 years ago I'm sure we'd have found you in those forums complaining too.

All I'm saying is that constructive criticism is good, but you are just flaming the game for the sake of it.

And thus the anti-thread is born. The AI isn't all that stupid, I've read of AIs doing decently intellegentand cool things.

[Mongoose]

I agree. Sometimes it's very smart. The issue is that the AI never win's the first battles, so it never get's any good commanders. The AI is fairly good when it has a 10* commander

Too bad that almost never happens.



i would say the hardest battle i have ever fought is the one where the AI withdrew back inside a city after losing 10-20% percent of it's army, a very choice given the circumstances. If it had kept fighting, i would have won the battle with ~35 percent of my army lost. As it was, i had to fight all the way to the town center....loosing something like...75% of my army The enemy had a 10* general.

This was with the SPQR mod, BTW.

[Muska Burnt]

after i killed all of the generals body guard but the general the general charged all by himself its was pretty funny

[BobTheTerrible]

Well waaay back in the 1.0 days (first day I had the game I think) I played out a siege battle, Julii (me) vs Gauls. I don't remember the details, but I created a breach in their walls. Their men on the other side taunted me, I charged my Hastati in. The offenders ran backwards. Once my Hastati got inside, they were charged from both sides by cavalry and other infantry which I assumed would just sit there. This gave me the false impression that the AI was excellent, and it probably was more by accident than design that it happened, but needless to say, they eliminated my Hastati.

[spacekraken]

This could probably go in the "Most Embarrassing Smack Down" thread as well.

I just recently fought the Dacians over a bridge as the Brutii. I was pretty confident it'd be a cake walk. My forces equalled theirs and it was over a bridge. When the battle started, I set up an "area of death" that had worked so well for me before: four sets of Hastati forming a box at the end of the bridge so when their first warband entered it they got decimated by the cross fire and would immediately route while those stuck on bridge were eaten up by arrows. It didn't work out that way though.

They actually did not come rushinmg across the bridge. I thought, "Wow, that's interesting." Then huge flaming balls started crashing around my side of the river. "Oh, they have onagers," I thought. "That's different."

About the time I thought that, a huge flaming ball landed smack dab in the middle of my hastati on the right. The unit was nearly gone, like 4 men left! A whole side of my "square of death" was gone. I started to get worried. Then it started aiming for my general. I was impressed and frightened. I moved my general out of range but then they went after my archers and they got hammered by the onagers.

I sent a small force across a crossing in the river to come around to kill the onagers but it took so long my main force was getting pretty hurt. I thought the Dacians might split up to save their onagers but the AI didn't flinch. They let the onagers go and came across the bridge.

By the time the Dacians decided to do that, my force was a lot smaller. I kind of froze up and freaked. They routed what was left of my hastati, and started harrassing my archers. I sent in my equites but they couldn't even help and they routed. I rallied a few times but my guys were all over the field in shambles and exhausted from routing. Big healthy chunks of warband were there to great those who rallied. Eventually even my general routed.

Very nice use of the onagers on the AI's behalf. I was thoroughly spanked.

[CMcMahon]

I got feinted in a recent battle as a single Julii army (my reinforcements were delayed, for whatever reason) against two Greek full stacks. The first full stack sent all of its cavalry to my right flank, while the second stack remained far behind. So, I sent out my cavalry to fight the first cavalry.

Well, while the infantry from the second stack was sitting back their, all of their Greek cavalry came in from my left and routed all my triarii and principes that were fighting armored hoplites (who had already routed most of my hastati, which I was using as a buffer anyway).

Terrible loss.

[sapi]

I was sieging a town long time ago (i think i was roman) (1.1 i think), and unknown to me the enemy had onagars.

They immediately aimed for my general (who was standing still), and in a freak shot over stone walls they hit him dead on with a flaming ball. Ouch. Needless to say, he died.

The battle then proceeded to the enemy's satisfaction, with my army being pinned near the wall breach by pikemen and being decimated by archers/towers.

Without a general, my men routed, and i faced the loss of my entire greek field army, along with a rising, 20 year old, 6 star general, who died to a well timed onager blow.

[Enderel]

I've experienced a good example of intelligent campaign AI last night. (Mundus Magnus, hard, hard) Sieging an Egyption city with Seculid army and they bought up reinforcements from behind to completely trap me. Faced with two massive armies in the middle. Got to the battle map and found I was completely surrounded needless to say my army was total annihilated.

So decided to replay that round again on the campaiign map and flee the battle initially, the AI had put another army (1 unit just to have a presense) above the city and I got trapped and hit by all three armies!

