Artificial stupidity

[Arker]

The worst thing about this game for me is the so-called AI. I'm really steamed right now. Scripted an atlantian king to cast a handful of spells then attack. He has the champions trident, but also a chest wound, so I'd really rather not have him attack, but the thing is, a few turns back when he was on 'stay behind troops' he decided to cast the cold-radiation spell and destroyed my mages with it. Dumb &(@%... grr... so I figured having him attack would prevent that. Nope. He casts his spells, and throws in that cold radation trick again all on his own, then goes to attack, killing another mage (the just arrived replacement from the capital for the two he killed before) and several spearmen in the process.

There's got to be something to do about this, it's just way too stupid. I've come up with a lot of little tricks to try and minimise it, but I haven't found any way to keep it from happening entirely. Very frustrating. Anyone else?

Any word on whether Dom III will pull the same crap? I think I'm going to wait to be convinced it doesn't before I buy it. I'm so sick of this.

[Wish]

you could... um... jut move him away from the mages for his starting position?

[Arker]

I do. He moves over to them and kills them anyway.

[Arker]

Started a new game with Jotunheim. At least breath of winter doesn't cause friendly-fire deaths with the giants. Still just hilariously stupid though.

Niefel giant prophet. Scripted:

Divine bless
Holy avenger
Fanaticism
Attack one turn
Fanaticism
Attack

What's he do?

Divine bless
Holy avenger
BREATH OF WINTER
Attack one turn
Fanaticism
Attack

I'm not making this up. Heck, I couldn't make this up. Blows my mind. This guy has that effect already, why would he waste fatigue casting it? *ROFL*

I've gone through the replay over and over, and thought and thought, and the only thing I can come up with is this. He hits the first fanaticism, no one has been hit yet, so there's no morale loss to fix, so he decides to cast another spell instead. That much of it makes sense, I guess. But why he picks a spell that does nothing but increase his fatigue is a mystery. Why his Atlantean predecessor would consistently pick that *same* spell, and proceed to decimate his own mages with it, is similarly a mystery. Playing man last week I had a Jade Sorceress with the same fixation. Whenever she got a chance, she'd fire off that Breath of Winter and then get lonely and start snuggling up with the lizards. This was particularly funny when she chose to do this while fighting Jotun, so not only was there no chance of it ever hitting anyone except her own side, it wouldn't hurt the enemy even if she did get close to them somehow.

The spell-casting AI in this game is seriously whack.

[Ygorl]

You're right about why he didn't cast Fanaticism. In a case like that, the AI picks a spell out of everything he might cast. The AI tends to favor spells that protect the caster, followed by spells that summon dudes, unless there's a nice target available for a direct-damage spell.

It might be true that Niefel Giants have "chill" (which causes fatigue and sometimes chilling of neighbors) but not "Breath of Winter" (which also causes actual damage). I suspect this is the case, actually? Anyway, the AI likes the spell, and isn't aware that it can sometimes hurt your own guys. It's maybe the biggest spellcasting AI frustration in the game.

The way the AI works, by the way, (if I'm remembering right) is that it first looks at the scripted spell - if it would have no effect, or if the script is such that the caster's spell is not specified, it practice-casts a bunch of spells (several times each?) and picks the one that has the best effect to actually cast. Not sure how "best" is defined.

[shovah]

I had the same problem with atlantis, the answer is either spread your mages out and set them to their spells then just cast (so they never move) or script them all to BoW.

[Graeme Dice]

Arker said:
I'm not making this up. Heck, I couldn't make this up. Blows my mind. This guy has that effect already, why would he waste fatigue casting it?

No, he doesn't have breath of winter by default. He has a chill aura that causes fatigue and can freeze opponents. Breath of winter is a completely separate effect.

[Graeme Dice]

Arker said:
I do. He moves over to them and kills them anyway.

First off, he will only cast breath of winter if you give him an untyped "cast" order, or if you didn't put him close enough to the front lines so that his scripted spells would reach any enemies, or if you asked him to cast spells that require gems. and there's only a trivial number of opponents. Secondly, if you tell him to attack, then he will only move into range of your other mages if there is an enemy in that direction.

[NTJedi]

Arker said:
I do. He moves over to them and kills them anyway.

Move him closer to the front and move your mages closer to the back.
OR
Place him on one side of the battlefield and place your mages on the exact opposite side of the battlefield.

[Arralen]

A mage does not move over to other mages ... in fact he doesn't even know about them. He moved over behind the rearmost squad, as he was ordered to do!

Never, I mean NEVER set a mage to "stay behind troops" !!

A commander set to "stay behind troops" will move to the rear of the rearmost non-fleeing, non-bodyguard squad and stay there until the squad flees - but nothing more. No matter if he's a mage or a priest or has spellcasting ability from an item, he wouldn't cast any spells.(or would attack an enemy unit in melee, unless attacked himself)

But you want your mages to cast spells. Therefore their script should read:
"cast [spell XY]"
"cast [spell XY]"
"cast [spell XY]" OR "attack -" if you want him to move up to the front line
"cast [spell XY]"
"cast spells"

Be careful to choose your spells XY in such a way that the mage will be able to cast them.

If you want your mage to attack after buffing up, make sure there's a way for him to reach enemy forces. "attack nearest" might be a bad idea after 4 rounds of spellcasting - you troops will be engaged already as "hold and attack" has them on the move on the 3rd turn. With troops engaged and squads fanning out he won't be able to find his way around them and get stuck in their rear.
Therefore, use "attack nearest" only on turn 3 but not later, or place your troops and mage/pretender in such a way that there's a clear path for him towards the enemy. If he needs 3 or 4 turns to buff up, better set him to the side and use "attack rearmost" or "attack archers"... . Just make sure he's strong enough or assign him some bodyguards.