AI Army in the Field (REALLY)!!

[Antrine]

I heartily concur with your wishes 'king' bongo

I am here posting an e-mail response I have sent to an inquirer, jamesyao received today, as reference for the boards and to update those who requested a copy of my modded BIQ game file.

" Hi Jamesyao,

How familiar are you with using the Conquest Editor?
Do you set up your own games?
Design maps or use only random?

So far as I can tell there are only a few key reasons why the AI uses or does not use Armies in the field.

A. It use Leaders to 'rush' improvements instead of converting to an Army

B. It bogarts (or holds in reserve) at least two and sometime all of them in the Capitol.

C. It brings them out in the field maybe by the third one on. I say maybe, because in my current game I am seeing as many as six AI Armies held in the capitol. Mayhap that will change as the current war drags on. I am not playing on 'debug' mode so I am not seeing everything.

If you wish to set a game similar to what I have, let me know and I will give you the detailed instructions. Otherwise I am polishing my own mod and will make it available soon. (soon of course is relative to time available)

Many thanks for asking,

And happy gaming!

Antrine"

[mesut]

Hi Antrine,

what exactly are the modifications you did in the editor to encourage the AI using armies? Just make the palace produce an army every 15 turns?

I would appreciate your answer.

Mesut

[Antrine]

Real quick, basically yes only the Palace plus 1 army per two cities. However, there are other consideration more involved, such as making sure the AI has the units to stuff the Armies with.

I will have to answer that quandary another time, sorry.

[Chrush]

Hi!

Surely I didn't come across an attacking AI Army very often.

But I happened to play the Mongols on Pangaea standard map. I rushed th pyramids with the first leader and poprushed my next two neighbours to death. I had Japan and Carthago fighting each other for quite a while to keep them busy . When I conquered China I had borders to both of them. My diplomatic skills were far from experienced, so they both started war on me . So few turns later I was facing two samurai and a knight army and the usual stuff like cavalry and longbowmen. Quite a horror, considering that my border was running along a chain of mountains.

I never saw an attacking army again. But as I play quite peaceful (Spacerace-Victory), I never wondered. But as you say that it's quite rare, I have to agree.

Ciao,

Agran

[Sinapus]

Modded my game to allow the Palace to spawn armies every 50(?) turns and the AI does use them, though as others have noted they don't pick the best mix of units. Found 2mp and 1 mp units loaded in the same army. Oh well, they're hard kills requiring an army of my own or a bunch of sacrificial units/bombard attacks to destroy.

[Antrine]

Great! Actually I have only tested the Palace producing an Army every 15 turns and lately even every 10 turns.

As far getting the AI to 'stuff' worthwhile units in them, I do this:

Have something the AI normally builds in the Capitol, such as Barracks and Colleseum also spit out 'longbowman' and 'the Roman Swordsman' every so many turns say 8-10 so those units will be there plentiful, ready to be stuffed into Armies.

This is how make it work (work-a-round)

[mesut]

I experienced that armies in the early game are not properly used by the AI. However after a while the situation changes and the AI makes good use of them. I encountered attacks by 3 armies on one city!

Mesut

[Antrine]

It makes a goodly difference in gameplay!

[Conqueror]

Just played some C3C 1.15 and saw a Zulu army with 3 Impi in it.

So AI armies do exist in C3C, with standard game rules. Even tho very rarely.

Used to see much more AI armies in PtW and vanilla. Somehow C3C has cut down the amount of them - or then i just have the bad luck of not seeing them in action in C3C.

[Antrine]

News Flash News Flash News Flash

An AI (Egyptian) ELEPHANT ARMY!! Just smashed 2nd Horse Brigade (Army) of the West Aryan Empire in North Egypt.

[Antrine]

Update, for any who care. Now on Version Twenty-NINE, have the TechTree for Ancient Age completed and fine-tuned (mostly). Thirty-six Techs. The next Age will be Napoleon/Civil War Era, and then followed by World War II and lastly Doomsday Era of escape or annihilation.

I may want to ‘name’ this Mod ‘Armies Arise’ or something, for they are now being used widely and consistently by the AI and found stuffed with Ancient Calvary, Legionaries and very nicely ‘War Elephants’.

See images below:
I am getting closer to finishing this puppy, however it seems there is no fear of Firaxis beating me to the punch!

Happy Smiles

[Antrine]

[Antrine]

[vmxa1]

I guess you like purple.

[Krill]

Pity about the tech tree, but atleast you proved that the AI uses armies offensively.

All is not lost