AI difficulty. Something wrong?

Matrix Games Forums

Forums Register Login Photo Gallery Member List Search Calendars FAQ

My Profile Inbox Address Book My Subscription My Forums Log Out

AI difficulty. Something wrong?

View related threads: (in this forum | in all forums)

Logged in as: Guest

Users viewing this topic: none

Printable Version

All Forums >> [Current Games From Matrix.] >> [Ancients] >> Tin Soldiers: Julius Caesar >> AI difficulty. Something wrong?

Page: [1] 2 next > >>

Message

<< Older Topic Newer Topic >>

AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/1/2005 2:03:20 PM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

Hi
I truly enjoyed TSATG and bought TSJC the day it was released. I love the tension before a turn is resolved and you know the outcome of the battle can depend on the success of one or two flanking attacks. My concern right now is that it seems to me as the game is to easy.

In TSATG I had to play most of the battles 2-3 times to get even a minor victory. Playing TSJC on hard I have this far four straight major victories in the gallic campaign. The "hardest" battle was against the British: my casualties-16000 enemy-64000. Battle of Alesia: 6600/75000.

I have a game(can't remember which it is)that had it's difficulty settings reversed. Hard was easy and easy was hard.
Could that be the case here? I hope so. Otherwise, I don't understand how I can be such a good general all of a sudden.

Post #: 1

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/2/2005 2:14:59 PM

GreenDestiny

Posts: 177
Joined: 1/4/2005
From: Alamogordo NM
Status: offline

I agree, as far as I can tell TSJC is easier than TSATG. I don't know if the difficulty setting is reveres because I've been playing on normal all the time. What I like to know is what do the difficulty settings do, is the AI different/better of does the other side get a combat bonus. Maybe I should try out a battle a few times and see what happens.

_____________________________

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 2

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/2/2005 4:51:10 PM

koiosworks

Posts: 813
Joined: 6/20/2004
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: GreenDestiny

I agree, as far as I can tell TSJC is easier than TSATG. I don't know if the difficulty setting is reveres because I've been playing on normal all the time. What I like to know is what do the difficulty settings do, is the AI different/better of does the other side get a combat bonus. Maybe I should try out a battle a few times and see what happens.

Here is a scoop on how our AI works and what the settings mean. Also some commentary on overall hardness compared to Alexander.

Our AI is built in a similar way that a Chess Algorithm thinks. Because there are too many possible moves to effectively evalutate them all in any reasonable time, we use Heuristics. That is, our AI takes an educated 'best guess' at what each unit should do given the current map. The AI then looks at all the unit's best guesses and attempts to coordinate the units. It coordinates the units by having them take more 'best' guesses given what it now knows what its own army plans to do (for example, if 2 out of 3 units in a line decide to march forward, then the 3rd unit will now decide it should also move forward, changing its original guess). We cycle through this process until an optimal strategy is scored. With a few small exceptions, the AI is totally clueless on what orders the player is issuing - that is, the AI does not cheat by looking at the players orders. Just like a chess computer, the longer the AI thinks (cycles through guesses) the better the outcome.

On easy level we limit the AI thinking time to about 1/2 normal
On normal level AI thinking is normal
On hard level AI thinking is about double normal

Note, that just like a chess computer, the 'best' move may be so obvious that "easy" and 'hard' come up with same decision.

We also give the player more gold each level on easy and less gold each level on hard.

As an aside, the single biggest complaint we heard from our player on Alexander was the dificulty level. We understand how frustrating it can be to lose a battle 6 or 7 times. Therefore, in general, JS is easier. Not from the AI perspective as much as from the VP requirements to 'win'. So, in a round-about way we made it easier to win by simply lowering the VP requirements. Also, in Alexander, the AI was always on "hard" - so normal and easy are indeed 'easier' levels.

Cheers!

(in reply to GreenDestiny)

Post #: 3

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/2/2005 6:28:58 PM

offbase

Posts: 29
Joined: 4/11/2005
Status: offline

Thank you SOOOOOOOOO much for not allowing the AI to cheat but peeking at the player's commands! You have no idea how frustrating it is when in some games, e.g., you pull a completely unexpected masterstroke that should net you a victory, only to have it snatched away when the AI "coincidentally" and simultaneously sends strong forces to the same spot to cut you off. Of course, there are other examples of cheating which are just as frustrating, which IMO is just a shortcut to make up for a poor AI. Hats off!

