Mercs

[Saxon]

I have been having a harder time in single player keeping mercenaries before. It seems that sometimes they sometimes leave if I do not pay a fair bit more than they are asking. Further, the AI is more aggressive about bidding, I am sometimes beaten now. Anyone else noticing this change of behavior?

[Ballbarian]

Barely. Instead of bidding 6 over the base, I have been bidding 11 over and have not lost a single bid yet in my current long game. Playing as EA Ermor and I have controlled all mercenaries since the beginning of the game. Now on turn 108. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[Saxon]

I guess I was being too cheap! Many thanks, I will use this formula. In my recent game, I was outbid on the trolls and had to kill them. It was a shame, as I really needed the heavy infantry punch against Helheim.

[NTJedi]

Ballbarian said:
Barely. Instead of bidding 6 over the base, I have been bidding 11 over and have not lost a single bid yet in my current long game. Playing as EA Ermor and I have controlled all mercenaries since the beginning of the game. Now on turn 108. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif



Unfortunately the computer AI opponents don't place high bids on the mercenaries giving a significant edge to SP gamers. Way back during dominions_2 it was also mentioned how the AI opponents are not competively bidding on the mercenaries... yet same as what you noticed there was virtually no change.
In multiplayer games the bidding on mercenaries will go 50, 100 or more over the original price depending on the mercs. The AI opponents could seriously do lots better if when bidding on mercenaries when they FIRST appear randomly was up to 100 over.

[Endoperez]

Formulas?

(2d6 oe roll) x 10 gp over asked price?

The AI can probably analyze how many of the merc soldiers are alive, and how many it started with. How should that affect bid price? Direct multiplier, so that e.g. with 10/30 archers dead the bid would be 0.67 of what it would be otherwise? Or should the AI bid much less for mercs that have lost some units or are currently recruited by someone else, in the case it's booby-trapped or ordered to take the burnt of a Knight charge next turn, leaving the AI with 3 soldiers total?

It's complicated business.

[Meglobob]

In SP Dom3 I bid exactly 1 gold over the asking price and get them 100% of the time. The AI has however then stolen the mercenaries off me by outbidding later on. Overall the AI is not too clever with mercenaries I feel.

In MP (currently in 4), I have a real hard time getting mercenaries and I am bidding 100-150 gold over the asking price. Perhaps the developers should observe MP behaviour and try to emulate this too some extent in SP, especially in the early game, 1st 10 turns where they have a big impact.

[Action]

How much of an income bonus does the SP ai get on higher difficulty settings like mighy/impossible?

If they have tons and tons of gold anyway I'd rather they use it to steal mercenaries from the player, even if they pay too much, than to use the money to recruit more slingers/light infantry/those tribal warriors with two daggers.

As is I feel like it's cheating to even use mercs in single player so I'm just not using em.

[NTJedi]

Action said:
As is I feel like it's cheating to even use mercs in single player so I'm just not using em.



I feel the same way... and even worse a SP gamer can take a destroyed mercenary group where only the non-magic commander remains and ignore the contract renewal where the stupid AI will purchase him for 100 or more gold. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Easy Quick AI fixes for the mercenaries
1) AI opponents should never bid on mercenaries where more than 50% of its army died. If the mercenary starts with zero units then obviously it bids the regular amount.
2) AI opponents should always bid when mercenaries first arrive. Their bidding price for the appearance of new mercenaries should randomly be as much as double the asking price PLUS 1% of the AIs total gold from the start of a turn.
3) AI bids on keeping existing mercenaries if 30% or more of the army is still alive. It should randomly bid as much as double the discounted price plus 1% of the AIs total gold from the start of a turn.



This method is not perfect, but it's an easy formula and better than the games current method.