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Realistic Aggressive AI (6.0 Ready)

Update 4.0 (11.6.23):
Please see the new addition (7) below.

Update 3.0:
The mod has stayed 99% the same. A very slight increase was made to the direct action minimum change amount (in other words, your minor offense will be taken slightly more seriously than it was in this mod's version 2.0). Other than that, the mod is basically the same but brought in line with 3.0's new coding.

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Are you tired of AI just ignoring you while you systematically destroy them? Tired of an AI with 5 army stacks just sending one at you? Do you wish the AI took you seriously? If so, this mod is for you! And it's save game compatible!

This is the final version of my original mod that worked great pre-2.0, but was largely broken after 2.0. Nevertheless, this mod's prior versions had plenty of commenters declaring they could*definitely* tell this mod was working. The mod is now re-worked, re-balanced, and working better than ever before!

Who this mod is for:
This mod is for the people who enjoyed the game more pre-Update 1.2 (when CA nerfed the AI's aggression towards the player). This mod is NOT intended to create a game where the AI will entirely ignore each other for the player. This mod IS intended to create a game that will challenge the player where the AI will *prefer* attacking the player - WITHIN REASON. You should not experience the AI crossing the entire world to come attack you.

It shares many similarities with the previous versions, but many upgrades as well. See the details below:

This mod implements SEVEN (7) layers of changes to dramatically up the challenge from the AI - and to make your AI allies more useful to you. What this mod does:


In Vanilla, many AI factions did not establish a "main threat" to them until far too late. And in higher difficulties, CA has set the preference for the player so high that an AI viewed you - a player 5 provinces over - as their main threat rather than the AI faction next door currently gobbling up all their territories. And even when the AI did establish a nation as their main threat, it really didn't change their actions much. This mod does two things: it balances the main threat correctly so the AI will consider its ACTUAL main threat as its main threat in diplomacy. Second, it will take its main threat extremely seriously, and will prefer attacking it over random factions, including you. While the AI preference to view the player as its main threat has been put at a realistic value, it still has a slight slant towards the player - this means an AI that doesn't have a real main threat will probably pick you. An AI's main threat will also now change realistically based on what's happening to it. If you were not the main threat a few turns ago, but you've declared war and grabbed a few AI territories, you will probably be the main threat very soon.


In diplomacy, all nations will have a "threat to player" value independent of its main threat value (safe, minor threat, moderate threat, major threat, dominant threat). This value governs their likelihood to declare war on you and how aggressively they will attack you in war. This value has also been extensively re-worked and carefully balanced through rigorous testing. In Vanilla, this value was usually very low. Most AI were "safe" to the player or a "minor threat" at most for far too long. This value has been increased so AI who don't like you will be a threat as long as they have any military at all. So, if you are a Dwarf faction, every Greenskin faction you encounter will probably be declaring war on you within a turn or two of discovery because of the -100 aversion they have. This section of the mod considers 3 factors to determine an AI's threat value to you (in the following order): (1) AI attitude towards you, (2) Direct actions vs AI nation, (3) Proximity to you. If they hate you, they will probably declare war on you - they will be even more likely to if you have raided them, used an agent action against them, or trespassed against them. Lastly, an AI faction next door is more likely to declare war on you than an AI faction across the world.


These table values have been changed to boost an AI's desire to attack the player (as opposed to just raiding endlessly), as well as to actually take your settlements (rather than just sack and leave). The extreme difference you will find with this change is that if you have a string of unprotected settlements, and an AI army arrives at the outer edge, the AI will start gobbling up your settlements one by one every turn it can. Depending on how close the settlements are, the AI could take 10 settlements in 10 turns. What this means is that you can no longer rely on the AI just giving you time to get an army in position to attack them once they announce their presence. They will take your settlements until you stop them. This can and will result in you losing an entire empire in a just few turns if you don't take immediate action to stop your new attacker.


Increase the priority for your AI allies to actually listen to you when you set an AI attack priority. It hasn't been set so high that they will ignore critical threats to them if they deem it necessary (they aren't all your vassals after all), but they will be more likely to listen than in Vanilla. Passive AI are still less likely than any other AI to follow instructions (because they don't like fighting) but are much more likely to listen than in Vanilla.

One thing that has been dramatically increased is the AI's desire to finish off your - and each others' - last settlement. No more letting their enemies just linger about forever. When their enemy is ailing, they will move to finish them - even if that enemy is not their "Main Threat." No more whittling down a Main Threat enemy then leaving them to return because a new enemy became the Main Threat.

Playing on Hard, Very Hard, or Legendary will make your experience more challenging. The harder your campaign difficulty setting, the more aggressive the AI will be.

As of Update 4.0 of this mod, the AI will now bring more of its units to attack your armies. Before, even with this mod, the AI would bring armies that it THOUGHT were strong enough to defeat you, but actually weren't. Now, it will bring an adequate number of troops. I accomplished this by tweaking the Autoresolver settings to give the player a boost in Autoresolve. I have tested this, and the only result is that the AI will now bring MORE troops before attacking you. Gone are the days of easily dispatching AI forces one by one via manual battle as they foolishly underestimate you based on the autoresolver's estimates of their chances. Now when the AI comes for you, it's coming to win.

Note: The change in (7) can occasionally lead to too easy Autoresolve results when the AI occasionally doesn't bring enough troops. I suggest using this other mod below alongside mine to minimize any temptation to exploit this.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2854146839&searchtext=autoresolve

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Note: Extensive tables have been changed regarding AI behavior. If you are using this and another AI behavior mod, they will likely conflict. Mods that simply change the resources available to the AI or how they use their resources will likely be compatible.

Save Game compatible.