SS Map and Faction Expansion

[Quark]

Having played many Campaign's for the Ai testing, it seems that Denmark never advances to the North, nor does Kiev-Rus to the East.

Now in the testing we tried many Ai's and gave these factions spys to ensure that they could see the settlements. I have played Denmark (never did get to Bergen), put not Kiev-Rus, so am looking for some input.

I know that some of this is CA pathfinding issues, but I am thinking it may be best to give these two factions another army to help them capture settlements. Would this however make it to easy to do for players, or to hard on thier economies?

Does anyone know why Groningen is so important for Denmark, its a added city, so it cannot be hardcoded. The only difference in descr_regions is food value, I do not think victory conditions are used and these are both 5.

religions { catholic 80 orthodox 0 islam 0 pagan 5 heretic 15 }
Groningen_Province
Groningen
hre
Flemish_Rebels
98 30 86
fish, timber
5
5

religions { catholic 0 orthodox 33 islam 5 pagan 60 heretic 2 }
Uppsala_Province
Uppsala
denmark
Norse_Rebels
0 255 128
iron, furs
5
4

[Drakkar]

I played a lot with Denmark and i dunno really about campaign mechanics but i can assure you that denmark start with little money and little economy and have to face power like HRE since the beginning.

I think that before attacking another country Ai make a comparison between forces and Hamburg and HRE is simply too strong for Denmark at the beginning.

So i think that Denmark won't move cause it is stuck.

Kievan-rus has 2 problems.

first it start with a big group of rebel near his capital and second it has long distance to cover to reach other cities and the ai, using lots of armies without general go rebel easily.

I think that improving Denmark economics (giving them another city or a castle in the beginning) could solve denmark stuck.

I think also that removing kievan rus starting group of rebel near his capitol and adding some provinces in the east side of map could solve his problems.

But i'm not sure i'm not really experienced ....

[Uryens]

I have noticed something about this subject. I had to re-install SS recently and when I did I forgot to add back in Snipafist's AI

After about 30 rounds or so I noticed that Denmark had conquered all of Scandinavia. Kieven Rus had taken 5 rebel provinces and the Knights Templar had expanded by about 6 provinces'.

After adding in Snipafist's it was back to the way before...Denmark halted half way and Keiven Rus didnt budge from its starting 2 settelements. Knights Templar took Antioch but stayed its hand there.

So maybe aggressiveness plays a large part in it, since Vanilla is so much more aggressive and irrational.

[Quark]

Uryens
I might agree, except I use Snapifists Ai and there is no problem with the Templars expanding at all. Pathfinding is part of the problem, but this is a known Ai problem that CA has to fix, on day...., I am trying to find the ideal solution until then. Its true that aggression plays a part, so maybe reducing the rebel settlement defences might work. The problem is that in my version they get extra money to build and become harder. Maybe give these two factions more money in the campaign script.

Still if anyone else has seen Denmark or Kiev-Rus expand in their game, can you say what Ai you are using please.

[delra]

It is even more about the time frame of this expansion. They should take Uppsala and Oslo till 1150 to be considered "ok". I hardly ever see it happen in my game. Usually due to Denmark being outpaced to Groningen.

[Petykemano]

As far as I know different CAI scripts Snipafist's is less aggressive than the Vanilla AI. It might plans his attacks and pays more attention to defense, and choses his foe with more awareness. He attacks only that faction, which he is sure he can defeat. While on the other hand vanilla AI seems to attack randomly no matter the chances of the outcome. This way there is more chance for a war to break out between non-equivalent powered factions, which war can be won by the little bit stronger or say the fortunate faction.
This might help.

[warlord_anubis]

i never played kiev,but demark i did.
The problem there is that they have a weak army and a bad econemy.and the hre is a strong threat.they usely attac the deens even when youre alied with them.they have to garison theire city's heavyler with theire (bad) army
the problem is that theire army is underpowerd.and i think that that's the reason.

[Ma'ahes]

I use all of Lusted's AI, and for me Denmark just keeps to itself in Scandinavia--I think b/c the HRE rushes north to grab that castle, so Denmark stops expanding. As for Kiev, they've become a powerhouse, although that may be due to me as Byzantium taking out Hungary and the Turks....perhaps hehe.

[Gorrrrrn]

Played Denmark campaign for about 150 years (game time!)

Using vanilla SS4.1.

HRE grabbed Hamburg first turn. I managed to get Stettin; Poland grabbed Thorn before I could get there and Novgorod grabbed Helsinki (but I took Riga) After you grab Scandinavia (don't forget Uppsala and Bergen) Groningen is the only available rebel city. I've seen Scotland take Bergen and in my game Novgorod sent an army all the way to Uppsala and would have taken it if I hadn't rushed up there to see where they were going. Novgorod army then marched all the way back home - all under the control of a captain. I couldn't even move a unit of town militia one turn out of Arhus without it deserting.

Denmark is a challenge there's no doubt, if you had peaceful neighbours then you could slowly build the economy but Scandinavia is relatively poor and along the Baltic coast you need castles just to defend them from incessant attacks from HRE. Oh and then there's the Mongols. Defended Riga from 4 full-stack attacks by Mongols. Bless Norse archers and their pointy sticks.

[delra]

Yep. This is crazy what Novgorod is doing as far as Scandinavia is concerned. They send their armies on foot through modern Baltic republics, Poland, northern Germany, Denmark, up to Sweden with intention to get to Uppsala. Sometimes they siege Stockholm too. Why not take a boat for Christ's sake?

This is a separate issue though. Maybe Lusted will have an idea what's going on. I saw it only in his work but when playing other AIs I haven't looked so carefully what AI is doing so maybe I overlooked it there. For sure it's present in Lusted's CAI. :-)

[Caesar Clivus]

Hmmm. I've never seen Novgorod try to take anything near Denmark, but I have had Scotland try to take Bergen several times. At least the Scots took a boat

Personally I feel that giving Kievan Rus extra starting troops will make it too easy for players to expand. It is easy enough as it is.