jscott991 wrote:If the AI doesn't build any more, I'm going to have to script an event. It's ridiculous to not face anything in the West.
Are you playing with mods?
I am still playing AACW.
I am playing with two minor mods. The first is a change to McClellan's stats to make him the equal of McDowell (the reality is that McClellan was vastly superior to McDowell, but I didn't want to fudge the game too much). The second is that I noticed a bug in the July 1861 scenario that meant that many generals in the 1861 division pool (like Morell, McCall, Blenker, Shields, etc.) don't appear in the game if you play from July. I simply changed the date on that event.
The AI simply didn't do anything in that game so I started over. I still don't get why it didn't build a second army container or why the only Confederate army trudged around in the valley and left Richmond completely undefended for months. It also didn't oppose my moves to Winchester, Manassas, Fredericksburg, and Memphis (it did throw some divisions at me around Nashville).
I am going to buy AACW2 in the near future. I'm holding out for a Steam sale or my return from several weeks in France.
I am playing with two minor mods. The first is a change to McClellan's stats to make him the equal of McDowell (the reality is that McClellan was vastly superior to McDowell, but I didn't want to fudge the game too much). The second is that I noticed a bug in the July 1861 scenario that meant that many generals in the 1861 division pool (like Morell, McCall, Blenker, Shields, etc.) don't appear in the game if you play from July. I simply changed the date on that event.
The AI simply didn't do anything in that game so I started over. I still don't get why it didn't build a second army container or why the only Confederate army trudged around in the valley and left Richmond completely undefended for months. It also didn't oppose my moves to Winchester, Manassas, Fredericksburg, and Memphis (it did throw some divisions at me around Nashville).
I am going to buy AACW2 in the near future. I'm holding out for a Steam sale or my return from several weeks in France.
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ArmChairGeneral
- AGEod Grognard
- Posts: 997
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:00 am
- Location: Austin, TX, USA
Looking forward to having you fully on board, though I am seething with jealousy over several weeks in France! Anyone with enough interest in the subject to have opinions on the relative quality of civil war generals is going to fit in here just fine 
Till then, ramp up your settings and keep at it with AACW, the gameplay is very similar and you will not miss a beat when you switch over.
Till then, ramp up your settings and keep at it with AACW, the gameplay is very similar and you will not miss a beat when you switch over.
Is there a key command to clean up a region and make all the units appear in one stack?
For example, as I move units into heavily trafficked areas (Fairfax and Cairo come to mind), it gets very cluttered and hard to see what all is there with just a quick glance. I know the game can display multiple stacks as one stack (it does it unpredictably). I was hoping there was a way to make it do that.
For example, as I move units into heavily trafficked areas (Fairfax and Cairo come to mind), it gets very cluttered and hard to see what all is there with just a quick glance. I know the game can display multiple stacks as one stack (it does it unpredictably). I was hoping there was a way to make it do that.
), which stacks all forces in a region together.Does the AI usually launch kind of crazy invasion of the North?
Is there any way to stop them from attacking Pittsburgh or Maryland or whatever and being trapped and destroyed with ease?
I keep starting a new game, and the AI has lost Beauregard's army in three straight games because it ran off into the north, besieged some city, and then wilted and died.
Should I turn the aggressiveness down to the lowest level?
Is there any way to stop them from attacking Pittsburgh or Maryland or whatever and being trapped and destroyed with ease?
I keep starting a new game, and the AI has lost Beauregard's army in three straight games because it ran off into the north, besieged some city, and then wilted and died.
Should I turn the aggressiveness down to the lowest level?
jscott991 wrote:Does the AI usually launch kind of crazy invasion of the North?
Yes.
Is there any way to stop them from attacking Pittsburgh or Maryland or whatever and being trapped and destroyed with ease?
Yes. Don't move Patterson's forces, with or without Paterson, directly into the valley. Linger a bit and convert the railroad in the regions between Harper's Ferry and Morgantown.
I keep starting a new game, and the AI has lost Beauregard's army in three straight games because it ran off into the north, besieged some city, and then wilted and died.
Should I turn the aggressiveness down to the lowest level?
No. Do as stated above vs. the AI.
Its the second aggression setting, and the difficulty setting is the last one where the AI doesn't get cheats (I decline to play against an overtly cheating AI). FoW is off, extra time is on, and I gave the AI the first detection bonus (although it shouldn't do anything with FoW off, I thought I'd see).
