Couldn't agree more with you Praylak. There are days where I'm on the verge of saying to some of my friends to pick up the game, and there are days where I'm deeply disappointed by how the game works.
But if your or your friend don't want the AI to cheat, then don't pick the options that allow the AI to cheat. (One of the cheats the AI uses at higher difficulty levels is that monsters will never attack AI units.)
Right now for experienced strategy players, either you play below expert and have no challenge whatsoever. Or you play above it and need to exploit the game weaknesses to pull out a victory (at first it was quest loop with lightning hammers, then juggs, now dodge stack and easy Spell of making victory with a bit of beastmaster). It's come to a point where this topic pops up every week or so on the forum, and is immediatly met with several people denying the monsters' behaviour towards the AI and blaming it on the difficulty. Is it too much to ask for fun&challenge at the same time? ala AoW for exemple.
Having the AI cheats at higher difficulty levels in any game is ok.. even if it feels cheap, since human players wanting a challenge should be able to outsmart the AI after figuring out the appropriate tactics (take the research/income rate/starting location that the AIs get for exemple).
But having the game flawed to the point were your opponents hardly interact with the world you play in is, in my most honest opinion, the biggest probem of this game. Why the AI units are (almost) immune to monsters, coming from wildlands or being neutral? It does not make any sense. It makes the world feel more dull than anything else.
There are rules that have to be observed by every playing side in games. In a 4x strategy game, having the AI interact with neutral monsters as the player do is one of them, especially at higher difficulty levels.
i.e: you send you settler or citizen unprotected in a civ5 game, it gets taken by barbarians=> your fault, now go and deliver it. AI settlers are not immune to the rules.
People have been asking for proofs lately (are we playing the same game?), so let me give you a few exemples:
Stealth pioneers



Clearly a good location

More stealthy pioneers

Stealth army


Really?

Guess what happens when it's your hero?

Pioneers' party!


Stealth pioneer, again

From city placement&armies to pioneers, you can clearly see the pattern of monsters avoiding AI units (and playing the game you can clearly see how the monsters stalk your units even when AI units are closer). Again, my question is: why? As I said before, having the AI get out with some of these situations is ok, but not all of them, every game, in a consistent way.
I have encountered these situations from challenging to ridiculous, from the day of FE release to today's LH 0.75 patch, in every game!
Isn't it time to use this potential?
https://forums.elementalgame.com/436954/page/1/
The game has a soul but lacks balance in many aspects and a better AI, and I fear that several of these issues are not gonna be addressed any time soon, as they have not been (or hardly been addressed) in the past:
https://forums.elementalgame.com/437178/page/1/
https://forums.elementalgame.com/440554/page/1/
https://forums.elementalgame.com/442354/page/1/#3340039
https://forums.elementalgame.com/442751/page/1/
https://forums.elementalgame.com/442652/page/1/#3341798
https://forums.elementalgame.com/438336/page/1/
https://forums.elementalgame.com/438616/page/1/
https://forums.elementalgame.com/438622/page/1/
https://forums.elementalgame.com/439017/page/1/