Battle scripts

[Amiller]

First off let me say that this game is amazing and this forum is incredible. This game has actually caused me to waste money as I have bought two other games, installed them and ignored them in favor of this game.

I am a single player junky but know I would be bLasted into nothingness by any one of you because of one significant limitation in my skills. Commander battle scripts

The excellent walkthrough by Mr. Geryk doesn’t go into much detail on these scripts and I can tell from much reading in the forum that commander scripts are what really makes a great player but I have never really gotten the hang of them beyond "spells" or "attack rearmost"

So this said, I would love some general advice on scripts and perhaps some examples.

Thank you for your time.

[condors]

i am no expert but i usually play ulm

what i do typically have in my main attack force
1-prophet commanding heavy infantry front center on stay behind troops casting
2-1 unit of knights on each flank(with knight commanders) hold attack rear
3-smiths (hopefully with some bodyguards fall bears/statues) casting summon earth power, invulnerability, fireshield, cast spells
iron warriors can also be added at the start to boost troops, also if they have flying iteam they will join in the attack rear.

typically i go with a couple blade winds then cast spells(or 1 blade wind for the guys who cast iron warriors first)

not too much flexibility with ulm you have 1 caster with no randoms so its straightforward the indy mages can offer alot of choices but i don't have anything set in stone yet...

[Norfleet]

Scripts go hand-in-hand with formations: It's kind of like planning a sports move. You lay out your squads, or players, and then give them instructions on what to do. A squad of units can be given only a few basic orders: Attack something, Hold and Attack something, Fire at something, Fire and Flee, and Guard Commander. These are pretty self-explanatory orders.

Commander orders are somewhat more complex:
In addition to one of the above basic orders, you can give them up to 5 specific orders, such as casting a specific spell, casting an automatically chosen spell, etc, as well as a few commander-specific basics, such as "Stay Behind Troops" and "Cast Spells".

One helpful trick, to get a flying attack squad that can execute a hold and attack for something other than the basic wait-2, attack, is to give a squad of fliers an order to Guard Commander on a flying Commander, then give your Commander orders like (Spells)(Spells)(Spells)(Spells)Attack rear.

This will cause the entire squad to, instead of rushing ahead after two rounds, hold their position longer, guarding the commander, while your ground troops advance and engage the enemy. Then after the commander exhausts his 4 Hold or Cast Spells orders, he'll fly and attempt to attack the enemy's rear....and the flying squad, having been told to Guard Commander, follows him!

Naturally, this will put your flying commander at risk: Make sure he isn't the only commander, in case he buys it.

[Nethog]

Originally posted by Norfleet:

... then give your Commander orders like (Spells)(Spells)(Spells)(Spells)Attack rear.
... Then after the commander exhausts his 4 Hold or Cast Spells orders, he'll fly and attempt to attack the enemy's rear....

Wow, I didn't know you could give more them a single order to a commander - how do you do it?

[Arryn]

The commands window is broken into two parts by a horizontal line. The commands above the line are those that can be scripted up to 5 times. You just keep selecting commands from the top half until you've used up all five. (You don't need to do all 5.) Then you issue the command the AI will use the rest of the battle from the bottom half.

EDIT: typo

[ March 03, 2004, 22:24: Message edited by: Arryn ]

[Nethog]

Arryn, THANKS! I was wondering why the line was there! It is amazing that this wasn't mentioned anywhere in the manual (unless I missed it).

[Amiller]

Thanks for the inital responses. A follow up question to better clairfy my weakness. Can some of you experts give me some examples of what five commands you give to your spell casters in battle. I have seen clues in the various forums for specific strategies against Ermor. I havn't really gotten the hand of what orders to give say an astrial mage and the like.

Again thanks for the help.

[Demosthenes]

I'm no expert, but I think a good example is:

In a current SP Abysia game, I set my Prophet Anathement Dragon to cast:

(Divine Blessing) (Phoenix Power) (Holy Pyre) (Holy Pyre) (Fanaticism) Cast Spells

The blessing boosts all of my Lava Warriors at once (they are sacred) the Phoenix Power boosts the mage's Fire+1 then he lets loose a couple direct damage bLasts and concludes with boosting the morale of the infantry who should be clashing swords at this point. Of course it wont affect the berserking Lava Warriors, but it works on the Abysian HI and (I presume) the non berserking LW's. Then he's on his own but I've seen to it that He Boosted the holy troops, bumped his own power up, thinned out the enemy infantry and boosted morale before turning him over to the AI Spellcasting.

Hope that makes some sense and is remotely helpful.

[CharonJr]

Originally posted by Amiller:
Thanks for the inital responses. A follow up question to better clairfy my weakness. Can some of you experts give me some examples of what five commands you give to your spell casters in battle. I have seen clues in the various forums for specific strategies against Ermor. I havn't really gotten the hand of what orders to give say an astrial mage and the like.

Again thanks for the help.

I my R'lyeh AAR all my 4S astral mage are set to cast "Quickness" (needs 1 water skill which all of my squiddies do posses) in order to enable them to cast 2 spells each turn, followed by "4x Enslave Mind" to make the enemies fight among themself (well, vs my mind slaves actually ) followed up by "Cast Spells".

This is neting me some decent units sometimes while slowing the enemies advance to give my mages/mindbLasting squids (ranged troops in general) more time to do some harm before the enemy (or at least all of them) get into close combat range.

Often they will route before being able to engage any of my troops.

3S astral mages could use 4x Soul Slay instead of the Enslaves.

Just 2 examples, depending on your mages/researched paths there a TONS of possible strategies.

One more - Fighters who are able to cast spells:

I got me a nice Cyclops form a Tartarian Gate in my AAR and Gift of Reasoned him (turning him into a commander). Due to his 200+ HPs and decent skills he can be easily turned into a SC (super combatant) by giving him some items. But even without items due his his 4E magic skill he would be a very good fighter. He is scripted to cast "Invulnerability" (raises protection to 30) and "Summon Earth Power" (+1E, and more importantly reduces fatigue by 4 each turn IIRC) followed by the order to "attack closest".

CharonJr

[Endoperez]

Why not Summon Earthpower, Invulnerability? He would get less fatique from casting Invulnerability, and would be suspectible for only one round. In that time, no troops would have time to attack him unless they could fly, and if they could they would attack on the first turn. Same with Crossbows, they shoot their bolts the first round, the second they are loading those things.