Losing in Medieval?

[Cadwallon]

I'm intrigued to know whether anyone actually still loses at Medieval Total War? I'm playing on VH/VH - have since Rome. Haven't even looked like losing - even when playing the Moors or Poles.

As the Byzantines, the turks in my most recent game made some headway but lost out eventually.

Though it was exciting when one of my large elite stacks (varangians, pronoi, latinkon) lost to Osman and his elite army. He was too weakened after that though - I think the Antioch crew got him, while I took the last Anatolian erritory - Ankara.

I'm intrigued by those who say that they lose at lower levels - is it so hard?

[Zim]

I'v elost the occasional battle, in rare (too rare) cases even to some impressive tactics on the part of the AI, but lost campaigns seem next to impossible. Every one in a while an early blunder(especially in some of the better mods) allows the comp to gain a huge advantage, but if I tough it out and keep playing they always squander it eventually.

I did quit a Teutonic Order campaign(my first) that was going very badly, but I don't know what would have happened if I'd kept it up.

[hrvojej]

I've lost a couple battles vs. Mongols. For example, the last one was in the Crusades campaign when I faced two Mongol stacks with one of my own - just a regular stack, nothing specifically designed to counter them.

I haven't played all factions in the game, so maybe I missed some of the hardest ones, but I never felt like I was going to lose any of the campaigns. But then again, I don't recall losing a campaign in any of the TW games. I expect to win anyway, just as long as it's tense and challenging.

[DVX BELLORVM]

I never lost a campaign, playing mostly on M/VH (recently going to H/VH). I did have some hairy moments, especially with the Turks, but usually only in the early stages.
Once you have about 10 provinces, with healthy economy, I don't think there's a chance of loosing.

I agree with Sinan, the AI desperately needs to be improved, on both tactical and strategic level.

[Ramses II CP]

Unless you're horribly outnumbered you'll probably only lose significant battles to the Timurid Horde, and not often even them. As far as campaigns, you'll have to make some substantial mistakes to give the campaign AI even the slightest chance of making up for the incompetence of the battle AI.

If you want to make battles a challenge only attack when odds are 2 to 1 or worse against you, don't fight night battles, don't sally during sieges, and don't retrain experienced units.

[Shahed]

After reading this and wondering how to improve things, I have found a solution !!!

I just installed this mod: GrandViz's Ultimate AI 1.06, and MAN WHAT A BIG DIFFERENCE !

I just did a custom battle and the AI performed really, really well. First thing, no suicidal charge, only sent two cav against my muskets which forced me to stop shooting and deal with the attack. Meanwhile the rest of the enemy formation, FORMATION, rock solid staggered echelon arrived. That's the first time I've seen the AI attack using a preset formation. He rolled up the musket flank and gave me a bit of a shock. I won ofc but the battle was extremely enjoyable.

Did a quick few turns as Sicily and attacked Calgiari. Guess what ? As my ram approached the gates, the AI ran out ! and creamed the peasants using the ram and then went back in. All the while it's archers shooting at my now frantic attempt to get to the RAM before it catches fire. Again a great battle, and extremely enjoyable.

I've only tried two battles but I can immediately see the difference. I'm DEFINTELY keeping this mod installed. BTW if you only want the AI files, you can install them seperately, so the rest of your game stays the same. It is 100% compatible with most other mods.

See here for details:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=124751

I highly recommend you guys try it out. IMO it's by far better than standard AI.

Readme By GrandViz

I am proud to present you the next and now complete Ultimate AI, featuring a challenging campaign and battle AI
along with a massively improved vanilla campaign.

The changelog to the previous versions is just too long, so I will only give an overview of the main features.

Campaign AI
- Total revision of vanilla AI with separate AI profiles for Papal States, Catholics, Orthodox, Muslims, Mongols (Timurids), Aztecs, and Neutrals
- AI systematically evaluates every available campaign parameter to find the best offensive or defensive option
- Reasonable alliances, backstabbing still possible
- AI using large stacks for attack and defense - no other AI will give you these results!

If you want to experience an AI that expands fast, uses weaknesses in your defense, and acts planful, then stop searching!

