Aggressive/Expansionist AIs

[Sp4]

Has anyone ever seen an AI faction grow to be a major power? It seems that a lot of times, they grow too quickly and too suddenly and then run into food or money shortages and seem to just die out again. The biggest faction in my current campaign was Egypt, which controlled everything in the bottom right corner of the map, until they got into a war with my fearsome client state in Northern Africa and started falling apart.

One other thing that seems to be a lot more stable since Egypt is the Seleucid faction now, about 50 turns later although they really don't control a lot of territory themselves. They do have 8 or 9 satrapies though and seem to be happily ganging up on anyone who annoys them too much.

Macedon, Athen and Sparta have some sort of love triangle going on ever since they killed off Epirus but since then, they've had -a- war with whoever lives in Dacia and then someone in Illyria before it all died down again and since then nothing has been happening at all.

I guess by the time I get to the Eastern part of the map, they'll have had peace and prosperity for 150 years and have teched up to tanks and airplanes

Oh edit: I'm playing on hard with some battle mods and an otherwise vanilla game.

[AntiDamascus]

I never seem to find a power get too big. I'm always waiting for the lesser powers to die out as some get stronger and take over more land but they never seem to do that. I'm not sure what "expansionist" is then

[Hooahguy]

All the AIs around me are tiny one-settlement nations, Ill need to venture further south to see what happened to the other nations.

[HopAlongBunny]

With the discussion of AI aggressiveness/expansion: Can the AI win the game?
This seems to be a basic test of the game's soundness; is the AI a real competitor or is it just a punching bag?

[AntiDamascus]

That's a good question, if I just sat in my starting areas and just turtled the entire time, would another AI eventually grow out of control or would it just be turn after turn of endless stalemate?

[Quillan]

It depends upon what you mean by "major power". In my Rome campaign, the Eravisci got up to the point of controlling 7 regions (all of Dacia and Pannonia plus Nori) before they declared war on a client state of mine. However, in the Levant region in this game it's been a series of "faction grows to be 12-15 regions and dominates the area, faction runs out of food and starts to suffer attrition, faction loses province to rebellion and a previously eliminated faction returns, previously eliminated faction grows and goes on rampage, first faction eliminated by resurgent faction plus other enemies, resurgent faction grows to be 12-15 regions and dominates the area,..." repeat ad nauseum. I've seen the Seleucids come back at least 7 times this game. At one point Cappadocia owned everything from Pergamon to the mouth of the Euphrates, from the Black Sea coast down to Petra. They lost most of it and the Seleucids took the majority of what they lost. Then the Seleucids were displaced by Rhodes, who were then displaced by Nabatea. Right now Nabatea is in the process of losing their eastern holdings to Media.

[GarytheGreat]

I usually don't see too many empires form, but if I do it's strangely from a minor faction like Libya for instance.

[ReluctantSamurai]

There are several minor factions in Africa, Britanian, and Arabia that get a faction income bonus of +800 in their provincial capital. Some are claiming a typo in the effects_junctions_tables file

Here:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...-Game-Breaking!

And here:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...-Save-Carthage

[Spoonska]

In my current campaign, Cantabri and Pontus are #2 and or #3 in terms of power (of course me being #1). Early on in my invasion of "Asia" I agreed to a non-aggression pact with Pontus. That was about 100 turns ago and they've flourished. I want to say (just guessing from memory and what I have seen on the map) they have around 20 settlements. The own most of the Southeastern side of the map. Cantabri who I have no real dealings with owns all of Spain / France.

I think it might be possible for the AI to win. Maybe this weekend when I'm sitting around watching football I'll start up a new campaign on Legendary, and just sit tight in the British Isles. I assume legendary would be the best difficulty for a more aggressive AI, and Iceni because people will probably leave me alone. I'll take a bunch of screenshots, and see how many turns I can get through in an afternoon, and report back.


There's got to be a console command to reveal the entire map. If anyone knows it or a mod it would be much appreciated.

[Sp4]

I usually don't see too many empires form, but if I do it's strangely from a minor faction like Libya for instance.

Yeah, when I went to war with Carthage/Lybia/Nova Carthago, Lybia was defnitely giving me the most problems. They were a lot stronger than the other two.

[nearchos]

I own 100 settlements as Macedon right now, playing on Very Hard and there is no faction equal to power.
During the campaign, the Seleucids were very strong with about 10-12 settlements ant a few satrapies, then the Chorasmii took their place owning everything from bactria and all way to the west of the caspian sea, but eventualy ran out of food, and the same happened with deferent factions, Cyrenaica, nassamones, Rome etc.

My point is that when you pass the midle of the game and have become super power, with 15 armies etc, there is no other faction to confort you and become magor competitor and your prime enemy, its just a race against time to complete the objectives.

The only difficulty is to control vast areas and at the same time expand with a limited no of armies.

Im not sure wetther the AI will eventually win the game, with what i have seen it will grow strong, run out of foon and die.Its totaly incapable to manage the economy, the bildings or even to present armies with advance unit types later in the game.

Unfortunately....

[Bramborough]

its just a race against time to complete the objectives.

Um...I know I'm going to betray my ignorance here...but, there's a time limit?

I'm at 220ish turns right now (roughly 50BC) and still have like 50 settlements to go for a Mil Victory. Just never felt a time pressure to expand. Am I in trouble?

[Sp4]

Um...I know I'm going to betray my ignorance here...but, there's a time limit?

I'm at 220ish turns right now (roughly 50BC) and still have like 50 settlements to go for a Mil Victory. Just never felt a time pressure to expand. Am I in trouble?

I think the game 'lasts' until 0AD or 10AD or something.

Im not sure wetther the AI will eventually win the game, with what i have seen it will grow strong, run out of foon and die.Its totaly incapable to manage the economy, the bildings or even to present armies with advance unit types later in the game.

And yes, this really is unfortunate. There is no reason to tech any higher than cohort organisation as Romans because there is just no military any other faction can put up that's going to beat Legionaries, Auxiliary Cav, Auxiliary Infantry, some random assortment of Auxiliary missile infantry and 1-2 Ballistas in any of your 20 unit stacks.

I've had battles where I was surrounded on some little overgrown hilltop and 'dug in' enough for my 1600 men collection of all of the above to successfully fend off 4000 Iberian melee and skirmishing infantry with 'acceptable losses' and I'm playing on hard cause the game is so damn easy. I'm going to try playing very hard next although the potential agent spam is putting me off a little since right now, the only way the AI can really 'beat' the player is by being an annoying pain in the ass.

[Jonoleth Irenicus]

Has anyone ever seen an AI faction grow to be a major power?
.

African "Uber" Tribes.

Carthage doesn't stand a chance against them.

[Slaists]

African "Uber" Tribes.

Carthage doesn't stand a chance against them.

Thos "uber" tribes go down the same route as Carthage once they gain territory. The issue seems to be that the AI cannot handle the current army limit system. As soon as the AI grows, it, in effect, overextends by concentrating the limited number of armies where the main action is. This allows one-region minors march their 3 stacks right into the heartlands of the soon-to-be-dead AI empires.