[Rodion Romanovich]

This could probably go in the "Most Embarrassing Smack Down" thread as well.

I just recently fought the Dacians over a bridge as the Brutii. I was pretty confident it'd be a cake walk. My forces equalled theirs and it was over a bridge. When the battle started, I set up an "area of death" that had worked so well for me before: four sets of Hastati forming a box at the end of the bridge so when their first warband entered it they got decimated by the cross fire and would immediately route while those stuck on bridge were eaten up by arrows. It didn't work out that way though.

They actually did not come rushinmg across the bridge. I thought, "Wow, that's interesting." Then huge flaming balls started crashing around my side of the river. "Oh, they have onagers," I thought. "That's different."

About the time I thought that, a huge flaming ball landed smack dab in the middle of my hastati on the right. The unit was nearly gone, like 4 men left! A whole side of my "square of death" was gone. I started to get worried. Then it started aiming for my general. I was impressed and frightened. I moved my general out of range but then they went after my archers and they got hammered by the onagers.

I sent a small force across a crossing in the river to come around to kill the onagers but it took so long my main force was getting pretty hurt. I thought the Dacians might split up to save their onagers but the AI didn't flinch. They let the onagers go and came across the bridge.

By the time the Dacians decided to do that, my force was a lot smaller. I kind of froze up and freaked. They routed what was left of my hastati, and started harrassing my archers. I sent in my equites but they couldn't even help and they routed. I rallied a few times but my guys were all over the field in shambles and exhausted from routing. Big healthy chunks of warband were there to great those who rallied. Eventually even my general routed.

Very nice use of the onagers on the AI's behalf. I was thoroughly spanked.

Why didn't you back away and move all your troops out of onager range, and putting only one unit in range but with loose formation and 1-2 ranks deep line? Then AI would just waste their ammo and when they started charging over you'd run your men back into a half-circle position around the bridge. If the AI would keep firing then, they'd risk hurting their own men and therefore they often stop firing in such situations - and if they keep firing you'll most likely win anyway.

Also, did you use small unit size? Onagers never kill more than a fourth or fifth of a unit with flaming ammo when playing with large units - large units is the most balanced unit size btw - and flaming ammo rarely ever hits it's targets.

[The Stranger]

i never saw them doing sumthing good/smart/cool. ow wait i did. those b*tches lined up cat eles and normal cats and companions along my left flank and charged. my left flank with 4 spartans in it. were eliminated and the rest of my army chainrouted, (1.1v i thought)

[Mikeus Caesar]

I though it would be a great idea to repeat the mistakes Quintus Varus by marching one of my best armies across the Rhine, but this time i would win. So there i was, in a forest under attack from germans. I thought i would win, as they were flinging all the men at my front, but i didn't notice the two Berserker units creeping up on either side because i was too occupied with their main forces. Wack, the two units of Berserkers sliced through the ranks, killing quite a few men, and lowering their morale. The AI almost won!

[Kagemusha]

If nothing else the AI can really produce ships.If someone would like to fallow my leed and turn into raging lunatic.Try clearing the seas from enemy ships.

[mfberg]

With the timer off and me defending in a failed ambush the AI sat on the other side of the river and just waited. Either I charge into the larger Gaul units and their 3 supporting cav with my hastati or I retreat all my men and lose, or just end battle, but there is no retreat button. I got slaughtered moving my army across the ford.

mfberg

[Viking]

What's the smartest/coolest thing your AI has done?

Now that would be really cool; an AI that learned and developed the more you played against it. No complains about bad AI then

Back on topic, can`t I remeber the smartest thing the AI has done. But it certainly knows how to use forts properly like blokcading narrow passes, and bridges.

[Rodion Romanovich]

When Egypt on very hard, very hard attacked my cavalry with one chariot unit (if I hadn't tried to kill the first chariot they'd have slaughtered me when they reached my two footmen.), and I managed to fool it into a trap, surround it and kill it. Then I realized that the AI had kept one chariot in reserve and sent it in to hit my cavalry units when it was too late for them to pull out and I hadn't fully killed the first chariot unit. The keeping of reserves like this, that only worked thanks to the boni the AI gets on vh, was quite clever but could also have been accidental. I also doubt the enemy realized that I had to kill several of their chariots before they reached my infantry line consisting of two units. Either way, I was impressed and surprised that the AI for once won a battle with only 5:1 odds for the AI.

[CMcMahon]

just end battle, but there is no retreat button

You couldn't just hit "w" to withdraw?

