Is it me, or is the AI insane in this game?

[DasAntihero]

I've played a handful of RTS games in the past (Star Wars Empire at War when I was 5 in 06, not understanding how that worked until revisiting years later) and I used to watch my older bro play the demo to these games and I eventually played this myself, also playing an old Rome game. I finally got this game in 2015 and I've been playing it on and off, but I've never been able to play the campaign because of how crazy the AI is. I love playing as the Orks but the intro levels are freaking tough! I play most of my games on medium difficulty, so would easy be a good going for me with this game?

[Renfrew]

The AI is terrible in this game, to the point that Dawn of War shouldn't even be played exclusively for the campaign.

In campaign, increasing the AI level will increase the following:
- How fast the AI macros and micros
- HP and damage of enemy units (Easy = less than the player's, Medium = equal to the player's, Hard = more than the player's)

In skirmish/multiplayer:
- How fast the AI macros and micros
- Resource rate (At "Harder" the rate is equal to that of the players and at "Insane" the rate is faster than the players)

So as you can see the AI is indeed terrible, it doesn't have any strategy adjustments based on difficulty, as such once you learn how it works it becomes predictable and boring to playing against. In skirmish/multiplater sometimes the AI will bug and won't tech at all (this seems to happen a lot if the race is Space Marines, in my experience), so it will be stuck in tier 1, while you continue to advance in tech.

If you are the type of player who spends the first 30 mins just building and teching, and not doing any harassment or expanding your map control, then the AI will easily crush you. DoW is not a passive game. This is further reinforced by how the AI gets stronger the longer you wait to attack and consequently slow down their tech. In other words, playing against AI is indirectly teaching the player that idling is not a good thing, and that finding ways to slow down tech to gain an advantage is key.

Early Game harassment strategies:
- Uncapture strategic points belonging to the enemy
- Destroy listening posts (listening posts give an extra +6 requisition and a further +6 for each level it is upgraded to)
- Destroy generators (generators give +10 energy and losing one early game is a huge disadvantage)

Mid to Late Game has no particular harassment points because how you choose to attack is dependent on which race you are using and which race the enemy are using.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQKi3MFl6NYD2PPI2HKEUsQ
Watch some of this guy's videos. He analyses matches in detail, and you can learn tips for the race you want to play.

[Player 2]

Originally posted by Zack Cyrus:

In campaign, increasing the AI level will increase the following:
- How fast the AI macros and micros
- HP and damage of enemy units (Easy = less than the player's, Medium = equal to the player's, Hard = more than the player's)

That is just wrong.

Hard is actually have the same amount of HP as player.
Medium, player have double HP.
Easy, AI even have less HP (i am not sure how much is the ratio)

[Renfrew]

Originally posted by Shas'O Kais:

*snip*

I forgot that the player gets 200% HP on medium, while enemy has regular values (i.e. 100%), that is indeed correct.

The ratio on easy is so ridiculous, that it should be called baby mode.
Enemy:Player = 25%:250% (10 times the HP value of AI)

[Player 2]

Yea that is kind of weird how we get balance stat in hard not medium. Maybe that double hp on medium is to compensate 2 enemy base encounter.

Originally posted by ÆnimaNerd:

I love playing as the Orks but the intro levels are freaking tough!

Early mission is pretty easy. Basically just sent your hero + 1/2 basic infantry to enemy base at the start of the game.

With ork, you can attach your warboss to 1 squad slugaboys. Sent them to enemy base and GG.

[goka9696]

AI is terrible in all DoW games. The only one where it was even remotely passable is 3, and even there it's nothing special.

[magus]

main problem for me is that when enemy has more than one base, then it is not "one enemy player with multiple bases" but "multiple players with one base" which means that when you have 20 unit cap as a faction, enemy faction gets 40 if they have 2 bases because it means enemy has two players under one faction.

This kind of going over the unit limit as faction trick kills the campaign for me...

Is there a mod to fix this thing in the campaign?

[qrosa]

I'm not aware or such a mod.
The only reliable way of dealing with a 2v1 is to pressure them hard early on. Depending on my Honor Guard, as well as on the enemy's strength, I either split up my HG and camp their base entrances while slowly moving forward to prevent them from teching, or I swarm one base and completely destroy it to turn the match into a 1v1.
I agree that it is not a good design decision. I guess they didn't have time to make better AI?

[zlloyd1]

The Campaign in this game is ridiculous....
Even with the difficulty set to 'EASY' it seems that you are doomed to fail, mainly because the MEGA-DORKS who created the AI should be taken out and hung from a wet noodle.
You can win the 1st map simply enough, but after that, it becomes a complete joke to progress any further for a few reasons.
1) The enemy seems to ALWAYS have a dramatically increased unit cap, meaning they can build as many troops as they need to win, while you have a SAD limit.
2) Sometimes you will just randomly lose, even though you were winning, out of nowhere.
3) The enemy's units can appear to be invincible, and even having 20 units concentrating fire on a single target can do literally NO DAMAGE, as if they have some kind of shield or something.

I recognize that I am pulling a severe Necro on this thread, but I just got this game last week, for nostalgia, I suppose & have been attempting to beat this thing, only to realize that the Devs are religiously against letting you win!!

[HappySack]

Originally posted by zlloyd1:

The Campaign in this game is ridiculous....
Even with the difficulty set to 'EASY' it seems that you are doomed to fail, mainly because the MEGA-DORKS who created the AI should be taken out and hung from a wet noodle.
You can win the 1st map simply enough, but after that, it becomes a complete joke to progress any further for a few reasons.
1) The enemy seems to ALWAYS have a dramatically increased unit cap, meaning they can build as many troops as they need to win, while you have a SAD limit.
2) Sometimes you will just randomly lose, even though you were winning, out of nowhere.
3) The enemy's units can appear to be invincible, and even having 20 units concentrating fire on a single target can do literally NO DAMAGE, as if they have some kind of shield or something.

I recognize that I am pulling a severe Necro on this thread, but I just got this game last week, for nostalgia, I suppose & have been attempting to beat this thing, only to realize that the Devs are religiously against letting you win!!

Are you making more troll replies again? you being bad at a game does not mean it's hard.

In fact the hard difficulty in the campaign in Dark Crusade is the most balanced compared to hard in any other DoW 1 game as it doesn't inflate HP values that enemies have, and again since you ignored my other reply, the AI in this game has aged poorly if unmodded and if you're still losing to it then there's no helping you.

[Vambran]

replaying the game after years... ah i find pathfinding to be the true enemy here. Units constantly getting stuck.