My observations on the AACW AI are that:
1. It really hates defending Richmond. In five games through about the end of 1862, I've never once encountered consistent resistance in taking Richmond. The Army Container (commanded usually by Beauregard unless he's been destroyed earlier in the game trying to take York or Pittsburgh) hangs around in the Valley or Culpepper, doing nothing. A corps by Robert Lee will sometimes sit in Richmond for a little while, but it almost always leaves and wanders around at some point.
2. It likes to invade the North. Wow, it really likes to invade the North. The Patterson trick slowed it down (thank for the tip!), but the AI will make a ridiculous beeline for Pittsburgh as soon as it thinks it can make it. I don't get this. What is causing it? What is it about Pittsburgh?
3. It does a better job in the West usually. The West is the great downfall of Forge of Freedom and Grigsby. The AI in those games just won't defend it. They turtle in Richmond and you can take Memphis, Nashville, Vicksburg, etc. with ease. The AACW AI does a good job defending Nashville (too good of a job; the game doesn't really model how indefensible the city was after Henry and Donelson fell). It isn't as consistent about resisting around Memphis, but usually a corps or army shows up in Corinth at some point to cause a bit of trouble. I've had a game (my first really long play) where I never saw anything out west, but that's been the exception.
4. It doesn't change generals. It's Beauregard, the two Johnstons, and Earl Van Dorn forever! It never uses Robert Lee as anything other than a corps commander, and I seldom see much of Jackson or Longstreet. The game needs a "Lee Takes Command" event like the McClellan event.
Reading this forum, I don't think CW2's AI is a lot better about some of this stuff. What's so hard about designing a CSA AI that sits on the defense in an intelligent way, covering Richmond, Nashville/Chattanooga/Atlanta, and Memphis/Corinth/Vicksburg/New Orleans. No game seems to get it right and you'd think the CSA AI would be the easiest to code.
My observations on the AACW AI are that:
1. It really hates defending Richmond. In five games through about the end of 1862, I've never once encountered consistent resistance in taking Richmond. The Army Container (commanded usually by Beauregard unless he's been destroyed earlier in the game trying to take York or Pittsburgh) hangs around in the Valley or Culpepper, doing nothing. A corps by Robert Lee will sometimes sit in Richmond for a little while, but it almost always leaves and wanders around at some point.
2. It likes to invade the North. Wow, it really likes to invade the North. The Patterson trick slowed it down (thank for the tip!), but the AI will make a ridiculous beeline for Pittsburgh as soon as it thinks it can make it. I don't get this. What is causing it? What is it about Pittsburgh?
3. It does a better job in the West usually. The West is the great downfall of Forge of Freedom and Grigsby. The AI in those games just won't defend it. They turtle in Richmond and you can take Memphis, Nashville, Vicksburg, etc. with ease. The AACW AI does a good job defending Nashville (too good of a job; the game doesn't really model how indefensible the city was after Henry and Donelson fell). It isn't as consistent about resisting around Memphis, but usually a corps or army shows up in Corinth at some point to cause a bit of trouble. I've had a game (my first really long play) where I never saw anything out west, but that's been the exception.
4. It doesn't change generals. It's Beauregard, the two Johnstons, and Earl Van Dorn forever! It never uses Robert Lee as anything other than a corps commander, and I seldom see much of Jackson or Longstreet. The game needs a "Lee Takes Command" event like the McClellan event.
Reading this forum, I don't think CW2's AI is a lot better about some of this stuff. What's so hard about designing a CSA AI that sits on the defense in an intelligent way, covering Richmond, Nashville/Chattanooga/Atlanta, and Memphis/Corinth/Vicksburg/New Orleans. No game seems to get it right and you'd think the CSA AI would be the easiest to code.
jscott991 wrote:Its the second aggression setting, and the difficulty setting is the last one where the AI doesn't get cheats (I decline to play against an overtly cheating AI). FoW is off, extra time is on, and I gave the AI the first detection bonus (although it shouldn't do anything with FoW off, I thought I'd see).
It's a long time since a play against the AI but if I remember well it was less prone to the kind of attack you describe. My settings were the following :
AI ranking : Lieutenant
Use all behaviors : On
Activation bonus : Normal
AI detect bonus : Medium
Aggressiveness : Normal
Give AI more time : On
Fog of war : On
I use the play against the AI more as a way to understand the game mechanisms and understand the constraints and advantages of each side.
