Weird stakes moment

**Dahoota** · June 29, 2011, 01:36 PM

I just played a battle against the Bulgar rebellion as the Romans with me attacking and as I was redeploying to get a better angle (they deployed on a steep hill) the enemy general suddenly died. The general was quite powerful too, the most powerful of the three who spawn in the rebellion.

I turns out the general had run into the stakes that their archers had deployed as the AI re-positioned itself to match my new position. It made the battle a lot easier than it should have been.

Anyone else had this happen? Or is it a bug?

**recentiy03** · June 29, 2011, 02:09 PM

I've never seen the AI use stakes, but I'm not shocked it happened. I think they're 100% oblivious to them.

**RedGuard** · June 29, 2011, 02:13 PM

with germanicus ai they definitly use stakes. ive lost many a general after the battle is over and my general runs right into them as he chases the retreating army

**recentiy03** · June 29, 2011, 09:50 PM

Originally Posted by RedGuard

with germanicus ai they definitly use stakes. ive lost many a general after the battle is over and my general runs right into them as he chases the retreating army

Cool, I just installed it. It'll affect my current campaign, right? I reran setup and selected the new AI options but I didn't notice an immediate difference in the one battle I fought.

**Lord Baal** · June 29, 2011, 02:26 PM

He was double crossed (literally, with stakes) by some power hungry captain?

**Ichon** · June 29, 2011, 04:58 PM

I've seen that happen many times. The worst was not only the general died, but also the 2nd general and about 3/5s of the AI's 6 heavy cavalry. It was an English army of about 1/2 archers... they dropped stakes everywhere and when the AI repositioned it ran over the stakes several times before my army even came into bowshot range.

I actually think its worse for the AI to drop stakes in mid battles. I've seen it kill itself more times than its ever caused me problems.

**Dahoota** · June 30, 2011, 12:57 AM

Originally Posted by Ichon

I've seen that happen many times. The worst was not only the general died, but also the 2nd general and about 3/5s of the AI's 6 heavy cavalry. It was an English army of about 1/2 archers... they dropped stakes everywhere and when the AI repositioned it ran over the stakes several times before my army even came into bowshot range.

I actually think its worse for the AI to drop stakes in mid battles. I've seen it kill itself more times than its ever caused me problems.

It's ridiculous, it seems to reduce the difficulty of the game rather than increase it. Perhaps in a future release the ability should be disabled for the AI or somehow be edited so they somehow only damage enemy units.

IMO while stakes are perhaps historically accurate for some factions, maybe they should be removed all together - if all they do is cripple the AI and get exploited by the human player. I personally only rarely use them in set piece battles, usually only in special defensive circumstances.

**Ichon** · June 30, 2011, 01:29 AM

Originally Posted by Dahoota

It's ridiculous, it seems to reduce the difficulty of the game rather than increase it. Perhaps in a future release the ability should be disabled for the AI or somehow be edited so they somehow only damage enemy units.

IMO while stakes are perhaps historically accurate for some factions, maybe they should be removed all together - if all they do is cripple the AI and get exploited by the human player. I personally only rarely use them in set piece battles, usually only in special defensive circumstances.

Yeah I agree- the next RC should have stakes limited to much fewer units as even the English rarely deployed them and they were the most famous for it. If the stakes lethality could be lessened it might have a place but its hardcoded.

With Germanicus latest BAI's the AI will usually avoid stakes in open field battles though sometimes you can get it to scrape by the stakes with part of its formation as the AI seems to figure movement from the center of the formation. So I'll use some stakes to defend a flank but putting them in gateways or on the end of bridges is a bit much.

Removing completely from battle or near enough is probably better for the AI.

**ziserman** · June 30, 2011, 07:05 AM

Couldn't stakes be made so that they don't kill cavalry, they instead make it unable to run (and charge) through them? I mean like cav will only be able to walk when passing through stakes.

**Dahoota** · June 30, 2011, 12:56 PM

Originally Posted by ziserman

Couldn't stakes be made so that they don't kill cavalry, they instead make it unable to run (and charge) through them? I mean like cav will only be able to walk when passing through stakes.

So you mean they would only kill cavalry when they are moving at speed? That does make a great deal of sense, as the cavalry's own momentum is what makes them dangerous.

