Question about "Historical" Random Force Selection in Quick Battles

[EarlofWarwick]

I’ve been playing a lot of random battles pitting the British against the DAK in N. Africa, and, since I like the element of surprise, I’ve been letting the computer pick units for both sides. I’ve found, though, that the “German AI" LOVES Pz II’s and that the “British AI” loves Matildas and Valentines. As a result, my British tanks (I always play as the Brits) slice through Rommel’s forces as if they were butter. As much as I like that outcome, it doesn’t seem very accurate; from what I’ve read, a more accurate –and challenging – scenario would be a battle between Crusader MK I’s and a force with more Pz III’s than Pz II’s.

So here’s my question: has anyone ever modded the rarity values the AI uses to select forces? If not, is there any hope of another patch that might fix this?

[Omi]

It seems to me that the computer always prefer to have more weak tanks rather than less stronger ones.

[Redwolf]

That is only a symptom.

The Panzer II is much cheaper than the other entries so it has a higher probability to "fit" into the rest of the allowance when the AI randomly pokes around the unit list.

A human first picks the most expensive things he/she wants. If you don't do that then you often fail the decent stuff by a few points - which is what happens to the AI. After all, halftracks on the defense and towed AA guns on the attack need to be purchased first, don't they

[Joachim]

Originally posted by redwolf:

That is only a symptom.

The Panzer II is much cheaper than the other entries so it has a higher probability to "fit" into the rest of the allowance when the AI randomly pokes around the unit list.

A human first picks the most expensive things he/she wants. If you don't do that then you often fail the decent stuff by a few points - which is what happens to the AI. After all, halftracks on the defense and towed AA guns on the attack need to be purchased first, don't they

a) Try variable rarity. It might make PzIIs more expensive than other tanks now and then...

Play bigger battles. A 1000 pts ME armor does not allow for many tanks. The AI likes buying in plts. So guess which plt it can afford. A 3000pt battle may give you a better mix of units.

c) Give the AI a bonus... after all it is the AI and desparately needs it. Plus the increase armor budget might result in decent tanks.

Don't even bother below 50%!

Gruß

Joachim

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Joachim:

c) Give the AI a bonus... after all it is the AI and desparately needs it. Plus the increase armor budget might result in decent tanks.

The way I've understood bonus is that it simply multiplies the selected force by that amount. Eg. Two StuG's times 150% => three StuG's. Let me know if I'm wrong. If you want the AI to have more points than you, simply set the budget to 1500 points but only buy 1000 points worth of stuff yourself.

[birdstrike]

Originally posted by EarlofWarwick:

I’ve been playing a lot of random battles pitting the British against the DAK in N. Africa, and, since I like the element of surprise, I’ve been letting the computer pick units for both sides. I’ve found, though, that the “German AI" LOVES Pz II’s and that the “British AI” loves Matildas and Valentines. As a result, my British tanks (I always play as the Brits) slice through Rommel’s forces as if they were butter. As much as I like that outcome, it doesn’t seem very accurate; from what I’ve read, a more accurate –and challenging – scenario would be a battle between Crusader MK I’s and a force with more Pz III’s than Pz II’s.

I had the exactly same problem - well not exactly: I did also play a lot of QBs in the early stages of NA with mostly Italians vs. British (me playing the Italians). All battles were between 500 and 1000 pts. I bought my Italian troops myself, the British units were purchased by the AI.

The outcome was almost ever devasting with platoons of invulnerable Matildas or Valentines killing off my Italian tanks. Finally I got the impression that about 9 out of 10 British tanks used by the AI were either Matildas or Valentines.

While I understand, that there are units in the game that are pretty much invulnerable to certain other units in the game (like Matildas to anything but german 88-guns) because this was also the case in reality and does indeed play out very well in normal scenarios, it does take some of the fun out of QBs because there is no way to determine a restriction of these, 'invulnerable' units - apart from increasing their price with rarity.

There really needs to be some way to restrict the maximum number of these units used in QBs or a switch to not allow these units in QBs at all.

[Joachim]

Originally posted by Sergei:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Joachim:

c) Give the AI a bonus... after all it is the AI and desparately needs it. Plus the increase armor budget might result in decent tanks.

The way I've understood bonus is that it simply multiplies the selected force by that amount. Eg. Two StuG's times 150% => three StuG's. Let me know if I'm wrong. If you want the AI to have more points than you, simply set the budget to 1500 points but only buy 1000 points worth of stuff yourself. </font>