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woodtick1168
- Civilian
- Posts: 2
- Joined: Wed Sep 10, 2014 5:52 am
Hi all. New to forum but have been mucking about in CWII for a bit now. This has been a great thread for me especially the scouting discussion I just finished a most excellent battle and took Manassas by following the ideas laid out in this thread. Found Jackson in the mountains which meant Manassas lost a lot of Pwr so when I sent some cav around Manassas there wasn't much there. I have only played Union thus far and have not attempted a game vs the AI yet. Still working on the learning curve. To all you AAR folks well done for the details you present. To Grey Fox and MickeyD I bestow upon you the highly Valued ITC award (In The Clutch) for delivering such a great AAR.
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ArmChairGeneral
- AGEod Grognard
- Posts: 997
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:00 am
- Location: Austin, TX, USA
jscott991:
It sounds like you really have a handle on how to play this game and are ready to kick it up a notch.
In AGEOD games, there are two kinds of difficulty settings, rulesets and AI advantages. On the Game screen, you add rulesets like realistic attrition, FoW, historical force pools, manual replacement purchasing and naval box automation. These make the game harder for the player by adding complexity to decision-making. I strongly recommend at this point in your play to use ALL of the rulesets, setting Attrition to Historical for player but not AI, (which is harder than historical for both) Activation on the second from the right right setting that gives you a chance of being fixed, and your choice of FI, naval box handling and replacement automation. The quality of your leadership becomes an important consideration (activity settings) and you must consider all weather/terrain/cohesion effects carefully (historical attrition). Play with FoW ON, so that you must scout manually (a critical AGEOD skill). This will make your game "harder" by forcing you to play with the entire ruleset.
(I recommend playing with all rulesets on from the very first game since they don't add that much difficulty to the already steep learning curve. You are putting dozens of hours into your games, you might as well get the full experience, and the extra rules aren't that much harder, just different. Using all the rules makes the game feel more natural, realistic and intuitive, lending depth and verisimilitude to your play experience.)
The AI settings, like Rank (Sergeant, Lieutenant, Col.,) Activation bonus (outright plus to strategic ratings) and Detection bonus give specific advantages to the AI, and can be thought of as the "difficulty" settings in that they give the AI advantages. The AI can only "cheat" to the extent that you buff her using these sliders. If you have not granted Athena specific advantages in these settings, she has no scope to "cheat." She plays by the same rules you do except for what extra you choose to give her. Rank gives movement and cohesion bonii, (and some extra replacements at the hardest levels) Activation Bonus (not to be confused with the Activation Settings above, which add rulesets) adds to her generals' Strategic ratings, and Detection bonus increases all of her units' Detection ratings. Rank allows her to move faster and recover quicker than you, Detection gives her a scouting advantage, and Activation gives her an activity advantage. No matter these three sliders, Athena plays best and most realistically using All Behaviors, Extra Processing Time and Normal Aggressiveness.
As far as I know, there is no setting that gives her a materiel advantage (except for the few extra replacements she gets with higher Rank settings). "Easy" Athena has the same $$, WS, CS, force pool depth and scripted forces as "hard" settings, the difference is what movement, scouting and leadership advantages you choose to give her so that she can utilize these forces more effectively.
If you are playing with the FoW ON, the single most important thing you can do to improve AI performance is to give her an advantage in Detection: with better information she will make better decisions. In most other video games, Rank would be the obvious slider to increase to increase "difficulty" but in CW2 Rank is merely one of the available dials, and not necessarily the most important either (although it certainly has a noticeable effect). As you master the scouting subgame you will find that you are significantly better at it than the AI can ever be, so high Detection Bonus becomes de rigeur in advanced play.
If Athena has been making foolish attempts at Pittsburgh you have probably already gained some experience in the most important tactic in the game: running down retreating stacks and destroying them before they can flee back to safety. A failed attack often leaves a stack low on cohesion, in unfavorable terrain and easily cut off from supply. Athena is TERRIBLE at preventing you from surrounding, starving and ultimately destroying these vulnerable stacks. The pattern is: win the initial battle on defense and then surround and destroy the defeated low-cohesion, slow moving, out-of-supply retreaters. Athena is pretty good at doing this to YOU, however ( as you have probably already learned). She is very capable of making you pay when YOU foolishly overcommit, but regularly gets herself into the same predicaments (although this tendency is is lessened with better Detection and Low or Normal Aggression).
