AI game balance is a joke

[FilthyPeasant]

whoever designed AI balance is an idiot. Like putting 2-3 enemy AI HQ's in campaign matches
Ill be the first to admit i'm not the best RTS player so I tried to turn on cheats to make it a more level playing field only to find out they don't work anymore because they got patched out
I mean they have pre built bases and pretty much half the map capped already from my experience.
I hate poor game design like this. So yah, uninstall and of to the shadow realm with you, your a perfect example of rose tinted goggles
no hate comments or 'git gud' I want to have fun not be stressed out

[Cursed Hawkins]

The max amount of enemies allowed in campaign is two but that's only when the territory's defense value is 5 or higher so this is literally on you if you're getting two enemy bases in one territory!

[EthanT]

Multiple bases is from a high strength value in that province. Youre not supposed to be attacking those provinces without a few honor guard units to counteract their initial advantage.

[XDthedemonXD]

"Youre not supposed to be attacking those provinces without a few honor guard units to counteract their initial advantage." Really, a territory of power 8 can swarn me in 4 minutes with 60 guys and vehicles, but Victory bay and the chaos marine main base were absolute joke. That is balanced like ♥♥♥♥. And a territory of 13 power is a walk in the park. Something is indeed very wrong.

[overkill17]

I can relate to your frustration and feel that some occasional bugs make the campaign even a bigger pain in the *** (in larger battles, melee units or walker vehicles not engaging enemy units, some squads not engaging the enemy since they're a little far off, badly positioning themselves etc). I'm not that skilled too and felt stressed out in many campaigns. This led me to conclude that even beating normal difficulty with Space Marines is not only an accomplishment but also felt chore-like as I progressed after almost defeating two of the factions fully.

However if this can be of some encouragement, I finally beat the map where you earn the "Bulwark" upgrade. I started of as Eldar (a hard race, Ikr!) and defeated the Tau in normal difficulty. Whew..easily after 10+ tries over a period of months due to quitting in frustration in between and then feeling lucky again enough to try.

Two fricking Tau bases. And my honour guard basically being two Ranger squads. Each time I got closer and lost, I saw if I needed to change my strategy after a bit of introspecting...assessing if winning was still doable.

One thing I can say helped me deliver the killing blow was remembering that just "Destroy HQ" is the victory condition. I held the surrounding SPs around the first tau base quickly to prevent them from growing. As soon as I got vehicles, I rushed and destroyed their HQ ignoring most, if not all, of their firing LPs and unit-producing buildings sending new troops at me. Boom! Side 1 was no longer a threat and the odds tilted fully in my favour.

Not to mention the time holding those points were spent in some anxious waiting. I knew I could get attacked from both sides when I would attack the Side 1 base with my vehicles, and lost previously like that. This time as soon as I saw Side 2 trying to feign an attack as I waited for my vehicles, I attacked them and managed to inflict enough casualties that I bought time by making them momentarily not a threat as I destroyed Side 1's HQ. Minimised the anxious "waiting for them to attack you" as your troops as getting prepped up.....in DOW, this usually means you're giving your opponent time to grow.

How often I keep re-learning "Heresy grows from idleness".

While I don't think the campaign is something I want to pass completely, I find that they're a good way to learn to play a faction well after finishing 4-5 scenarios with them. Skirmishes 1on1 only go so far since they end quickly. Right now another particular campaign I find impossible is the one where you unlock mobile bases I think? The one where your vehicles are split and you have no supplies...It feels so hard and I'm playing the Orks. Getting those damn Skrigoths to even move properly and reach the enemy without them getting stuck is a challenge itself :X

[LEFT4GABEN]

Originally posted by FilthyPeasantλROR:

whoever designed AI balance is an idiot. Like putting 2-3 enemy AI HQ's in campaign matches
Ill be the first to admit i'm not the best RTS player so I tried to turn on cheats to make it a more level playing field only to find out they don't work anymore because they got patched out
I mean they have pre built bases and pretty much half the map capped already from my experience.
I hate poor game design like this. So yah, uninstall and of to the shadow realm with you, your a perfect example of rose tinted goggles
no hate comments or 'git gud' I want to have fun not be stressed out

I absolutely agree with you. People like us who are not Adept at Micromanging and have literally not spent years of our lives playing RTS Games should just play the game on Easy due to bad game design...

The Damn Intro Screen says "On Normal Difficulty you will be on the same footing as the AI" but that statement is a complete ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ lie because the very moment you get more than five turns into the campaign that is no longer the case...

The AI Gets:

1. The ability to Purchase Honour Guard Units without Territory Requirements that you have
   
2. Bonus Campaign Requisition
   
3. Ability to prebuild bases when they ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ attack, I can even verify this as on some maps my Strategic Point Fortifications would at the very nano second the map loads start shooting at ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ Late Game Vehicle Construction Buildings. So the AI can just asspull prebuilt bases at an even greater extent than if you conquered that Ork Territory that allows you to spend campaign requesition to have buildings assemble next to your base...
   
4. When you attack a high defense AI Base they will have multiple pre built bases, the player technically can do this too after a sucessfull conquest and then spending huge amounts of time just building while purposely keeping your ai oppenent barely alive so you can have buidings everywhere however, this is bad game design, there should only be one HQ because otherwise the AI will just mass spam an overwhelming wave of Elite Units at you until it runs out of requistion. There needs to be a smaller building cap [if one even exists for buildings that are not turrets] because all this does is add to the grindyness of the game...