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 4

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/2/2005 10:44:31 PM

GreenDestiny

Posts: 177
Joined: 1/4/2005
From: Alamogordo NM
Status: offline

That�s cool�thanks Koiosworks.

I was thinking maybe you can have a very hard level setting were the AI can use some cards in a battle like Barrage, Berserk, Poison and Fire Arrows. And have a small card place besides them so a player can click on it and check and see what it is.

_____________________________

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 5

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/2/2005 11:47:07 PM

ravinhood

Posts: 3891
Joined: 10/23/2003
Status: offline

Yeah perhaps beefing up the AI a little more in the VP catagory might be in order if it's now become "too easy". I applaud games where it takes several games to defeat the AI. I have no problems with the AI cheating at all myself. I actually expect the AI's to cheat, otherwise mostly they are easily defeated on even the hardest difficulties like ROME TOTAL WAR is even with the bonuses.

Slitherine's SPARTAN v1.013 has one of the best AI's (yeah it gets handicaps and advantages) I've ever played and was appaulled that they dumbed it down because a "FEW" people whined about how hard it was. Big flippin deal, if you can't beat it, keep trying. I say make AI's hard as hell on hardest and highest difficulties like the Civilization series AI. Whatever it takes, but, at least have one difficulty that is harder than hell to defeat.

If there is no fear of losing, what's the use and fun of playing any game?

(in reply to GreenDestiny)

Post #: 6

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/3/2005 1:44:26 AM

hondo1375

Posts: 157
Joined: 3/12/2005
From: London, UK
Status: offline

Thanks for the candid response concerning the AI's workings.

Is there any way to have some setting - either through a mod or an enhancement - that increases the time the AI takes to calculate its turn to be greater than twice normal? I'm assuming there must be some law of diminishing returns in operation, i.e. giving it an hour of computation time doesn't give you a factor of 60 better solution than a one minute computation, but perhaps significantly better solutions can be obtained with more computation time than the hard setting.

I know most people understandably want short computation times, but there are some fanatics that what to squeeze the most out of the AI whatever the cost in time (or maybe it is just me). Any chance of humoring an old man on this?

Hondo

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 7

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/3/2005 5:58:16 AM

sol_invictus

Posts: 1961
Joined: 10/2/2001
From: Kentucky
Status: offline

I agree Hondo; I wouldn't mind waiting a bit more for the AI if it would mean better play by the AI.

(in reply to hondo1375)

Post #: 8

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/3/2005 9:48:48 AM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

I also agree with the above.Give the AI more time if it means it will put up a better fight.

Koiosworks, thanks for the answer and AI explanation. If I understand it correctly, the hard level in TSJC corresponds to the level of AI thinking in TSATG. This makes me somewhat bewildered because I play on hard now and I don't feel that the AI is nowhere near as challenging as in the previous game.

The combat calculation also seems different to what I remember from TSATG.
I've often have units of mine standing in place and defend for several turns, fighting of attack after attack with practically no losses and inflicting 3,4 and even 500 in losses to the attacking units (for each attack-not combined) . If attacked from the flank they still usually win by a margin of 100 or 200.

In TSATG the difficulty was near perfect in my opinion(close to being to hard). I wish there is some way this game can come closer to that.

(in reply to hondo1375)

Post #: 9

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/3/2005 3:49:09 PM

z1812

Posts: 1796
Joined: 9/1/2004
Status: offline

Hey Koios,

Am I to understand that the hard setting of TSJC would be the same as the hard setting for TSAG? Including victory conditions?

If not why not? You have built your reputation on TSAG and a great deal of its success was based upon a good A.I. and challenging victory conditions. If it is not broken don't fix it!

I really become tired of gamers with no stomach for the patience and thought that is required to play a challenging wargame. So they whine and the developers respond by "fixing the game" so wienies can win.

At least if you are going to dumb it down allow a selectable option that would maintain difficulty and victory conditions ala TSAG for those of us who relish challenge and a thoughtful game.

A good A.I. is so hard to find. You at Koios seem to have developed quite a good one. Please don't water it down. In the wargame world it is too rare a find.

Regards John

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 10

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/3/2005 4:35:50 PM

koiosworks

Posts: 813
Joined: 6/20/2004
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Hidde

The combat calculation also seems different to what I remember from TSATG.
I've often have units of mine standing in place and defend for several turns, fighting of attack after attack with practically no losses and inflicting 3,4 and even 500 in losses to the attacking units (for each attack-not combined) . If attacked from the flank they still usually win by a margin of 100 or 200.