It sounds like you really have a handle on how to play this game and are ready to kick it up a notch.
In AGEOD games, there are two kinds of difficulty settings, rulesets and AI advantages. On the Game screen, you add rulesets like realistic attrition, FoW, historical force pools, manual replacement purchasing and naval box automation. These make the game harder for the player by adding complexity to decision-making. I strongly recommend at this point in your play to use ALL of the rulesets, setting Attrition to Historical for player but not AI, (which is harder than historical for both) Activation on the second from the right right setting that gives you a chance of being fixed, and your choice of FI, naval box handling and replacement automation. The quality of your leadership becomes an important consideration (activity settings) and you must consider all weather/terrain/cohesion effects carefully (historical attrition). Play with FoW ON, so that you must scout manually (a critical AGEOD skill). This will make your game "harder" by forcing you to play with the entire ruleset.
(I recommend playing with all rulesets on from the very first game since they don't add that much difficulty to the already steep learning curve. You are putting dozens of hours into your games, you might as well get the full experience, and the extra rules aren't that much harder, just different. Using all the rules makes the game feel more natural, realistic and intuitive, lending depth and verisimilitude to your play experience.)
The AI settings, like Rank (Sergeant, Lieutenant, Col.,) Activation bonus (outright plus to strategic ratings) and Detection bonus give specific advantages to the AI, and can be thought of as the "difficulty" settings in that they give the AI advantages. The AI can only "cheat" to the extent that you buff her using these sliders. If you have not granted Athena specific advantages in these settings, she has no scope to "cheat." She plays by the same rules you do except for what extra you choose to give her. Rank gives movement and cohesion bonii, (and some extra replacements at the hardest levels) Activation Bonus (not to be confused with the Activation Settings above, which add rulesets) adds to her generals' Strategic ratings, and Detection bonus increases all of her units' Detection ratings. Rank allows her to move faster and recover quicker than you, Detection gives her a scouting advantage, and Activation gives her an activity advantage. No matter these three sliders, Athena plays best and most realistically using All Behaviors, Extra Processing Time and Normal Aggressiveness.
As far as I know, there is no setting that gives her a materiel advantage (except for the few extra replacements she gets with higher Rank settings). "Easy" Athena has the same $$, WS, CS, force pool depth and scripted forces as "hard" settings, the difference is what movement, scouting and leadership advantages you choose to give her so that she can utilize these forces more effectively.
If you are playing with the FoW ON, the single most important thing you can do to improve AI performance is to give her an advantage in Detection: with better information she will make better decisions. In most other video games, Rank would be the obvious slider to increase to increase "difficulty" but in CW2 Rank is merely one of the available dials, and not necessarily the most important either (although it certainly has a noticeable effect). As you master the scouting subgame you will find that you are significantly better at it than the AI can ever be, so high Detection Bonus becomes de rigeur in advanced play.
If Athena has been making foolish attempts at Pittsburgh you have probably already gained some experience in the most important tactic in the game: running down retreating stacks and destroying them before they can flee back to safety. A failed attack often leaves a stack low on cohesion, in unfavorable terrain and easily cut off from supply. Athena is TERRIBLE at preventing you from surrounding, starving and ultimately destroying these vulnerable stacks. The pattern is: win the initial battle on defense and then surround and destroy the defeated low-cohesion, slow moving, out-of-supply retreaters. Athena is pretty good at doing this to YOU, however ( as you have probably already learned). She is very capable of making you pay when YOU foolishly overcommit, but regularly gets herself into the same predicaments (although this tendency is is lessened with better Detection and Low or Normal Aggression).
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Whichwitch
- Conscript
- Posts: 5
- Joined: Wed Sep 10, 2014 1:32 am
OK, This thread has made so many things clearer. I was disappointed with Athena because of her erratic attacks but I just tried a scenario with Armchairs recommended settings and Athena does a lot better.
And after reading both sides of MickeyD's and Gray foxes AAR I have come to realize that the supply system is glorious in it's nuanced and intuitive simplicity.
Still having some problems with understanding command structure but with the higher settings I'm getting the importance of strategic rating and its effect on organizing divisions and corps.
On to a new campaign!
And after reading both sides of MickeyD's and Gray foxes AAR I have come to realize that the supply system is glorious in it's nuanced and intuitive simplicity.
Still having some problems with understanding command structure but with the higher settings I'm getting the importance of strategic rating and its effect on organizing divisions and corps.
On to a new campaign!
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