Going from Normal AI to Impossible AI...

Loren · #1 June 14th, 2008, 01:15 AM

The AI gets more points as the difficulty goes up.

At impossible I've seen pretenders with 4 paths at level 9.

MaxWilson · #2 June 14th, 2008, 01:29 AM

Quote:

Loren said:
The AI gets more points as the difficulty goes up.

At impossible I've seen pretenders with 4 paths at level 9.

You can actually do this if you take the right Imprisoned pretender and poor enough scales. EA Mictlan can get a F9W9D9B9 Smoking Mirror with Dominion 4.

Not that the AI was doing that, it just had more points. The frustrating thing for me is that it still frequently takes Death scales and I'm too lazy to mapedit smart pretender designs in for it--so I just use a lot of opponents and let the good ones eat the bad ones.

-Max

NTJedi · #3 June 14th, 2008, 02:45 AM

Quote:

Loren said:
The AI gets more points as the difficulty goes up.

At impossible I've seen pretenders with 4 paths at level 9.

With some programming effort the AI could be designed to take smarter scales on higher difficulty. Smarter scales... such as never taking Death_2 or Death_3 or never taking Unluck_2 or Unluck_3. Human players know how to manage these scales where as AI opponents really suffer. Other useful scales for the AI would be taking Order and Production.

quantum_mechani · #4 June 14th, 2008, 02:58 AM

Quote:

NTJedi said:
Smarter scales... such as never taking Death_2 or Death_3 or never taking Unluck_2 or Unluck_3.

Misfortune is a staple of MP players, and there are plenty of times when a build has need of points from death scale as well.

kasnavada · #5 June 14th, 2008, 03:34 AM

I think you missed the second part of NTJedi's reply...

What I would actually like is to be able to set the AI before starting a game...

Edi · #6 June 14th, 2008, 03:58 AM

I'm too lazy right now, but somebody should dig up the references to just how much bonus the AI gets at what difficulties to make sure so I could add that to the FAQ.

I'm not quite sure, but I think the bonuses to gold, resources and gems were something like
Easy -30%
Normal 0%
Difficult 30%
Mighty 60%
Impossible 100%

Herode · #7 June 14th, 2008, 05:51 AM

Only +30% for "difficult" ?
Considering the intense troop spamming I have to face at this level, I would have guessed almost 100%

I often play at difficult level, until mid game. I never went past mid game since this adverse spamming is boring in SP. On the other hand at "normal" level, the AI is far too weak and easy to beat and it is #my# spamming which becomes boring

Dedas · #8 June 14th, 2008, 05:57 AM

It would be really cool if you could change the difficulty when setting human players to AI when inside a new game. That way you could design their pretender gods by yourself making them much harder to beat. You could also set up challenging scenarios for yourself. What say you Kristoffer and Co?

MaxWilson · #9 June 14th, 2008, 06:30 AM

Quote:

Edi said:
I'm too lazy right now, but somebody should dig up the references to just how much bonus the AI gets at what difficulties to make sure so I could add that to the FAQ.

Ask and ye shall receive, knock and it shall be opened unto you.

-Max

Gandalf Parker · #10 June 14th, 2008, 11:50 AM

Yes SemiRandom will work on the Dawn of Dominions map.

A couple of points. Firstly, SemiRandom doesnt do anything that you cannot do yourself. The Dominions 3 game comes with a doc file for map commands to create your AIs. You can use a text editor (like notepad or wordpad) on any .map file altho you probably want to copy it to a new name first. You can place AIs if you want to so that they start in powerful locations. You can set the scales. You can create the gods (even ones not on the god list such as giving Eater of Gods as a pretender). You can give the AI extra starting armies (flight of dragons, or even a squad of titan pretenders). You can give the AI specific magic sites and extra castles. You can make sure that the AI begins the game with extra provinces next to it which are high in resources, or gems, or gold. Or even that have specific independents that you wish the AI would use more such as cavemen or knights. And you can set the AIs to ally with other AIs against you (they dont share but you can set it so they do not attack each other).

Secondly its fun to point out that Ballbarian wants very much for people to send in those AI designs so that they can be included in the files that SemiRandom can choose from when scattering random surprises into a map file for people to play on. If you find the program fun then thank him for the couple dozen random things it tossed in that made you smile by sending him one he can add to SemiRandoms library.

Gandalf Parker
--
Me: "Some people play to win or lose, others just to stay in the game."
Them: "Are we talking about games? Or life in general?"
Me: "Exactly."