Discussion: AI Expansion

[ahowl11]

We will be using an AOR system for sure

[Bercor]

This should be simply impossible. In no way would any empire in the Antiquity be capable of conquering and control half Europe in only 50 years. This is the type of things that we have to fight if we want to make justice to our name Rome Total Realism.

Yeah, Alexander went east from Macedon.

Well, I would say that Alexander was the rare exception that confirmed the rule. The circumstances behind the Alexandrian persian conquest were very especific (a giant corrupt crumbling empire, with independent satraps that joined and helped the invader) and are not reflected in-game. Alexander didn't siege and conquer every single persian city, he did won a few key battles assaulted a few key cities and all the empire collapse into his hands.

[Alavaria]

Reminding me that the bribing mechanic in RTW is close to useless in the current form. Far too expensive to bribe anything, if I recall.

[Alavaria]

This should be simply impossible. In no way would any empire in the Antiquity be capable of conquering and control half Europe in only 50 years. This is the type of things that we have to fight if we want to make justice to our name Rome Total Realism.

Yeah, Alexander went east from Macedon.

Well, I would say that Alexander was the rare exception that confirmed the rule. The circumstances behind the Alexandrian persian conquest were very especific (a giant corrupt crumbling empire, with independent satraps that joined and helped the invader) and are not reflected in-game. Alexander didn't siege and conquer every single persian city, he did won a few key battles assaulted a few key cities and all the empire collapse into his hands.

So the realities of the day isn't part of the game. Ahhh, right.

Only natural since you wind up with a dozen empires dropping everything they have to make war on one guy. The player faction. And they can make peace with just about anyone, except one guy. The player faction.

Also, there are hardly any key battles or key cities since the AI is bad at doing things and throws stacks and stacks in a semi-blind manner, recruiting from everywhere and trying to drown you whenever you make forward progress. You can take Rome or Carthage and the AI can still spam from all the other cities.

[Bercor]

So the realities of the day isn't part of the game. Ahhh, right.

Only natural since you wind up with a dozen empires dropping everything they have to make war on one guy. The player faction. And they can make peace with just about anyone, except one guy. The player faction.

Also, there are hardly any key battles or key cities since the AI is bad at doing things and throws stacks and stacks in a semi-blind manner, recruiting from everywhere and trying to drown you whenever you make forward progress. You can take Rome or Carthage and the AI can still spam from all the other cities.

Of course the game doesn't reflect the reality of Antiquity. There were so many factors that could influence the outcome of a situation that it would be impossible to represent ingame. What I was talking about when I posted that example of blitzkrieg was the necessity of slowdown the expansion to at least try make a realistic medium/late game interesting for the player.

As for your points, all true. The constant spamming of armies it's a problem that should be analyzed. Maybe we should implement a restricted recruitment system similar to MTW2, if you recruit a unit, that unit would be only available to recruit again a x number of turns. In regards to the constant war against the player, we have the force diplomocy script, but that doesn't prevents the AI to attack you in the next turn. I'll see if a script that makes two factions not enter in war if the signed a ceasefire for, for example, 2 years (8 turns) it's possible.

[Alavaria]

Admittedly, I'm not being entirely "oh so serious". Part of the issue with restricting AI recruitment is that you get into a state where AI throws some stacks, then you kill it, then it is defenceless as you start wasting it since it can't get a stack together, allowing you to just kill small 6-unit groups while taking settlements over and over.

Of course garrison scripts can help with this (and I think we are removing the onagers etc, so only the spy method bypasses that).

[Bercor]

Admittedly, I'm not being entirely "oh so serious". Part of the issue with restricting AI recruitment is that you get into a state where AI throws some stacks, then you kill it, then it is defenceless as you start wasting it since it can't get a stack together, allowing you to just kill small 6-unit groups while taking settlements over and over.

Of course garrison scripts can help with this (and I think we are removing the onagers etc, so only the spy method bypasses that).

Yes, of course, I agree. That will need much thought and balance. Ideally, I would like us to implement something similar to Bryg's Grim reality submod for Stainless Steel (don't now if you ever played), but we'll see.

[Fëanáro]

You should probably have a cost for building and empire maintenance.

[Bercor]

You should probably have a cost for building and empire maintenance.

A monetary cost?

[Fëanáro]

Exactly.

[Bercor]

Exactly.

Well, building already costs money, but I agree with you, empire maintenance cost it's a must. I simply don't know if that's enough to prevent the overwhelming accumulation of money...

[Fëanáro]

Exactly.

Well, building already costs money, but I agree with you, empire maintenance cost it's a must. I simply don't know if that's enough to prevent the overwhelming accumulation of money...

Buildings should probably deduct from provincial income every turn they are active. Maybe some way to model the over-extension of an empire? Fourth Age has done that to great effect.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?532061-DoM-Gameplay-Mechanics-and-Features-Overview-%28upd-24-12-2013%29

We could take a look at some of the ideas there.

[Bercor]

Exactly.

Well, building already costs money, but I agree with you, empire maintenance cost it's a must. I simply don't know if that's enough to prevent the overwhelming accumulation of money...

Buildings should probably deduct from provincial income every turn they are active. Maybe some way to model the over-extension of an empire? Fourth Age has done that to great effect.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?532061-DoM-Gameplay-Mechanics-and-Features-Overview-%28upd-24-12-2013%29

We could take a look at some of the ideas there.

Yeah, I know, I'm eargerly waiting for that amazing mod. But I'm afraid will have to wait for Aradan to throw us some tutorials explaining how to implement some of that mechanics, there's noone currently because they pretty much created them from scratch, and I guess that could take a while...

[Mausolos of Caria]

What I noticed on Roma Surrectum II with their economy was, that it developed very differently with big and little factions.  Whenever I picked one of the big factions (e.g. the Seleucid Empire), but also Parthia, for some reason, in the long run it was impossible to increase the income to a point where I could build buildings in every city every turn- in every city, where construction wasn't already underway, obviously. Whatever I did, it would only rise a little bit and growing squalor and unrest forced me to let my own towns rebel and exterminate them sometimes, like it happened on vanilla Rome.
Now if I played a little faction, I would also get a good income at the start (not the last because of the treasury in your capital) and after only 20 turns in I had stored enough money for basically the rest of the game. Similarly, public order was easier to control since your starting towns were always content and you yould decide over the fate of the newly conquered ones.

I liked the system of RTR VII somewhat more. With choosing how to occupy your town by implementing a certain policy (shown as a building that was finished after 0 turns and didn't cost anything) and then developing different ways you could keep the public order stable. Similarly in your economy you had to choose a certain chain of buildings (similar to Rome II or Shogun II) and that restricted the number of buildings with income. The only minor weakness would be that controlling public order was too easy sometimes- and I didn't really understand why the town always rebelled when a new building was finished (sure, a new policy has to be accepted by the people at first, but it was really annoying, especially because it could kill your general which isn't too realistic). So maybe we could combine the advantages of both (if it is technically possible) which would make both the economy and the public order difficult enough, but also keep out random elements you couldn't control at all like the increasing squalor- which, for me, was one of the biggest flaws of vanilla RTW.

[ahowl11]

I like Mausolos' Idea. I'm hoping that Alavaria could not how to do this.