Level of difficulty and why?

[Hax]

Grammar is fine. Doesn't matter if there are some mistakes here and there, lot's of people aren't native English speakers. As long as y00 d0n't sp34k 1337. :P

I play on VH/M

Very Hard for the campaign. I like the AI expanding, gives me a more realistic feel.

M for battles, because..well...never thought about it. It just is recommended :P

[Midnj]

The problem I see with turning fatigue off is that it affects your armies too. So you have zero net change and all that is really accomplished is you make battles more bloody without making them more tactically challenging.

On top of that, if you play as the Romani - who somewhat rely on attacking in depth largely with exploiting fatigue in mind, you pretty much remove that entire aspect from tactical considerations.

But I guess on the other hand it does reduce the huge AI crutch that is defending siege battles when they run around like idiots. But then 90% of the time this seems to be caused by humans using ranged attacks against enemies behind walls. I usually "fix" this deficiency by not allowing my ranged units to attack anything behind a wall (even a pallisade) as its not terribly realistic for skirmishers/slingers/archers who are ground level to shoot at something nobody in your army can technically see.

[bovi]

With fatigue: AI troops mill around and get exhausted for no good reason, human troops preserve their strength.

Without fatigue: AI troops mill around and stay fresh, human troops stay fresh.

The net change is evening out the odds. And a loss in realism, of course.

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

I usually exhaust my cavalry and pay the price in nearly every battle. If I turned off fatigue, I would gain a whole lot from it and my stupid overuse of cavalry would go unpunished. That is the main reason I leave it on, dispite AI milling around.

[Redmeth]

Just started a new campaign on H/H and the battles are good sometimes frustrating because even Jugunthiz take a bit of effort to rout and last stands when sieging are a pain (need more archers I guess). I've tried out the ALEX exe and I like the expansion there seems to be less of the standing around with 2 stacks syndrome. I've started to use guard mode and other abilities and that's good, I can no longer just force the center when I like.

[mlc82]

How's the battle AI under Alex.exe? I've heard in the Alex thread that it's improved but haven't really heard how.

[Starforge]

My difficulty level typically depends upon the difficulty of the faction. I tend to RP / Houserule myself a bit and don't use exploitive strategies (and on the easier factions - no assaults.)

For Romans or other relatively easy factions VH/H
For most of the moderate "Barbarian" style factions VH/M
When I'm feeling Masochistic playing Haysadan or some such H/M

Much depends on your personal playstyle though. I find that if you blitz rebels or factional neighbors at the start - bump the difficulty a notch since you've used an exploitive tactic to make the game easier for yourself (as an example.)

Edit: I run using BI.