In TSATG the difficulty was near perfect in my opinion(close to being to hard). I wish there is some way this game can come closer to that.

That is the strength of the big 6 stand legions... as time wears on you can find your legions diminshing in strength but the barbarians keep coming. When you get to the civil war you will be fighting other Roman legions and tactics that work on the Gauls might fail. Pompey's legions will give you a beating if you allow them to. We wanted to have a different 'flavor' of strategy between the mob vs profession soldier parts of the campaign and we think the 6 stand units do well.

As far as AI difficulty. We believe the game's AI is very challenging at Hard. About 25% of our playtesters could not win at hard. Frankly, some of our playtesters had a hard time winning at 'easy'. (names withheld to protect their egos

) It is a struggle to balance 'hard' vs 'impossible' and "AI" vs "cheat". We tried hard to have the game have a proper balance while remaining a challenge but still fun.

Enjoy!

< Message edited by koiosworks -- 5/3/2005 4:36:03 PM >

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 11

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/4/2005 6:39:32 AM

ravinhood

Posts: 3891
Joined: 10/23/2003
Status: offline

But, that was the "beta testers", now you are encountering the "real gamers", the ones with minds beyond that of a mere beta tester (heh am I gonna get destroyed now). We want more challenge, we WANT IMPOSSIBLE, I DARE YOU TO CREATE an IMPOSSIBLE AI I can't defeat, haha. Well maybe "NEAR IMPOSSIBLE" perhaps? Heh, you probably could create an impossible one by just adjusting the combat values and my units even massed would never win. lol, of course we don't want that. But, anything that is an OPTION is always welcome to us hardcore players against the AI. ;)

One thing I've suggested to every designer and developer out there that I just do not understand why it can't be implemented is a simple combat SLIDER system.

You have one slider for Offensive stats that goes from -10 to +10
and you have one slider for Defensive stats that goes from -10 to +10 that the player adjusts to his type of play for a challenge. Combat Mission and Steel Panthers do a pretty good job of having options like that, though they aren't sliders they are there for the player to adjust the bonus that the AI gets. I like to give the Combat Mission AI 25% bonus to troups and the +2 or +3 combat modifier depending on the mission type. Gives me a challenge every game. This is so great for the solo player that likes to play against the AI, and for those that find it too hard, they have up to -10 to adjust the combat stats and defensive stats and for those that find the AI too easy they have up to +10 combat stats. This system should be in every game I think, so the AI challenge and adjustments are in the "hands of the player" and not "hardcoded" by the game.

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 12

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/4/2005 4:20:52 PM

koiosworks

Posts: 813
Joined: 6/20/2004
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: ravinhood

We want more challenge, we WANT IMPOSSIBLE, I DARE YOU TO CREATE an IMPOSSIBLE AI I can't defeat, haha. Well maybe "NEAR IMPOSSIBLE" perhaps?

Hey Ravinhood.... gonna have to make you a tester for our next product

I'm curious, did you ever buy TS: Alexander or TS: Ceasar? (it's hard to tell from post if you actually played them or not?). I think you will find the games bonecrushingly hard and not by using a bogus "AI is a cheating dirty dog" crutch that many games utilize since they lack the l33t AI programming skills of Deride. If I had a nickle for every time Darius III/Pompey spanked one of our players I'd be a rich man

(in reply to ravinhood)

Post #: 13

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/4/2005 6:24:23 PM

offbase

Posts: 29
Joined: 4/11/2005
Status: offline

I've bought both of them myself. Alexander was extremely challenging. I personally think JC is less of a challenge, but challenging nonetheless, and an improvement overall over ATG. I haven't spent 2 much time with JC yet, but it took me a few weeks to finish ATG, most of it spent on trying to figure out how to win that Gaza scenario, which just had horde after horde of "Egyptians" coming at you out of nowhere. The "lazy" cop-out you describe has always been my biggest gripe: artificial "intelligence" that merely utilizes cheats to screw over a player who has actually beaten it. You always know when a computer player has read your orders, or seen your units through the "fog of war". I'd love to be a beta tester, myself. One aspect of ancient and medievel warfare which games generally overlook is the effect a hammer-like break-through had on early minds. If you crushed one flank (or especially the center), they'd usually run for the hills en masse. That, and of course Darius' habit of running away himself when that happened, is pretty much how Al and his 30-40k army managed to defeat Persian formations 10 or more times their own size. Kill the king or general? It's usually over. MTW did have a fair system for the latter, but most games usually just don't reward you properly for a well-executed flanking or encirclement strike.

