after going back to rome, i see how bad M2 AI is

[Slaists]

I agree. The "smart" MTW 2 Very Hard Battle Difficulty AI is quite dumb... I suspect it can pull off a trick or two if it has a balanced army at hand. The problem is: the VH strategic map AI does not give it that chance most of the time (creating very one-sided armies easily destroyable by a human player).

Another fault, IMHO is the current implementation of the passive AI fix. With it, a human player can easily play an offensive battle as a defensive one instead... The AI almost never takes up an advantageous defensive position when defending, rather preferring to come to the player even if the player (attacker) is positioned on a hill.

I am not thrilled by the RTW AI either though. It's use of phalanx armies was laughable. And the piecemeal reinforcement arrival did not help the AI either.

IMHO, battlefield AI out of all the TW series was the best in MTW. The problem there was that a human player could dominate the strategic map AI too easily and too soon in the campain, leading to superior player armies, which could easily destroy anything the AI could throw at them. On equal footing (quality), the battle AI could be challenging in MTW. I still have to see that happen in MTW 2.

P.S. Horse archer armies can be challenging in MTW2, but these were challenging in all TW series simply because player cannot get to them unless fielding a mainly missile based army.