Diplomacy
- No more random declarations of war!
- Limited alliances between historically hostile factions
- Allies will help each other, if they have the means
- Papal States will primarily act via diplomacy
- Special relationship between the Pope and Italian states (Venice, Milan, Sicily) - Pope will ask for help when attacked
- Total revision of faction standing mechanics to provide more subtle changes in relations between factions, rather than jumping from perfect to horrible.
- All your actions will affect not only the target faction, but also its allies and enemies as well!
- Revised the value of all diplomatic offers and demands
- AI will make more counterproposals in negotiations

Battle AI & AI Formations
- Complete battle AI modification and mechanics for longer lasting and absolutely challenging field battles and sieges
- Massively improved flanking and skirmish behavior
- Improved pathfinding
- Realistic terrain modifiers
- Differentiated projectile and artillery settings
- Balanced unit stats thanks to the outstanding Real Combat modification by Point Blank
- Gates, walls and towers get more hitpoints with every upgrade level: higher level castles will require heavy siege equipment
- Six new AI formations for open field battles, that are all used by the AI depending on the army composition!
- Total Revision of all offensive and defensive siege formations!
- Naval engagements will result in more casualties

Campaign Settings
- Total revision of the starting conditions for all factions and settlements, so that all factions can build the faction specific basic militia units in cities, and basic infantry and cavalry in castles.
- The starting units have been changed to exactly match the starting recruitment buildings with the exception of Denmark, Scotland and Russia, as these factions start only with one settlement.
- Countless tweaks & bugfixes to vanilla configuration
- Complete new growth and economy model
- Increased corruption, religious unrest, distance to capital penalties
- Increased high tax penalties
- Increased income from trade, decreased income from taxation and farming
- Increased garrison effect on public order
- Increased govenors influence
- Higher population thresholds for updating cities and castles
- Settlement tax for the human player based on the settlement level - fast expansion should be more difficult now!
- Settlement based money script for the AI
- AI sight and command bonus

Building Tree & Recruitment
- Total revision of vanilla building tree, the previous RBT mod is no longer used!
- Balanced costs and construction times for the UAI 1t1y campaign
- Balanced bonuses and effects
- Revised the requirements for the availability of certain buildings and improvements
- Era based availability of high and late era units
- Revised manpower and refreshment parameter to ensure high-quality AI army composition throughout the whole campaign

Character Names Project- This excellent modification fixes the fantasy names from the vanilla game, and adds a huge variety of historically used names for all factions!

King's Banner
- New banners, textures and symbols from the King's Banner Mod enhance the Ultimate AI visually.

Loading Screens
- 23 new high-quality loading screens with original medieval motives

Credits
Real Combat by Point Blank
King's Banner by joedreck
The Character Names Project by deRougemont

[redriver]

I still don't have this game but by just lookin' at this thread I can tell the AI in M2TW 1.3 isn't better than that of RTW 1.5 and from what we've heard from CA there'll be no another patch for this title.
bascially, my question is this: was the original mtw battlefield/camp AI noticably better/harder than in the remake? I haven't played either one myself (tried the demos though) and have RTW which I think has a good mix of diverce gameplay and graphics as well as one of the best time periouds for this type of games.
I finally have the hardware to run this game without resortin' to lowest settings in order for it to be even playable but still feel like M2TW is a big failier as I espected it to be..
is it still worth it? nice graphics and a few cosmetic changes but nothin' that will be remembered as revolutionarry as was the case with RTW and MTW(the original) for instance... and without some serious help from some really ground brakin' mods it falls short in all other departments?

[Shahed]

In Kingdoms it's better because the AI has more armies and often they are of better composition than the original game's AI armies.

However the battle AI is still not up to it.

Last night I had a battle as the Teutons vs Novogrod and remarkably, for once, they did not foolishly attack me head on up the hill in suicidal frontal assualt, as they did in previous battles. After waiting for a few minutes on 6X speed I was amused to see that I'll actually have to move in this battle.

I left my hilltop position and took a very, very long walk to outflank their position on 6X speed. On arrival I just walked up the side of the hill and the AI did'nt even bother to turn to face me until the very last minute, at which point it was an excersise in futility.

The AI does seem to be improved considerably in Kingdoms but it's still really hopeless. It's easy to cream it even on very hard levels. There are still basic errors the AI makes in battles, e.g not waiting till it's archers have expended their ammo and utterly foolish Banzai charges seem to maintain a norm in AI battle strategy. It can pleasantly surprise you though, sometimes.

Future efforts should be put into IMPROVING the AI itself, cash bonuses and all help, but the fundamental AI is still not good enough to beat the player using guile and tactics.

Hence it's very hard to lose a single battle if you're paying any attention at all.