AI Combat Logic

[Morbio]

I've been playing this game a few weeks now so I thought I'd share a bit of feedback to help improve the game. It is not meant to be having a pop, but to help you make the game I love even better .

I find the AI to be a bit passive in the early stages. If the human takes a passive position, the AI will tend to do similarly. Maybe that's by design, maybe it's a good thing to do, or maybe it's just difficult to program some offensive logic and it's easier to respond to the human,

The biggest criticism I'd have though, is the way the AI resolved it's combat attacks in big melee situations. It doesn't seem to use any logic to help maximise the results it's attacks. For instance:

• I've repeatedly witnessed units that could attack a Fragmented unit or a Steady unit, attacking the Steady unit, when attacking the Fragmented unit could generate a rout that could help nearby attacks or could just reduce the number of attacks it will receive on later rounds.

• I've repeatedly seen AI Fragmented units attacking first, when they are almost certainly going to rout, before adjacent allied units, that may well cause an enemy rout, or at least just win the fight. The result of this is that they rout, causing nearby units to lose cohesion, making their fights more likely to have a poor outcome. Had the fights been done in the sequence of 'most favourable first' then less AI routs would occur and more human losses would be incurred.

I hope this helps

[IainMcNeil]

The AI is something we are looking at for the next patch.

[jamespcrowley]

The AI is something we are looking at for the next patch.

Good to hear.

In the same tone and with the same intent as Morbio's post may I make the following observations:

The AI too often breaks-up its own lines for no obvious reason. A BG will change direction and move out of a formed line even at the very start of a scenario. More often than not, at the point of first impact (excluding skirmishers and Cavalry), the AI side has disjointed and seperate clumps of BGs which puts it at a huge disadvantage.

The AI is too easily 'distracted' by light and skirmisher units. I have often seen, for example, Legionary BGs break away from the line to 'chase' skirmishers even though there are enemy medium and heavy units nearby.

I appreciate that coding AI is extremely difficult, to say the least but I, too, hold this game in very high regard and while I enjoy PBEM matches , anything that improves the solo game is much appreciated.

[honestabe]

Comparing this to Hoplite the Ancients card game of basically the same kinds of tactics and strategies the AI in Hoplites is 100x better and certainly not passive. Plus the card graphics are better too. {g}

[batesmotel]

Comparing this to Hoplite the Ancients card game of basically the same kinds of tactics and strategies the AI in Hoplites is 100x better and certainly not passive. Plus the card graphics are better too. {g}

From a quick look, the Hoplites card game looks to be much more constrained than either FoG PC or the Great Battles computer games (or the GMT borad games) in terms of the movement allowed. This would greatly simplify writing a decent AI while also removing a lot of the tactical decisions from the game. Might well be an intersting game and allow for a more challenging AI but it will be a very different feel than FoG PC or any of the Great Battles board or computer games.

Chris

[grumblefish]

I have to agree that the AI can be very weak. It used to beat me on Scirthea every time (AI as Romans), but now I have come up with a strategy that wins easily every single time against the AI; I have come close to having 0 break points in some rounds. Basically, I send all the blue-shirted warriors to the left along with Salvius, all the horses up the right with Athenion, and then let the mobs and the one good spearman unit hang around the middle/right without going to far forward. The AI always shows its weak, green-coloured units to my blueshirts, at which point I tear them apart, and the Roman horse gets utterly owned by Athenion. The strong red-units barely get to do anything. The AI never seems to try any different strategy, which has thus rendered the scenario pointless in single player. Some other scenarios have wound up this way, too.

It is worth noting, however, that I recently got stomped on Scirthea by a human Roman. He boxed up made sure his red units were first to engage; I will, however, argue that I got the worst rolls in the history of dice rolling, as Athenion was routed by the weak Roman cavalry, and all my blue shirts fragmented on impact. I whinge with the risk of being called a baby, though, because the last few games I have complained bitterly about dice rolls when it's probably my opponents skill that cost me the match.

Comparing this to Hoplite the Ancients card game of basically the same kinds of tactics and strategies the AI in Hoplites is 100x better and certainly not passive. Plus the card graphics are better too. {g}

Hey, thanks for naming Hoplites- I had never heard of it, and am now downloading it to give it a shot. Personally, I'm already pretty happy with FoG, which I now play as a purely multiplayer game, but sometimes I don't have internet access so it'll be good to have a single player game to waste time with.

[IainMcNeil]

Because FoG is so complex the AI is never going to match up to a human opponent. We could design a game where the AI would always win (it's not hard) but it wouldn't necessarily be any fun. It's always a balance, but some people just want AI, AI, AI and nothing else

The AI is going to improve over time but it will have new issues to worry about too as more army types start to appear.

[Morbio]

Just a little more feedback

I'm on the verge of giving up playing the AI, because it is so weak I only play it now while I'm waiting for some response to my PBEM games. Because I'm bored I've just played the Spartacus Slaves (also to try out some tactics because I'm in the middle of this scenario in a PBEM game) and I won with 0 break points against me . I then played Lake Trasimene (as Romans), which I originally struggled with in my 1st couple of days (as I learnt the game), and I beat the Carthagians, again with 0 break points against and finally I just played Lyginus River (as Triballi) and beat (and killed) Alexander with, you've guessed it, 0 break points against

There has to be some algorithms to determine when to go aggressive, when not to chase units it can't catch, when not to attack at all, to determine the correct units to attack (low cohesion enemy before higher) and the sequence of its own attacks (winners before losers). I look forward to the next release with a better AI.