[bubbanator]

If nothing else the AI can really produce ships.If someone would like to fallow my leed and turn into raging lunatic.Try clearing the seas from enemy ships.

I did that one time as the Scipii. The Egyptians had just blockaded one of my ports. I was in Greece still so my only settlement near them was Swia. I had no real army there so I figured that I would blockade them into submission. To make a long story short, it took many, many years to defeat the last fleet. They had a very strong navy when they attacked so I had to pump out some Quinquiremes and Deceres to defeat them.


Anyways, one time, the I was the Julii and was making my long awaited invasion of Britian. I sent an full stack army led by my faction heir to take thier capital and move on from there. I made my landing and laid siege to the city. It had a half stack army so I wasn't worried about it. The next turn, I was attacked by a full stack army that had come out of the woods. I decided I would take out the main threat first. This was a bad idea considering that I could have just taken the town square and won.

I organized my troops and began marching toward the ill-equipped British troops. I was not worried about the forces inside the city because they usualy just sit there or walk towards me after a while.

My line hit theirs and I was making short work of them. I had taken my cavalry around the flanks to charge into the back of their line and break them.
All of a sudden, several groups of charriots charge into the back of *my* line. I figured that my princepes could hold them off so I sent my cavalry into the enemy line. All of a sudden, the center of my line broke and my whole line began to route. However my cavalry charge had broken their line too. I charged my remaining men at their charriots and their general was killed. I managed to rally some of my men and eventualy took the city. But it was a hollow victory. My faction heir had been killed in the fighting in the streets and my army was almost completely wiped out. The next turn, the city fell into revolt and went rebel. I took what was left of my army to one of their other settlements and pilliaged the land until the entire region was black.

Many years later, I came back with a larger army and exterminated all of their cities. I had avenged the deaths of my soldiers, but the scars of that loss stayed for years to come...

[spacekraken]

Why didn't you back away and move all your troops out of onager range, and putting only one unit in range but with loose formation and 1-2 ranks deep line? Then AI would just waste their ammo and when they started charging over you'd run your men back into a half-circle position around the bridge. If the AI would keep firing then, they'd risk hurting their own men and therefore they often stop firing in such situations - and if they keep firing you'll most likely win anyway.

Also, did you use small unit size? Onagers never kill more than a fourth or fifth of a unit with flaming ammo when playing with large units - large units is the most balanced unit size btw - and flaming ammo rarely ever hits it's targets.

Yeh, I was on small unit sizes. I accidentally started the campaign like that. I usually use normal size. Large units is too big for wimpy system. I think you can change mid-game, but I'm seeing how it feels and the game runs alot less sluggishly.

Luck did seem to be on the side of the AI cuz they slaughtered that unit but when they came across the bridge they didn't hit themselves.

I didn't pull away out of range because I violated the maxim "It is a bad plan that can not be altered". I also was afraid to pull them away from the bridge. If I moved away the Dacians would probably come across. Then I'd be tiring my guys out having them run back and forth. I still thought weathering the storm would be best.

I probably didn't have enough units to start with. Cuz usually I'd have at least two more melee troops ready to replace the routers. Still they over ran my guys so quickly, I don't know if that would've helped. I blame that lucky hit the Dacians got. Though it could've been my own inept command that got so many brave men killed that day and made countless Roman widows.

[antisocialmunky]

I don't think that you really need a good AI to kill things with giant flaming rocks.

[mfberg]

You couldn't just hit "w" to withdraw?

It was a battle to the death for my units, as one had just used up all of its movement points.

[spacekraken]

I don't think that you really need a good AI to kill things with giant flaming rocks.

No, but you need good AI to keep your forces on the otherside of the bridge while the flaming rocks thin out the opposition. You need good AI not to divide your forces to save onagers from a unit of equites.

Another cool thing the AI was doing for awhile (I don't remember settings or which campaign) was when I'd bring my forces in range to rain arrows on them, it'd send a unit towards my defensive line. I don't know if this was intentional but friendly fire causalities increased when they got close to my line. When I pulled my archers back, the enemy unit would run back.

[Armoryk]

The AI as Scipii was besieging Croton (I'm Carthage). They brought a ram, which I thought was dumb against stone walls, I never bother with rams. But they put a somewhat depleted infantry stack on it and sent it right at the main gate. Result? There was a dead ram smack dab in the middle of the gate...no sallies through that exit, now my cavalry has to go all the way around to harass the siege tower pushers and ladder men in waiting. I thought it was a good tactic, even if by accident.