Unscripted AI follies

[Lusted]

Right, so an ai which doesn't have suicidal generals, makes co-ordinated flanking manouvers, knows how to move in towns, can work well with an ai ally and mix their troops together to make a stronger battle line is no better than RTWs?

[R'as al Ghul]

Right, so an ai which doesn't have suicidal generals, makes co-ordinated flanking manouvers, knows how to move in towns, can work well with an ai ally and mix their troops together to make a stronger battle line is no better than RTWs?

The AI that you describe would certainly be better than Rome's.
How can I experience that right now? I'm asking because the unscripted battles I've tried with the Gold demo are all the same. The AI approaches my line in a somewhat unorderly fashion, deploys a line or two but fails to adjust its angle to mine and then it waits for me to do something. If I don't it waits. When I do charge it with Cav in the rear it seems surprised and when I move my line closer it will send single units to counter, not the whole line.
Of course this is only a demo and obviously has the bug that Palamedes described in his blog but I can't see an AI that is promising in any way.

R'as

[Lusted]

Now see, i have seen that, but generally only when there is a missile infantry duel going on. Once either i withdraw my missile troops or wipe out his, and being my manouvers the ai responds very well or launches a well co-ordinated attack on my troops. I have seen the passive ai as well, but palamedes did say there will be a patch out to fix that on release day so im not too worried about it. Then im guessing the ai will be as aggressive as it was in the first demo in unscripted battles.

[R'as al Ghul]

I agree, that's why I mentioned Pala's post.
I didn't intend to join the "the AI sucks" crowd but I've also not experienced anything that I find new or improved.
It's just too early to judge the game and the demo is not the real deal.

[Lusted]

Well this battle i fought: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...9&postcount=73 was pretty damn tough. I know i don't go into much detail, but the ai was constantly adapting its formation and placement of troops to deal with my manouvers. Really gave me a challenge as i tried to divide it so that i would have a chance of winning. As soon as hit the enemy on one flank, my HRe ally attacked on the other.

[R'as al Ghul]

Seems that I've had bad luck with the choice of my battles then.
What you two are reporting seems indeed promising.

[Dave1984]

The AI that you describe would certainly be better than Rome's.
How can I experience that right now? I'm asking because the unscripted battles I've tried with the Gold demo are all the same. The AI approaches my line in a somewhat unorderly fashion, deploys a line or two but fails to adjust its angle to mine and then it waits for me to do something. If I don't it waits. When I do charge it with Cav in the rear it seems surprised and when I move my line closer it will send single units to counter, not the whole line.
Of course this is only a demo and obviously has the bug that Palamedes described in his blog but I can't see an AI that is promising in any way.

R'as

Hmm... in my case I've played a lot of unscripted battles and the only time I've seen an army just stand there waiting was in a three way battle when I was already bitterly engaged with the HRE and the French were waiting on the wings a few hundred yards away. Once I had beaten back the HRE but but before I could get my line into any kind of order the French launched a concerted assault, advancing with pikemen in good order and cavalry hunting down my weaker units that had become isolated in their first melee. With my army in no kind of order and already exhausted it was crushed.
Now that sounds promising to me.

[ProudNerd]

Right, so an ai which doesn't have suicidal generals, makes co-ordinated flanking manouvers, knows how to move in towns, can work well with an ai ally and mix their troops together to make a stronger battle line is no better than RTWs?

have you even played anythign besides the demo? have you played the hacked battles? The AI is

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

stupid.

[Ituralde]

@ProudNerd

If you had read his previous post you would know that he did play the altered demo.


Personally my experiences with the AI have been good for the most part but sometimes it just seems to lack sense altogether. One battle was especially noteworthy where I attacked the English as France on the Agincourt map.
The English were initially deployed on top of the huge cliff just off the muddy field while my French troops had to cross it to get to them.

Now instead of setting up a strong defence atop the cliff the AI decided to move its entire army to the left of their position closer to the town with the manor on the hill behind it. This gave me easy permission to the high ground which the English should have guarded. After coming on top of the cliff the English were still deployed in a long line near the town of Agincourt, even after I had reformed my battleline at 90° angle to the cliff the English line remained at a 90° angle to my advancing army. Only after I've annihilated their right flank with my Scots Guards arrows they began some movement. By that time I had sent several troops through the town of Agincourt and could then attack the English from behind. It seems like only then did the AI set in motion.

While his Archers skirmished and attacked my main force, the few I sent across town, which were accompanied by my general met an all-out attack by the English forces. Even my attempt to lure some of his troops into a trap in the streets of Agincourt were thwarted. My resistance was too strong and when finally my man body of troops arrived the English were smashed between my two lines.


The strange thing is that with the same setup and me playing the English setting up defenses atop the cliff the French attacker was very well able to skirmish in with his Scotts Guard and deplete my lines and even successfully tried to outflank my main battle line.

So overall the AI seems to have improved a lot but just sometimes it seems to shut completely down. Admittedly those shutdowns I have only encountered twice so the positive aspect still prevails.

Cheers!

Ituralde

[econ21]

Renamed thread - since it is getting serious, I want to avoid giving the impression of CA bashing.

[Lusted]

have you even played anythign besides the demo? have you played the hacked battles? The AI is stupid.

Yes, i am playing the hacked battles, and the ai is definitely better than in RTW. Yes, it does have some stupid moments, but i don't want a perfect ai. I wolud like an ai that is clever most fo the time, but can make stupid mistakes like humans do.

[Orda Khan]

You cannot form an opinion of the AI based on a demo and furthermore, hacked battles are precisely that; anything could happen which is something CA has posted before

....Orda

[Rob The Bastard]

Not being the best general in the world, I do not want to face a "Chess Grandmaster" 9 star type AI in every battle... where my every move is noticed immeadiately, analysed as being a real redeployment of my troops (not just a feint) immeadiately and countered immeadiately.

The enemy generals ai should change depending on his rankings and vices, I would expect dumb or ineffective or non-existant counters from a "slobbering drunk inbred chinless wonder" type general.

Of course, I don't know if that is what we are seeing now or not... but I am willing to believe that the AI is as good as it can be made.

Humans are intelligent and do dumb things!... good ai should emulate that as well.

[screwtype]

Not being the best general in the world, I do not want to face a "Chess Grandmaster" 9 star type AI in every battle... where my every move is noticed immeadiately, analysed as being a real redeployment of my troops (not just a feint) immeadiately and countered immeadiately.

The enemy generals ai should change depending on his rankings and vices, I would expect dumb or ineffective or non-existant counters from a "slobbering drunk inbred chinless wonder" type general.

Of course, I don't know if that is what we are seeing now or not... but I am willing to believe that the AI is as good as it can be made.

Humans are intelligent and do dumb things!... good ai should emulate that as well.

Yes I agree with that. You don't want to be facing a brilliant AI in every battle, because generals do vary considerably in skill, some of them are great, some mediocre and some incompetent.

It would be nice to think this is reflected to some degree in the game, with higher star generals being better opponents, but I have my doubts this will be the case.

The bottom line is that I want to be facing a competent opponent most of the time. If one occasionally has a battle where the AI does something incredibly stupid, or does nothing at all, that could be viewed not as a problem but as an accurate reflection of what could reasonably be expected to occur now and again in real life battles.