Aaargh the AI!

[Cainehill]

Heh. Whereas in Dom2, mages wouldn't cast Berserk on themselves, even when you scripted it explicitly for that (to send a solo SC over-the-top for melee).

[Ironhawk]

Moral of the Story:

Always have a retreat province, even when you think you are going to win.

[Arralen]

In Dominions, you normally get what you deserve:

" ... a big battle in an enemy capital. In one square, I had my prophet (a hero with nice gear and all), my main thug (Son of Steel with some nice gear) and one antlered shaman. ... my two most valued commanders ..."

This begs for punishment - and usually the RNG finds the most annoying way to hand it out, as you just noticed

- you're storming a castle: expect lots of slingshots, arrows or even ballista shots from the defending towers. Any missile landing in the commanders' square would have little choice but to hit them - with 3 size2 units all slots are filled.

- any area effect spell would be guaranteed to effect all of them. Thats true for berserkers, but also for some bolt spells (Fireball etc).

- any melee attack (flyers etc) into the square would be guaranteed to target one of your valuable commanders as well

- obviously, you hadn't given them even ONE lousy bodyguard. While 1 soldier wouldn't help much if the quickened commander charges into enemy ranks, they would keep the commanders from bunching up too much.

- there are not many N2 battle spells. Do not let a N2 mage sit in the back of an army without explicit orders what to do. His first spell should be "eagle eyes", btw. .. "berserkers" is only prec0 and range 1 .. therefore can only hit the neighbouring squares .. or the caster himself.


Maybe "berserkers" should be altered to have range of 2-3 to make it 'easier' for spellcasters not to accidently hit themselves when they try to boost their neighbouring soldiers battle morale

[Hullu]

I _KNOW_ I made fatal mistakes.

But still it doesn't remove the fact that the combat AI was surprisingly stupid I really didn't know whether to cry or laugh when I saw what happened

[Arralen]

Maybe it was stupid, maybe it was not - either I didn't make myself clear enough, or you left out the fact that the mages where there all alone in the back of the army:
The mage was casting "berserkers" at maximum range (1) .. maybe he just missed the neighbouring square ... . On the other hand, we all know the tendency of mage commanders to cast all those nifty boost spells on themselves first ...

Btw., go through the spell list - which other spells are there the Shaman could have cast, other then eagle eye? Keep in mind, the target must be in range, what often is not the case at the start of battle!

[Endoperez]

Hmm. I script my mages to "cast spells" most of the time, when I don't have any spesific plan for them. In this case, though, I think "Stay Behind Troops" would've been better. It's the global "hold or cast" order.

[Shovah32]

I try to script mine for something, especially when you have other very poor spells they could cast.

[alexti]

Hullu said:
I _KNOW_ I made fatal mistakes.

But still it doesn't remove the fact that the combat AI was surprisingly stupid

Remember, that AI players have to deal with stupid combat AI too. And, unlike you, with stupid strategic AI as well