Range of weapons and AI

[Neron25]

Hello, can you guys explain how does range of units affect AI? In vanilla it usually just send its troops to melee after first volley or blob units in front, very low distance of the player's army creating firing line. In Bran settings i noticed that units usually have a larger range than other mods or vanilla but on the other hand in Empire Realism range is lower than in vanilla and ai is doing fine job. Does it depends on range or maybe accuracy? Or maybe something else?

Regards

[Neron25]

And sorry for that text below haha (fixed)

[Sylla]

Hi,


I don't know much about BAI, but in my game i have modded the following to get nice and longer / more cinematic battles
- unit stats have a boost in defense and often armor (for horses), during battle melee lasts longer if you neither units have a huge advantage or reinforcements / flanking attacks but that doesn't change their willingness to attack in blob sometimes
- battle entities modded to reduce movement speed of both cavalry and infantry to slower pace, this makes the ai troop movement somewhat less erratic they don't change target too much and close in on your troops in a more orderly fashion
- weapon range i have increased by 20, every gun can fire to 90 if they where able to do it from 70, this setting i liked from a napoleon TW point of view but i think it fits in empire


Finally, again with units stats > most units have a very good accuracy, to say the least, and a single unit of line inf could devastate anyone if left unchallenged. But in my game i have modded accuracy and reload skill to pathetic levels and removed any experience bonus from building recruitments (i can finally see soldiers having misfire issues yay ! i make sure those guys die first as punishement for bad reloading skill in a volley)
- helps make the AI spend more time in firefights, yet it's not infinite trench war shooting range > i don't remember the vanilla ammo count for infantry but in my game i set it to 18 bullets for mostly every regular military units and it feels right
- prevents total anihilation from terminator-like marksmen, i mean, seriously the accuracy for even some basic units is ridiculously high
- gives AI and player more time to change tactics like flanking units during the fight or using artillery at specific or strategic points of the enemy line
- only experienced units have bonuses to reload and accuracy which is very immersive compared to the free snipers in vanilla late building recruits ...


BAI is bad though, and i dont like playing other difficulties than normal for battles because they get annoying bonuses which are pointless since they almost never attack me unless they have overwhelming numbers on campaign map ... When i attack though, i like to take it slow and stylish !


AI will not always attack in melee in my battles because they sometimes suffer too much losses by the time they are close enough, or my units will have been too damaged and fled the fight, leaving the AI freedom to target another of my units. Their cavalry will always try to attack me, especially the flanks where i usually have my light inf / marksmen.


I think the fact that their accuracy is downright atrocious in my game simply makes AI react better ... Even if they keep advancing there will be an epic shootout before it comes to bayonets and that's the point of my settings, use more melee and prevent musketry from destroying everything in a few seconds without doing any actual fighting ...


Something you already know i'm sure is the BAI is always threatened by long range attacks such as artillery and will close in in order to destroy it. However player rarely let them do so unchallenged, so they target player infantry and cav instead as long as they have no other choice (mainly weaker / isolated and yet reachable targets).