does the AI just cheat?

[Padds]

they just seem to come out of the fog with perfect tactical awareness of where everything is and can always make it past my heroes to block them or swoop in to take a town the instant im 1 too many hex's away

[Lavapotion]

Not in that way they shouldn't cheat. But depending on their settings they may have more income than you for instance. Is this something you are experiencing a lot we'd love to hear about it though, good AI feedback is crucial!

[Gilver Redgrave]

Certainly feels like it from time to time.

I mean i played on normal and the AI came at me with a full blown army and we had a Legendary battle. After that i had to rebuild my army again which took some turns but then the AI came across the corner again with another huge army as if it was aware i am *and i need you to pay attention to this one* utterly F*cked with no way of defending myself from it.

How ? Having more resources ? Possible. But why would their buildings produce units like twice as fast as mine ?

In the end i just activates the Towers and won that way by sneaking around like a little b*tch. Yes it was the last mission for the Loth campain. It also didnt help that 2 scripted enemys with huge armys spawn and go for me aswell. In general i feel like the AI is ignoring each other and decide to go for the player.

[Padds]

Originally posted by Lavapotion:

Not in that way they shouldn't cheat. But depending on their settings they may have more income than you for instance. Is this something you are experiencing a lot we'd love to hear about it though, good AI feedback is crucial!

round 22, 4 corners me vs 3 non teamed ai's

me spent every penny on troops
30 dreaths off in second army

main army is made up of
65 dire dreaths
15 artificers

enemy army walks into my home town with
60 sages
36 storm guard
39 hunters
4 guards
3 chelun
2 eth'dra

now i may not be an expert but am i really so far behind the curve that he can get that doom stack and cross 120 squares of map by round 22?

that just doesnt seem right


edit - every single game orange bee lines for me with this doomstack , then a few rounds later purple comes from the east, they are not meant to be teamed but its clear they are just throwing everything at me

[asapa]

Computer player has % buff increased for specific things, but AI isn't "cheating". It's just simply at a magnified percentage.

[Gilver Redgrave]

Originally posted by asapa:

Computer player has % buff increased for specific things, but AI isn't "cheating". It's just simply at a magnified percentage.

So. pretty much cheating.

"Well i am not cheating i just have higher numbers then you." x,D

[SaintTodd]

Is there a way to mod or tweak the .ini to "fix" this? I've been on the fence about buying this, and frustrating ai cheating is a deal breaker.

[sandman25dcsss]

Originally posted by SaintTodd:

Is there a way to mod or tweak the .ini to "fix" this? I've been on the fence about buying this, and frustrating ai cheating is a deal breaker.

There is nothing to fix. I have just finished a random skirmish and I was pleasantly surprised by AI, you can check my 1 year old thread to see how bad AI was https://steamcommunity.com/app/867210/discussions/0/3550553789966170444
I studied those graphs in this game and AI is quite good at managing resources now (better than me actually because I was a bit lazy to micromanage). It is not ideal of course, but both tactically and strategically it provides a decent challenge. My main complaint now is that AI loves to sacrifice its wielders to kill my scouts despite my main hero is nearby, it is not a good idea in game with 8 players, but then again it provides extra challenge for human player.
For example I mostly relied on ranged units as Arleon and then AI brought an army of units with 70-90% resistance to ranged damage, that was "fun". If I didn't use "reload magic" to avoid being attacked by much stronger wielders several times, I would probably lose the game. And then AI loves to use Armaggedon when outnumbered so even having stronger army does not mean an easy win for human player.

[Lavapotion]

Starting with hopefully next update the AI won't "cheat" anymore on normal difficulty, they won't have a free marketplace and they won't have any more resources than you will. The AI keeps improving and a part of that is a good and solid baseline, or normal!

[The Doctor]

I can agree with sandman's experience - last year, the AI was pretty bad and I put the game aside for a while. I returned to it yesterday and tried a skirmish on NORMAL and the AI beat me. Now I certainly wasn't playing optimally - I spent to much time faffing around my base at the start of the game and didn't get a building built until about turn 5 but I was impressed that it was both able to muster an effective force and to use it properly in combat.

Good job.

[Red Eye]

Glad to hear AI is getting better!!

[Flytrap]

Yea this just happened to me.

My two wielders were wayyy out of the sight range of an enemy wielder and it just knew where i was. Dont give me the spin of 'oh it was just exploring in that direction and happened to find you along the way' because:

It came out of nowhere, handed me my ass, i reloaded, stayed even farther away from where it came (trying to guesstimate its movement range) and i must have gotten it right because after the reload it didnt come for me. My best guess is that i did manage to be outside of its range of movement and it would have come for me again if it had the movement points.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥.
It shouldnt just 'know' where i am because it has access to the game's inner code.
It should either see me on already explored terrain (which this case wasnt, because it broke through a blocking enemy spawn in the same turn), or when its exploring and i happen to appear in its view

Edit: https://imgur.com/a/Odx9T2U
This was a load of bull. What the ♥♥♥♥ happened around turn 14 that the AI just skyrocketed in army value

[DaMan]

I dunno about cheating but the AI sure does have an odd advantage with its' main commander. On the flip side its' other armies tend to be puny.
I purposefully put the game on easy and 1v1 skirmish, just to learn the game. My recent game play I can tell I am getting better. I had a bigger army and town. Doesn't matter though. Here comes the same 'Bowser' looking wielder. Sure enough he has max what seem to be fully upgraded team. round 1 half troops cover almost the full length of the battlefield, while magic is wailing my team round 1 and more on round 2. lol

[Xerio]

@lavapotion How hard would it be to try using machine learning to iterate games to improve itself without "cheating" with more income than the player?

[⎝Wyrd Deofol⎠]

Originally posted by Xerio:

@lavapotion How hard would it be to try using machine learning to iterate games to improve itself without "cheating" with more income than the player?

Quite hard. AI improving itself needs borders set, otherwise it will blow every player away. Therefore it requires a lot of programming. Also this game is handcrafted from beginning to end which is a good thing and should be applauded.

[Lavapotion]

Originally posted by Xerio:

@lavapotion How hard would it be to try using machine learning to iterate games to improve itself without "cheating" with more income than the player?

As Apostate said "quite hard" But we are closing in fast (like really fast) a version of our AI that won't have more income or other similar advantages!