I have definitely noticed a big jump from hard to ridiculous. Hard was pretty easy although this time I needed to use lots of units so thats definite progress since the last beta - the solo channeler strategy is out the window due to the changes.

However the strategies that the ridiculous AI uses are only viable because it gets big bonuses - it will build hordes of units - like 4/5 armies of armoured spearmen, the maintenance on all those units would be crippling without the bonuses so it feels like the AI is playing by a different set of rules.

What I hope to see in the final game is a set of separate options so that you can tweak games like in FFH (Kael really knocked the ball out the park with that mod )

1) AI difficulty

2) AI bonuses

3) monster density

4) monster aggression (at the moment this seems to be random, sometimes a monster will attack you, whereas other times it won't - sometimes a horde of spiders will level your city other times they won't)

Even on the hardest setting I see empty lairs being ignored by the AI in their city borders and AI armies moving right next to hordes of monsters, with both groups ignoring each other. The AI is definitely making progress though so well done Frogboy for the work you have done so far - also the AI is making much more use of tactical spells so well done there too. I also notice variations in the armies too - the spearmaiden seems to be a staple for lots of armies but then they are supplemented by other units such as mages and archers and horsemen depending on the faction (or it seems that way anyway, they might have been making decisions based on nearby resources) - Irane, for example chooses to use lots of archers, whereas Ceresa will opt for mages.