Although it seems quite complicated and perhaps impossible to implement (as Ichon says it's hard coded).

Something else that would make sense would be some kind of directional control - at the moment cavalry spontaneously combust when they so much as touch them from ANY angle, even when the stakes are pointing in the opposite direction. That's probably wishful thinking as well, it would be simpler to limit/remove them.

**ziserman** · June 30, 2011, 01:01 PM

No, I mean that cavalry passing through stakes would be unable to run. Kind of like swimming in RTW Barbarian Invasion? If I recall correctly there was only 1 speed when swimming.

But what you said sounds better. Is it possible?

**k/t** · June 30, 2011, 01:40 PM

"So you mean they would only kill cavalry when they are moving at speed?"

No, that's already their effect. He meant force them to move slowly when passing stakes, without any of them dying.

Is it possible to make it so that the game considers the area where stakes are deployed a river crossing? Units move much more slowly there.

The next RC will make stakes available for very few units (I am going to remove them from all units, though, because the AI can't handle them and they make it so that a cavalry-heavy AI army - pretty much the only AI army that can beat the player - is neutralized, or at least mostly so). To compensate, RC will decrease the availability of cavalry, reduce the damage done by light cavalry, and make charges harder to pull off by making units take longer to reorganize before charging again (among other things, I believe).

**Lord Baal** · June 30, 2011, 02:48 PM

A solution for this could be that stakes only made damage to enemy units as long a infantry units is behind. Example:

You are England and in battle, one unit of your finest archers put some stakes. The battle start and you let your archers behind it. The enemy, let's say France attack that unit of archers and even when some horses do jump over the wall, the majority only gets impaled there. After some more fight have passed let's suppose you are losing terrain and have to left the stakes to go for a hill, the moment you move your archers the stakes becomes inactive, like the siege equipment does, and becomes a impassable object or it's lethally is reduced to something like 1%.

Now as you run uphill another French calvary unit make another charge and it's route pass straight where stakes are, but this time 99% of their horses jump over it, or maybe they just avoid it by passing by it's side?

To avoid your own units to get killed by your stakes, any stakes "owned" by you should become an impassable object for your calvary, and tada! Problem solved. The Ai won't get impaled in its own stakes or the ones left in the middle of the battlefield once the fight have moved to another place...

This is so going to my utter wall of doom...

**k/t** · June 30, 2011, 11:17 PM

Apparently the lethality of the stakes is hardcoded.

Also, why would the stakes be deadly if your troops are behind them but not otherwise? It's not logical. Why can the enemy horses jump over the obstacle only when there are no enemies hiding behind it?

**ziserman** · July 01, 2011, 05:44 PM

Originally Posted by k/t

Apparently the lethality of the stakes is hardcoded.

Can a new "thing" be created then? Another item similar to stakes, maybe call it "traps", give it the proper graphics and make it so cavalry are "swimming", then replace all units that can put stakes with the new thing. Would this be possible?

**recentiy03** · July 01, 2011, 06:31 PM

I'm guessing Germanicus's AI worked because I saw the AI use stakes for the first time earlier, although it looked like they did it right in the middle of the fight, as I was charging, is that possible? Or did my graphic card just not depict the stakes until I was right up on them?

**ziserman** · July 01, 2011, 06:51 PM

Originally Posted by recentiy03

I'm guessing Germanicus's AI worked because I saw the AI use stakes for the first time earlier, although it looked like they did it right in the middle of the fight, as I was charging, is that possible? Or did my graphic card just not depict the stakes until I was right up on them?

Because of AI limitations the AI doesn't deploy stakes in the deployment phase, instead it deploys them during the battle.

Be careful with your cavalry as they love to deploy them during or right before a charge. Riding with the cavalry near them but not charging seems to scare the AI into deploying them prematurely, so I do that instead and then find my way around them.

**Caesar Clivus** · July 01, 2011, 09:31 PM

Originally Posted by ziserman

Can a new "thing" be created then? Another item similar to stakes, maybe call it "traps", give it the proper graphics and make it so cavalry are "swimming", then replace all units that can put stakes with the new thing. Would this be possible?

That's a negative.