I do not want to spend literally hundreds of hours learning how to become a micromanaging servitor. That is the Antithesis of the concept of strategy, strategy is about well thought out actions against what you intellectually determined is the best course of action to defeat your enemy that are put to the rigors of war and have consequences. In most RTS Games however, high level strategic thinking is bad as it will make you a less efficient micromanager. You just need to keep spamming out half decent decisions and commands at a faster rate than your oppenent and you will win plain and simple. These games are more about speed and reaction time than it is about strategy my friend...
I do not want to sink hundreds of hours into a game to become an effective micromanager. Because that is required to beat this game on Normal Difficulty due to poor balance. So although I think I never played a game on Easy Mode before this will be my first time because I do not want to grind for hundreds of hours to learn how to be a wannabe cookie clicker master. So thus, I will enjoy my less than 60ish hours on my game having some fun and not wasting time grinding...

[Paradoks_DB]

Originally posted by LEFT4GABEN:

I do not want to spend literally hundreds of hours learning how to become a micromanaging servitor.

This game has active pause. This means that in single player it doesn't require micromanagement skills. Also, on Normal enemies units and buildings have less hit points compared to the player's units.

[Cursed Hawkins]

Originally posted by Paradoks_DB:

Originally posted by LEFT4GABEN:

I do not want to spend literally hundreds of hours learning how to become a micromanaging servitor.

This game has active pause. This means that in single player it doesn't require micromanagement skills. Also, on Normal enemies units and buildings have less hit points compared to the player's units.

Wrong difficulty M8, that's Easy you're thinking of, Normal everything should be even between you and them.

[Paradoks_DB]

Originally posted by Cursed Hawkins:

Wrong difficulty M8, that's Easy you're thinking of, Normal everything should be even between you and them.

Incorrect. It's "even" because on some maps the AI has 2 bases. When it comes to raw unit HP numbers the player is at disadvantage only on hard.
I'll quote the wiki here:

Easy
Player units have 250% health
Enemy units have 25% health
Start with 600 planetary requisition
Normal
Player units have 200% health
Enemy units have 100% health
Start with 400 planetary requisition
Hard
Player units have 100% health
Enemy units have 150% health
Start with 200 planetary requisition

[overkill17]

Originally posted by Paradoks_DB:

Originally posted by LEFT4GABEN:

I do not want to spend literally hundreds of hours learning how to become a micromanaging servitor.

This game has active pause. This means that in single player it doesn't require micromanagement skills. Also, on Normal enemies units and buildings have less hit points compared to the player's units.

Active pause?! I didn't know the game had this all this while! I immediately tried this out by hooking up an external keyboard since my laptop lacks the Pause/Break key. I'll find a way to make this work. Damn, this can potentially change how hard the campaign is for me...thanks a lot!

[xxx]

I think DOW overall is an easy game. Even Hard campaign is easy in Dark Crusade. My problem is the opposite. Even 2 large enemy basis is no challenge. I would like to script it for enemy would have 3. In map editor you can see even small maps have 4 players has scripted starting location(1st is you). In campaign script I can see the military strength scripts, but when I duplicate 1 more enemy at higher strengths does not happen anything. I don't know why. I want a huge 3(large starting bases at 10 strength) VS 1 battle with honor guards. That would be intetesting. I think the only challenge is the hyperion peaks against strength 11 or 12 orks(Except necrons. With necrons it's not so hard if you use well the monoliths and protect them. They're op cuz not like with other races necrons can reinforcement and repair all units with no limit. Cuz monoliths produce power and that is the only recourse they need. So slowly but steadally with good tactic you can conquere the whole map. Not to mention monolith is one of the most powerful unit in the game with its range, dmg and terrible cc. The only counter against it is 3 stealth suit team. With 3 emp Grenade you can keep the monolith in constant stun if it is not protected. But the ai doesn't know that).

[Včelí medvídek]

Originally posted by xxx:

I think DOW overall is an easy game. Even Hard campaign is easy in Dark Crusade. My problem is the opposite. Even 2 large enemy basis is no challenge. I would like to script it for enemy would have 3. In map editor you can see even small maps have 4 players has scripted starting location(1st is you). In campaign script I can see the military strength scripts, but when I duplicate 1 more enemy at higher strengths does not happen anything. I don't know why. I want a huge 3(large starting bases at 10 strength) VS 1 battle with honor guards. That would be intetesting. I think the only challenge is the hyperion peaks against strength 11 or 12 orks(Except necrons. With necrons it's not so hard if you use well the monoliths and protect them. They're op cuz not like with other races necrons can reinforcement and repair all units with no limit. Cuz monoliths produce power and that is the only recourse they need. So slowly but steadally with good tactic you can conquere the whole map. Not to mention monolith is one of the most powerful unit in the game with its range, dmg and terrible cc. The only counter against it is 3 stealth suit team. With 3 emp Grenade you can keep the monolith in constant stun if it is not protected. But the ai doesn't know that).

Play with mods.

I have installed Titanium wars and even though i finished all vanilla campaigns easily on hard, having real issue to beat AI on hard here even 1:1... as example last game I went with full cap Eldar army against tau with Avatar at spearhead.. well he was dead prior I came to melee range with him and rest of army followed. That said I have won Tau campaign too. having little experience with rest races.

The pop caps are larger with many new units including titan classes, research and abilities that need be utilized.

Can highly suggest it.

https://www.moddb.com/mods/titanium-wars-mod