Glamour post 3.08

Saxon · #1 June 28th, 2007, 05:36 AM

Baalz has a good point. They have a ton of advantages, they are great units. That versitility should not be underrated. The nation is balanced by the fact they have a weak end game, but in every 4X game, the beginning is the most important part. The rush is a very valid strategy and if well managed, will give you a great start over your oppenents.

The only other person who has spoken specifically about single player reports that they do not have the "Heim vs human player" effect, so perhaps my experience is not typical. Still, given that humans have a tough time stopping them, I don't see why the AI would do any better.

Sombre · #2 June 28th, 2007, 05:53 AM

The AI is simply not a challenge for me unless I handicap myself, but speaking from a SP standpoint, Vans are still too good. A better balanced game reduces the problems caused by how random the AI is, so resulting in slightly better SP gaming overall. This applies to all units which are miles better than anything else you could build - they just aren't desirable in the vanilla game.

Gandalf Parker · #3 June 28th, 2007, 10:22 AM

Interestingly even before the nerf, on massive AI tests it was not the heims that came out on top. I dont even remember them winning any of the games tho they probably did.

The tests were like endurance tests for the game. All of the nations were in as AI's, the game was run on immeadiate hosting and went for days. Mostly I watched for crashes (of course), CPU loads, hosting time (it started at about 1 hosting every 10 minutes and went to alittle over 30 minutes), and memory leaks. Each game did create a log and a scores page. I did not keep great notes about the winners but I was looking to see if the same nation came up too often. There was nothing worrisome to report to the beta team.

Different maps, map sizes, victory conditions, other settings did make a difference in the game. In abit above average times on standard settings; the games tended to be Undead Ermor doing well in the early game, Oceania in mid game, and Arcos in late game if it had managed to get there.

I had considered automating it all and doing a big batch of one-on-one contests but I never got motivated enough to do it.

thejeff · #4 June 28th, 2007, 11:10 AM

But that's because the AI can't actually play a bless strategy.

It doesn't take a good bless, except by accident. If it does it doesn't recruit enough sacred troops. When it does use sacreds it often doesn't bother to bless them.

Why would expect the AI to do well with an uber-bless rush nation?