Hey Ravinhood.... gonna have to make you a tester for our next product

[/quote]

< Message edited by offbase -- 5/4/2005 6:27:22 PM >

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 14

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/5/2005 12:49:47 AM

Adam Parker

Posts: 1848
Joined: 4/2/2002
From: Melbourne Australia
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: koiosworks

If I had a nickle for every time Darius III/Pompey spanked one of our players I'd be a rich man

I didn't know there was a Bondage card

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 15

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/5/2005 1:47:02 AM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

quote:

That is the strength of the big 6 stand legions... as time wears on you can find your legions diminshing in strength but the barbarians keep coming. When you get to the civil war you will be fighting other Roman legions and tactics that work on the Gauls might fail. Pompey's legions will give you a beating if you allow them to. We wanted to have a different 'flavor' of strategy between the mob vs profession soldier parts of the campaign and we think the 6 stand units do well.

Aha,I see.Meeting my fellow romans on the battlefield will be another kind of experience.
I haven't started the Civil War yet but can see how this could be the case.Sounds promising.

quote:

I'm curious, did you ever buy TS: Alexander or TS: Ceasar? (it's hard to tell from post if you actually played them or not?). I think you will find the games bonecrushingly hard and not by using a bogus "AI is a cheating dirty dog" crutch that many games utilize since they lack the l33t AI programming skills of Deride. If I had a nickle for every time Darius III/Pompey spanked one of our players I'd be a rich man

I don't want to be a nuisance but there is a difference in the level of difficulty between the two games. At least when playing the gallic campaign. I'm no grognard, hardcore player or whatnot but to me TSATG was hard. TSJC is not. It have been a walk in the park this far. Still fun, but no challenge beating the barbarians thats for sure.

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 16

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/5/2005 3:46:12 AM

CamelCity

Posts: 10
Joined: 4/15/2005
From: Winston-Salem, NC
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: koiosworks

That is the strength of the big 6 stand legions... as time wears on you can find your legions diminshing in strength but the barbarians keep coming. When you get to the civil war you will be fighting other Roman legions and tactics that work on the Gauls might fail.

I've just started the Roman Civil War, and it has gotten tougher. I scored Major Victories as I strolled through Gaul, but when I started the Civil War, I found that not only had my opponent become tougher, I was also forced to make choices before the battle as well.

I've had shortages in the treasury that have led to difficult decisions: do I take fewer but fully-replenished units to battle, or do I take the maximum number allowed, even if some are a few stands short of a full load. I've had Legions with Elite infantry units, but only 4 or 5 stands full. Do refresh and take the reduction of status, or send it to battle at less than full strength but with the elite status intact?

I think this "between the battles" part of the campaign play is a big improvement over TS:ATG. Presenting difficult choices to the player makes for a great game.

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 17

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/6/2005 2:19:58 AM

hondo1375

Posts: 157
Joined: 3/12/2005
From: London, UK
Status: offline

[/quote]

As far as AI difficulty. We believe the game's AI is very challenging at Hard. About 25% of our playtesters could not win at hard. Frankly, some of our playtesters had a hard time winning at 'easy'. (names withheld to protect their egos

) It is a struggle to balance 'hard' vs 'impossible' and "AI" vs "cheat". We tried hard to have the game have a proper balance while remaining a challenge but still fun.

[/quote]

Thanks for your comments. But here's the thing, some of us don't find any AI much of a challenge once we get the hang of the game (I'm differentiating here between the Computer Opponent and the Artificial Intelligence code that drives its decision-making - anyone can evetually be beat by a Computer Opponent given enough resource, die roll, combat factor or whatever advantages). It sounds like you guys have developed an AI that could be cranked up by increasing the calculation time beyond the currently hardest level. Why not humor some of us old grogs and allow a difficulty setting that leaves the AI an extreme amount of time to calculate its move? Pretty please.

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 18

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/8/2005 11:16:09 AM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

Ok, I have to give my opinion one more time.

I liked TSATG a lot. TSJC has improvements in graphics, in the campaign mode and more battles. What I find it hard to understand is why and how the challenging battles from the first game are gone.

I've played two battles( Ilerda & Dyrrachium) in the civil war campaign now and I'm sorry to say but they were about as easy as those in the gallic one. I don't know what's up with the AI but I'll give an observation about the quality of the units I faced in the two battles.

