What kills the game for me

from Elemental Forums

What kills the game for me? Answer: Going to war after a long buildup phase is totally anticlimactic. I played two games on hard difficulty so far. At least two or three AI nations were clearly ahead of me, so I expected some hard fighting and a long war.  However, my single stack of heroes with some average troops was enough to  march through enemy territory, take a city every few turns, and topple their mighty-on-paper empires like domino pieces. Here is my list of problems:

- The AI declares war on me but seems to be totally unprepared for it. It has no armies ready to strike. It does not seem to mass produce troops when at war. It needs to get into something like a war mode before it declares any war, with increased troop production and massing of armies at the borders.

- In my second game it send single heroes and even it's faction leader without any support to destroy one of my resources or two instead of using outdated troops (like militia) or spezialised fast troops like scouts and cavalry to harass me properly.

- One big issue is the stack quality. AI stacks are far inferior to mine in terms of troop quality. Their armies are often composed of outdated troops together with some better units and no leaders, which are busy running around solo.

- Despite being in their territory the AI never used a strategic spell against me.

- AI nations declared war on me despite them not having a single border city to me. Their armies never made it to me nor did they attack me with spells. What's the point of those war declarations?

I hope the developers can improve the AI over time. Currently I am not motivated to try another playthrough, knowing that after that slow build up phase there is no challenge in the middle and end part of the game.

11,653 views 8 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

agree, AI shoud not declare war if not going to attack right now or really soon.

it shoud be up to AI dif., hard AI shoud declare war right before attack, easy shout give 20-50 seasons before attack. 

 

also AI act wierd, declaring war\peace multiple time for not reason, with no effect expect boring dialog popping up each turn.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top


Can the Galciv2 diplomacy A.I dude come back.

Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

What also is frustrating is making peace with the AI is very difficult. They usually have a negative rating to a peace treaty on the order of several thousand, it only seems to lower when the war is going catastrophically bad for them, and even then, it rarely seems to go positive. 

Sometimes they will offer peace, but that seems unpredictable. I've seen situations where just a turn or two before, the enemy faction views a peace treaty as like -3454 or some crazy high number, and then a couple of turns later are offering to end the hostilities. No event happened directly to me (although I guess it is possible that they lost some armies in another unseen war with another faction I guess). 

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

In my second game it send single heroes and even it's faction leader without any support to destroy one of my resources or two instead of using outdated troops (like militia) or spezialised fast troops like scouts and cavalry to harass me properly.

- One big issue is the stack quality. AI stacks are far inferior to mine in terms of troop quality. Their armies are often composed of outdated troops together with some better units and no leaders, which are busy running around solo.

- Despite being in their territory the AI never used a strategic spell against me.
End of quote

Ya, its annoying that I can easily build an unstoppable empire. It not worth bumping the difficulty past hard either becuause then you just get the same weak troops but with weird traits like strength x3.

The problem is the AI never gets the specialized and powerful mages or uses strategic spells. When you look at a AI mages traits its a weird mishmash.

AI really needs smarter mana use, (or even some invisible mana bonus). Their targeting for spells could use work too. Ive had AI hit the only troop in my army with fire resistance with repetitive fire magic and the pyre of man threw a fireball at a single wisp, only taking away half its health.

I think we will see a less random diplomacy system in the next patch, as bugs have been identified.

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Ashbery76, reply 2


Can the Galciv2 diplomacy A.I dude come back.
End of Ashbery76's quote

 

Um, dude, he's already here. Brad Wardell himself...

 

Maybe he's lost his touch. Or maybe that was just a one-off success...

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Not sure if this is being done or not, but there should really be some sort of an evolving "underestimation" coefficient for each specific faction which would directly modify their perceived army strength. When they fight a battle with a player and lose when they "expected" to win (based on army strength), this coefficient would be increased, and they would be less likely to underestimate a players strength.

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting DevildogFF, reply 5

Quoting Ashbery76, reply 2

Can the Galciv2 diplomacy A.I dude come back.

 

Um, dude, he's already here. Brad Wardell himself...

 

Maybe he's lost his touch. Or maybe that was just a one-off success...
End of DevildogFF's quote

Galciv 2 is a completely different gameplay. There are a lot more things to consider with Elemental. Plus if you really want a good comparison, check out galciv 1 before any updates.... that my friends was not as polished as Galciv 2 most recent iteration... This took years and a well established foundation, but the mechanics were also well established and players told how they play the game to win (AI then countered these techniques making it difficult). Problem with the AI programing is that if a mechanic changes, then everything that was done for the AI before needs to be re-evaluated. This is an intense process. I have confidence and faith that Frogboy can produce a very awesome challenging AI if Kael lets him. It's a fine line in making the AI too difficult or make the game too easy. Takes some time before you find that niche, give it some time.

If you want to make the AI more difficult show Brad how you play and why you choose these strategies and you will see the AI doing the same things... Shame the Tuidjy is not around of late.

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

I think the reason why the AI is "programmed" to be quick to war and hard to make peace with...is to protect itself from being blindsided by a human player.

Remember in GC2 - if you parked a fleet on the border, the AI would pop up and say "I know what you're doing"...

Well it's the same basic concept. The AI is the way it is, to counter those kind of tactics.