My oppinion of what the AI is good for...

[Salkin]

I've been a CM player since CMBO.

I have to say that I'm a casual gamer and that I vary my CM sessions with some other games and activities.

Right now I'm playing a very simplified homemade european campaign that takes place between the russian border and Berlin. These two being the targets of the campaign depending on which side I play.

I go from city to city fighting the enemy , the size of the battle depending on the size of the city. I sometimes win several battles by a small margin or I even get beaten by the AI. This resulting in not enough winning points to buy new troops.

If this occurs I do an "operatinal halt" awaiting possible reinforcements.

I roll a die and check my charts :

* I can get a random nr of reinforcement points in a random troop branch (mech, naval, infantry etc)

* I can get ordered to assault an enemy depot for troop points (resulting in a small battle)

* I can ambush enemy forces on their way to counterattack me

* I can get outright assaulted by one of their generals ( he get's a lot of extra experience and extra troops, scary stuff)

Well in the end I just want to emphasize that the QB generator with it's changing forces/weather as time goes by and the fairly competent AI, especially on the defense is providing a lot of fun !

Oh, and I like that the AI isn't cheating.

For CMX or whatever you call it I wouldn't mind a simple and fairly unlinear campaign .

I know some of the groggs here would want the advanced monster campaign , but for us casual gamers it would be nice with something simpler .

Steve, any comments on a possible campaign ?

//Salkin

Fanboy material

[ November 04, 2003, 06:20 PM: Message edited by: Salkin ]

[Salkin]

*Bump*

[Battlefront.com]

Guys, too early for much in the way of CMx2 talk. But building on what I have already outlined here, CMx2 will offer a lot more control over the "look and feel" of user created battles. Probably even more control over random ones too, just not to the same degree since it isn't possible. Specifics... too early for that, but yeah... we are planning on doing more with campaigns. They can be a big black hole just like AI (ironically!), but there is more we want to do than is currently available.

Steve

[Salkin]

Good news Steve....and thanks for your answer.

I'll make do with my pen and paper cheap risk rip-off while waiting.

//Salkin

[CombinedArms]

BTW, getting back to the original question of "What is the AI good for"--I think it's particularly good for fighting historical (or fictional) battles that involve an element of surprise. It's nearly impossible to achieve surprise in a CM battle vs. a human opponent (except maybe in terms of the sector of the attack). Even if the briefing says there's no enemy for 100 miles, the human opponent knows we wouldn't be fighting this battle w/o a credible threat, so he's on hyper-alert. On the other hand, the AI does a pretty good job of approximating a surprised opponent who has trouble pulling his units into a coordinated defense. A good scenario designer can take advantage of this.

It's also good for portraying daring defensive exploits against impossible odds--most of the best defensive scenarios give the AI attacker a strong force with a lot of armor, and maybe dribble the defender's force out in small groups of reinforcments.

And, if you want to practice defense, simply giving the AI assault odds in a QB can sometimes result in a good defensive game, esp. if the AI picks from the Armor category and you restrict yourself to Combined Arms (which gives you not quite enough armor and not quite enough ATGs.)