In the Ilerda scenario I counted 26 units for the AI. Poor:11 Warior:15 Veteran:0 Elite:0.
My troops in comparison. Poor:0 Warior:1 Veteran:6 Elite:17. (Three Inf. units had five stands & one Cav. unit had one stand)
Come on! Thats like giving me a handicap instead of the AI.
Dyrrachium was comparable.Lots of warrior units(24) and some poor(7) for the AI.No veteran or elite units whatsoever.

Someone suggested in an earlier post some kind of slider or +/- scale the player could use to give the AI an advantage in numbers and/or quality.Excellent suggestion in my opinion.

(in reply to koiosworks)

Post #: 19

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/20/2005 6:41:49 PM

ravinhood

Posts: 3891
Joined: 10/23/2003
Status: offline

quote:

Someone suggested in an earlier post some kind of slider or +/- scale the player could use to give the AI an advantage in numbers and/or quality.Excellent suggestion in my opinion.

See I told yah so. It's an excellent system to continue to make the AI a challenge. That's why I play Combat Mission and Steel Panthers so much, leaning more towards Combat Mission cause I like the gameplay better.

All games need that option so the players can adjust the AI. To this day I'm still trying to beat the highest difficulty level of Civilization II even without a slider, but, Sid knows how to create a very challenging AI, always has. Look how long Civilization II has lasted for play value. Once I beat an AI on the most difficult level it is no challenge or use to me anymore, thus, why I scream for player optioned AI control or an extremely challenging impossible difficulty level.

Then again perhaps designers/developers make cheap AI's for a reason, they "PROMISE" you a MORE challenging AI in the NEXT RETAIL (give us more money) version and then you end up getting more of the same or even less. Rome Total War is a prime example of that.

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 20

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/20/2005 6:53:59 PM

Deride

Posts: 488
Joined: 6/21/2004
From: Dallas, TX
Status: offline

We have actually adressed the exact problem reported by Hidde with the 1.1. patch. His army was too elite, causing a major imbalance against the game's design. There is now an elite unit cap that keeps this from happening.

ravinhood, you should understand that developing the AI for a wargame is extremely difficult. There are a number of parts that go into this:

1) Level design -- you have to make the level itself fun to play and include things such as bottlenecks, strategically important areas, etc. Also, the objectives have to be challenging yet achievable.

2) Resource balancing -- does the AI have access to more things or less things? What about types of things? In our game, the player has cards, # of troops, troop training and commander bonuses. The AI army needs to be somewhat balanced against these features while, at the same time, responding the the dynamic nature of the player's choices.

3) AI scripting -- the AI opponent needs to know what it is trying to accomplish in the game. Making it go for objectives or defend them requires both the appropriate placement of troops at the beginning of the map as well as a general idea of how to achieve a victory.

4) AI programming -- something that is very hard to achieve without cheating since the solution space is usually so huge! Simply using a "slider" does not make the AI smarter (especially since the particular alrogithm that we developed does not really get better with time, per se.)

So, with that all said, let me just tell you that Koios Works (as well as most developers I assume) have little ulterior motive in designing/implementing the AI in a certain way. We are trying to make the game fun and challenging. If it is, we hope you enjoy it and consider buying our next game. If not, we hope you tell us why so we can address the issues and patch as quickly as we can.

Deride

(in reply to ravinhood)

Post #: 21

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/22/2005 9:52:31 AM

ravinhood

Posts: 3891
Joined: 10/23/2003
Status: offline

Heh, I am telling you why. And even with all your description of what you have to do to program an AI, it is past my feasabilty to understand why you cannot put in some slider or option system where the player merely has the ability to adjust the AI combat STATS.

I'm not asking for a SMARTER AI, just an AI that I myself ME can make STRONGER in their STATS. Combat and Defensive, now explain to me why that is so hard to do.

Every unit has a combat stat correct? And a Defensive stat, why can't a slider or option be added that merely adjusts these stats up or down from -10 to +10?

Your AI would remain in tact as presented by the game, but, those of us who find the AI too easy or too hard just have that ability to change the COMBAT STATS, nothing else, just that. How does that affect all you descibed above?

Now I'm an old programmer of the olden days, but, even I could put in sub-commands for the AI to adjust to it's combat/defensive values. It's nothing more than an IF statement and a GOTO statement of the days of old.

What I see in todays AI programers is laziness, they don't want to program in those "sub routines" because they do take time, they want to build one single AI pattern and that's it, thus the AI grows old, easy and boring.

And you can't tell me it's not possible, Combat Mission, Steel Panthers and even Madden Football incorporate this system so the AI challenge is in the PLAYERS hands and not hard coded.

