Best Campaign AI?

**Zipzopdippidybopbop** · August 16, 2009, 01:47 PM

allrite lads.

i'm asking from personal experience and opinion - which is the best campaign AI out so far (that supports SS latest version)?

feedback would be great. thanks =)

**Vae victis** · August 16, 2009, 04:21 PM

I play with SS patch 6.2 RC4, and I feel it has the best campaign ai of all the MTW2 mods that I have played. There may even be sub-mods for this release that make the campaign ai better. I have not tried any though because I feel that RC4 gives plenty of challenge by itself.

**Ichon** · August 16, 2009, 04:33 PM

Originally Posted by Vae victis

I play with SS patch 6.2 RC4, and I feel it has the best campaign ai of all the MTW2 mods that I have played. There may even be sub-mods for this release that make the campaign ai better. I have not tried any though because I feel that RC4 gives plenty of challenge by itself.

How do you differentiate the different campaign AIs? I have tried the different battle AI's that 6.2 compilation mod includes but not sure where you change campaign map AI as the only ones I know about are hardcoded.

**Vae victis** · August 16, 2009, 05:20 PM

I could tell that SS 6.2 RC4 had much more activity vs some of the other mods that I have played. I recently played a campaign in Lands to Conquer, and there is no comparison in the way the ai behaves and reacts on the campaign map.

In both mods the ai gets significant bonuses so that it can function. In both mods the ai will field stacks of troops and improve its settlements. In both mods the ai will eventually come after you, after initially expanding into rebel settlements. The differences that most stuck out to me was that the ai in Lands to Conquer did not react to the players moves. I was playing as Denmark in LTC and taking HRE settlements left and right. The HRE ai did not react. It could have built up its garrisons, or fielded an army to come after me but it did not. It was not busy on other fronts either. When I further expanded into the HRE, Poland could have come after my weakly defended settlements on their border but it did not. It had 3 stacks of troops just sitting there and meanwhile the HRE wasn't putting up a tough fight either.

In SS the campaign ai is much better. You can see how neighboring factions react to your moves, even if you are not at war with them. In SS if you take a settlement from an enemy, you can expect that enemy to try to take it back or to build up its garrisons in other settlements. If you leave a settlement poorly defended in SS you are asking for it to be attacked by you neighbors. In SS the game doesnt become static after the rebel settlements are taken. There is always diplomatic and military activity taking place somwhere on the map. The ai in SS would have found a use for those 3 stacks that Poland had.

The campaign ai in SS is much more challenging compared to LTC. It plays out more like a game of chess where you have to scrutinize every move. The ai will react to your moves as well as the moves of the other factions. I think the reason the turns take so long is that there are some additional scripts that run for each faction to make the ai think and react better.

There might be some sub-mods out there for SS that give the ai more scripts to run to make a better campaign ai. This might make turns longer though. Right now I am about a quarter of the way into another SS campaign and the turns are already taking longer then 2 min. When you think about the amount of strategy needed per turn, its worth the wait.

**bɑne** · August 16, 2009, 06:50 PM

How do you differentiate the different campaign AIs? I have tried the different battle AI's that 6.2 compilation mod includes but not sure where you change campaign map AI as the only ones I know about are hardcoded.

The 6.2 combo has 3 different campaign AIs - Gracul's AI, Byg's and Savage's.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...32#post4650032
I think Gracul's is the best for turtle style players (those who want to build up their empire in peace) and savage's and byg's are more for those who want to build up again from pieces. (Ok, Im exagerating here)

**Ichon** · August 16, 2009, 07:14 PM

Originally Posted by bane_tw

The 6.2 combo has 3 different campaign AIs - Gracul's AI, Byg's and Savage's.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...32#post4650032
I think Gracul's is the best for turtle style players (those who want to build up their empire in peace) and savage's and byg's are more for those who want to build up again from pieces. (Ok, Im exagerating here)

I am using BYG now, I tried Savage for about 15 turns of a Crusader States campaign but I find that faction obscenely powerful even in 6.2 VH-VH so I went back to BYG in a Genoa campaign right now that is the most fun I've had in a game since original MoO.

For some reason though I was under the impression those were just battle AI, so they are campaign as well?

**bɑne** · August 16, 2009, 07:50 PM

The reason might be that all those modders also release battle AIs - I think the mod only uses one battle AI at the moment but offers the choice between the 3 campaign AIs.

CampaignAI by TheSavage
BattleAI by Germanicu5

If you want to use another BattleAI, make sure that you have the following text at the top of the data/battle_config.xml file:

Default setting is TheSavageAI, and no BGRIV
To use BGR IV with TheSavageAI, copy the contents of the SS6/Data_BGRIV_TheSavageAI folder to the SS6/data folder
To use BGR IV with Byg's AI, copy the contents of the SS6/Data_BGRIV_BygAI folder to the SS6/data folder
To use BGR IV with Gracul's AI, copy the contents of the SS6/Data_BGRIV_GraculAI folder to the SS6/data folder
To remove BGR IV, copy the contents of the SS6/Data_BGRIV_REMOVE folder to the SS6/data folder

**Hambone** · August 16, 2009, 11:23 PM

I thought that there were multiple battle AI's? reallybadai by germanicus5 and the standard SS AI? Or is reallybadAI the standard one.
EDIT- Bane, after more carefully reading your post I think you may have already answered my question, but I am still not quite sure.

**The Noble Lord** · August 17, 2009, 07:09 AM

You may even try Lusted's battle AI and campaign AI. They are good too.

**Goofy** · August 18, 2009, 09:27 AM

Originally Posted by The Noble Lord

You may even try Lusted's battle AI and campaign AI. They are good too.

Totally agreed; I play with first-mentioned and have a lot of fun because the enemy doesn't make as stupid moves as before.

**Minta** · August 18, 2009, 01:08 PM

Is there any campaign ai's out there that know how to mount an effective offensive campaign? Im playing a game with the crusader states and the fatamids keep on attacking me with tiny stacks that are easy to defeat. Even when they do mount an offensive that could overwhelm me their armies are so far apart that they cant support each other on the battlefield and I can just pick them off one at a time. They would be better off if they didnt do anything at all instead of throwing their soldiers away. I don't want to insult anyone's work, but is their any ai that knows how to concentrate their forces and at least provide a meaningful challenge?