Is AI biased against charm?

[WraithLord]

I'm playing Man in MP game and for many turns of this game I'm witnessing what seems like a certain dislike of the AI towards the spell charm. I'm not saying the AI doesn't cast charm, it does, at times. However I've had battles in which my N mages simply refused to cast charm. They were equipped with MR penetration items and were facing usually lone SCs with not too high MR (in range of 14-20).

I've output the log of such battle in which I had a fairly large squad on N mages scripted to some buff or summon spell and then 4Xcharm. In this battle charm wasn't even cast once and hence the battle was lost.

I'd really like to get to the bottom of this seemingly strange behavior of the AI.

[Gregstrom]

Charm has low range - would that be part of it?

[Psycho]

You weren't trying to charm something mindless like a golem?

[Psycho]

Or a Marble Oracle?

[Lingchih]

Yeah, Charm is pretty iffy. Even for simple, friendly mage transfers, you may only get half the charms that you scripted. It's always been that way, though, afaik.

[WraithLord]

Or a Marble Oracle?

Stupid, stupid, stupid me. I hereby apologize to the AI, in that case you proved the smarter of us :)

So Golems and Marble Oracle's can not be effected by enslave mind as well?

Edit, ok in this instance the target was indeed a marble Oracle. At other instances the AI refused to target banelords which it should have. However I have an explanation to this and IMO its somewhat of an exploit (of the banelord's employer). I'll refrain from detailing now, since this kind of info can boomerang to me in my current on going game

[Edi]

Oh, the AI has no compunctiuons about using charm at all. At least the indie AI doesn't, when it can cast it. Nothing like losing two or three fully kitted out SCs in the same battle to an indie province with scripted defenders. In the same fight.

[Psycho]

Or a Marble Oracle?

Stupid, stupid, stupid me. I hereby apologize to the AI, in that case you proved the smarter of us :)

So Golems and Marble Oracle's can not be effected by enslave mind as well?

Edit, ok in this instance the target was indeed a marble Oracle. At other instances the AI refused to target banelords which it should have. However I have an explanation to this and IMO its somewhat of an exploit (of the banelord's employer). I'll refrain from detailing now, since this kind of info can boomerang to me in my current on going game

They cannot be affected by enslave mind, paralyze, hellbind heart, leach, life for a life, etc. They are immune to most SC counters.

Do write some more on that exploit when you can.

[Sombre]

Oh, the AI has no compunctiuons about using charm at all. At least the indie AI doesn't, when it can cast it. Nothing like losing two or three fully kitted out SCs in the same battle to an indie province with scripted defenders. In the same fight.

When are indy provinces going to have scripted defenders?

When are you going to be attacking an indy province with an SC, let alone 2 or 3?

[Aezeal]

probably on the fearun map or something.. armies there can be pretty impressive

[Edi]

Oh, the AI has no compunctiuons about using charm at all. At least the indie AI doesn't, when it can cast it. Nothing like losing two or three fully kitted out SCs in the same battle to an indie province with scripted defenders. In the same fight.

When are indy provinces going to have scripted defenders?

When are you going to be attacking an indy province with an SC, let alone 2 or 3?
When the opposition is a W9E9N9 Great Mother with an assload of scripted defenders. Myrloch Vale on the Faerun map has precisely that and my friend lost two Earth Kings equipped to the gills with artifacts, at least one fully equipped lesser thug and a rather large chunk of his army to that. N9 charm has +3 penetration bonus from the magic paths alone, so it becomes really brutal.

[WraithLord]

Sounds awesome :)

I'm SPing the adventure Faerun now and will respect Myrloch Vale greatly. Or maybe I'll bring my own N mages full with MR penet. items to charm the fat lady ;)