(in reply to Deride)

Post #: 22

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/23/2005 1:29:08 AM

Erik Rutins

Posts: 37503
Joined: 3/28/2000
From: Vermont, USA
Status: offline

Ravinhood,

Have you tried a new campaign on the Hard level since v1.1 came out?

Regards,

- Erik

_____________________________

Erik Rutins
CEO, Matrix Games LLC

For official support, please use our Help Desk: http://www.matrixgames.com/helpdesk/

Freedom is not Free.

(in reply to ravinhood)

Post #: 23

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/23/2005 5:39:05 PM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
Have you tried a new campaign on the Hard level since v1.1 came out?

I have. It's changed for the better but not by very much I'm afraid. So far I have fought three battles. Major victory in all three but in both the Helvetii and the German scenarios I found myself 2-3 times in quite serious trouble that required both some thinking and a bit of luck to solve.

I also noticed that the German cavalry had a lot of veteran units(even a couple of infantry units were veterans).
I don't remember if that was the case the first time I played and I haven't read anything about a change with the patch.
As ravinhood said above the AI is fine(it put up a good fight in TSATG after all) but I really agree that there should be an option for the player to change the level of training(quality) of the AI army.

PS. Increasing the number of units for the AI maybe is'nt such a good idea since it could probably make the battlefield to cluttered. But what about reinforcements? Let's say the AI fight for a certain amount of turns without breaking then a fixed number of extra units(for the AI) appear somewhere on the field. DS.

(in reply to Erik Rutins)

Post #: 24

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/23/2005 6:18:59 PM

Deride

Posts: 488
Joined: 6/21/2004
From: Dallas, TX
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Hidde

quote:

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
Have you tried a new campaign on the Hard level since v1.1 came out?

I have. It's changed for the better but not by very much I'm afraid. So far I have fought three battles. Major victory in all three but in both the Helvetii and the German scenarios I found myself 2-3 times in quite serious trouble that required both some thinking and a bit of luck to solve.

Hidde,

Did you start a new campaign or continue playing with your old one? If your army already has a large number of elite units, the unit cap will not reduce them -- it will just no longer auto promote to elite at the end of a battle. Also, the AI settings will remain at a much easier level unless you start a new campaign.

Deride

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 25

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/23/2005 6:55:04 PM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

New campaign. The first one was victorious after seven battles.

I think the unit cap is good and it do make a difference that I hope will be even more noticable later on in the civil war campaign. But still...it's not enough to make the challenge comparable to what it was in TSATG I think.

(in reply to Deride)

Post #: 26

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/24/2005 10:54:43 PM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
Have you tried a new campaign on the Hard level since v1.1 came out?

quote:

I have

Oh boy! Am I confused now!?
It's possible I've played the 1.0.0 version the second time as well.

I just spotted those numbers when had finished the Alesia scenario. Shock and embarassment! The 1.1.0 "read me" was in the JC folder and when I reinstalled the patch I got a message that it was already installed.
I then started the game and now it said 1.1.0. What can I say? It seemed a little bit harder and I thought the elite unit cap was in place.
I appologise for any complaints that's not founded in reality.
I don't know much about the inner workings of computers and I'd be grateful if someone could explain what might have happend.
Thanks

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 27

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/24/2005 11:17:49 PM

Erik Rutins

Posts: 37503
Joined: 3/28/2000
From: Vermont, USA
Status: offline

Hidde,

Did you perhaps have your anti-virus software running when you applied the patch previously? That can cause odd results. Also, installing it as a user that does not have administrative rights can cause issues for some.

In any case, lets us know how your new v1.1 campaign works out.

Regards,

- Erik

_____________________________

Erik Rutins
CEO, Matrix Games LLC

For official support, please use our Help Desk: http://www.matrixgames.com/helpdesk/

Freedom is not Free.

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 28

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 5/25/2005 12:33:02 PM

Hidde

Posts: 81
Joined: 5/1/2005
Status: offline

Erik
Thanks for your answer
Could be the anti-virus software I suppose. Had it on both times,though. But who knows how a computer reacts from one time to another?

Regards
Hidde

(in reply to Erik Rutins)

Post #: 29

RE: AI difficulty. Something wrong? - 6/17/2005 10:42:21 AM

hondo1375

Posts: 157
Joined: 3/12/2005
From: London, UK
Status: offline

Hidde, I wonder if you got your version issue sorted and have had the opportunity to play against the updated AI? Have you found it significantly improved? Hondo

(in reply to Hidde)

Post #: 30