Quick bits of feedback after about 100 hours of play

Thats what I ment Graeme. There is only a % chance that orders on Fire Rearmost will actually target them. Fire Rearmost is the only one that I know that functions this way, all other orders work right out of the box.

I believe it is a 20% or lower chance, from the tests I've done.

I may have phrased it wrong, but that's what I ment

Edit: Or it could have been any # of things that may or may not impact the game that we have no idea on. Having only 1 mounted unit on a battlefield is also not a good idea, as well as only 1 large unit (unless you have Air Shield or high prot) simply because of that.

[ January 30, 2004, 20:05: Message edited by: Zen ]

[Chris Byler]

Originally posted by Zen:
Thats what I ment Graeme. There is only a % chance that orders on Fire Rearmost will actually target them. Fire Rearmost is the only one that I know that functions this way, all other orders work right out of the box.

I believe it is a 20% or lower chance, from the tests I've done.

I may have phrased it wrong, but that's what I ment

Edit: Or it could have been any # of things that may or may not impact the game that we have no idea on. Having only 1 mounted unit on a battlefield is also not a good idea, as well as only 1 large unit (unless you have Air Shield or high prot) simply because of that.

Having only one large unit can even be a useful tactic, if it's something like a Crusher that is built to take it. Put the Crusher up front on attack closest, watch it get surrounded by enemies that can't get through its PROT, and watch all the enemies on fire large monsters decimate their own troops that are surrounding the Crusher.

Similarly, one flier, if it's an Iron Dragon.

I don't know how the game decides what qualifies as "cavalry" though. Is a Centaur cavalry? A chariot? A War Lobster? An elephant? A wolf rider? (I'm pretty sure elephants qualified in Dom I; I used fire cavalry orders to rout them faster, sometimes before they reached my lines).

Anything with the #mounted tag I believe.

Spiders, Black Hunters, Elephants, Cavalry, Any Centaurs (I dunno about Chariots, I've always had people fire on the Elephants first, but I believe that was because they were nearer than the Chariots), any commander with no feet slots, Mammoths, Behemoths, Great Lions (Summer Lions), Fay Boars, Salamanders, and probably a bunch of other things I can't think of off the top of my head.

I've never actually tried to fire on War Lobsters with Fire Cavalry, but I assume they are. I don't know where Shambler Thralls or Minotaurs stand either.

[ January 30, 2004, 21:07: Message edited by: Zen ]

[diamondspider]

Originally posted by Zen:
Well since you claimed the AI was *cheating* (as you put it) I'd assume you are not providing honest feedback on what you know, but your opinion about something you may or may not understand. I don't claim to understand the game in it's entirety, and even in part the Develeopers have said the same themselves. So I find it particularly hard that you suddenly know the secrets to the AI in a 100 hours, unless you are reading the code and can say.

It's hard to come to a discussion claiming "cheating" and "this is what is WRONG" when you in fact don't know if it's wrong, right, bad luck, circumstance, or in fact cheating. And blanket statements like "The AI this" are in fact very misleading.

I'd hope you'll find as you play with the game more and discover more about it, how you think it works, and how you were wrong about any number of things, you'd have more appreciation for that, but not everyone does.

You might want to read this thread again. I said that IF the unit is using the old command that allows targeting of commanders that it would be something that I couldn't do and therefore cheating.

Besides, my purpose as I clearly stated in my thread starter was to point out a few things that annoyed ME.

How you got to "right" and "wrong" is 100% about you and has nothing to do with me.

Do realize that I can dislike something and still not believe it is wrong. In any case, I do dislike one crossbowman targeting my one commander while being obsured by 100 other units and it seems I'm not alone in this dislike. I have every right to express that and did.

Trying to bully me out of my feeling isn't going to work.

[ January 30, 2004, 22:35: Message edited by: diamondspider ]

Since when has disagreeing with someones opinion been bullying? Or pointing out the flaws in an argument?

IF it is doing it, it is a bug and it has been at the very least acknowledged. But you'll find as you play the game more and the more you read these forums that half of what you consider a 'bug' is intentional or at least unfixable at current. Just like your bug of towers shooting poison slingshot. So stating that a remote possibility of what happened is a bug and therefore cheating is tainted by all the variables of the game and not so cut and dry.

If you feel that me arguing with what you consider 'wrong' is bullying, then so be it. But my opinion is that your argument is less based on fact and more based on ignorance, that we ALL have and takes time to overcome (so you think I'm not saying I don't have times where I don't know what is going on the same as everyone else).

Neither was I flaming you, if I was flaming you I'm sure you would have noticed as well as most of the forum. This forum is lacking much of the common flaming you find elsewhere and I think that is in part because it's rational discussion and not "Flame people often?" comments that prove no point.

[diamondspider]

Originally posted by Zen:
Well I can say personally I didn't know the in's and out's of the AI as apparently you do after just 100 hours of play.....

Not a very friendly thing to imply. Do you flame people often? Do you enjoy it?

I am here giving honest feedback to what personally bugs me. I don't claim to know anything about the AI, but I sort of have to speculate if something is bugging me and there are 4 people telling me that it isn't.

No good deed goes unpunished it seems...

[ January 30, 2004, 12:45: Message edited by: diamondspider ]

[diamondspider]

Originally posted by IKerensky:

quote:

---

Originally posted by diamondspider:
[QB] So 2 horsemen ride up and my unit of 50 breaks them, that unit then pursues the one remaining horseman (on foot no less) the entire length of the battlefield while ignoring the 50 other troops they pass unless they are directly in their path?

Even you must admit that the troops didn't pursue fleeing units forever, right?

Well all depend of what you mean by forever. In numerous case ( antiquities battle mainly ) troups going into pursuit never come back to the battlefield until long after battle end.

We have account of pursuit for several hours to even days.

In fact, this even was a part of battle strategy and at a point Hannibal (IIRC) specifically deploy his small cavalry in front of the heaviest Mauritanian one in the hope they will rout and be pursued, effectively deprieving his opponent of one of his better weapon, leaving footmen fight between them. His tactic work and the ennemy cavalry doesnt show up until next day.

I think that the current AI could use some cleaning but the problem is not nearly as bad or illogical as it can seem.

BTW I am totally against a specific fire at commander, from a gamebalance and historical point of view. It is simply impossible to distinguish the commander from the unit in the battlefield in real life. All you can do is target the rear area and hope for a lucky shot. I am speaking of unit commander and not HQ wich tend to be more identifiable but usually out of harm way.

The current target rear and target archer commands are enough, it is up to you to protect your valuable unit by carefully setting them up... For the lone XBow targetting your commander I think it could be the AI unit commander equipped with magical weapons at they seems to target more specifically their counterpart... wich I fairly understand due to their "magical" power.

I think we need to remember that Dominions worl is more antic ( ancient romans, greek, and so ) than modern age thus the current way the battle work ( give order to unit before hand and pray, having no power to alter battle after it start ) is absolutely right for thsoes times.

---

Yes, I generally agree with all of your points.

In most cases it is fine and "makes sense" to me. However, on occassion it does silly things.

My intent was to expand on another post regarding "switching" intelligently rather than just sticking on one target forever regardless.

Just one aspect of the AI that I don't personally like and wanted to share that fact as most of the game I find to be very fun