AI 'handicap' on border forts goes too far.

[Arumba]

Forced march would make it possible though, wouldn't it? I know that you can activate it for naval landings... I don't know for shure if it actually does anything, though.

Ahh you're right. That does work.

Revised:
No forced march
0 maneuver = 36.0 days = 36 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 100% modified speed))
1 maneuver = 34.3 days = 34 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 105% modified speed))
2 maneuver = 32.7 days = 33 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 110% modified speed))
3 maneuver = 31.3 days = 31 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 115% modified speed))
4 maneuver = 30.0 days = 30 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 120% modified speed))
5 maneuver = 28.8 days = 29 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 125% modified speed))
6 maneuver = 27.7 days = 28 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 130% modified speed))

With forced march
0 maneuver = 24.0 days = 24 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 150% modified speed))
1 maneuver = 23.2 days = 23 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 155% modified speed))
2 maneuver = 22.5 days = 23 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 160% modified speed))
3 maneuver = 21.8 days = 22 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 165% modified speed))
4 maneuver = 21.2 days = 21 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 170% modified speed))
5 maneuver = 20.6 days = 21 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 175% modified speed))
6 maneuver = 20.0 days = 20 days (36 days base * (100% base speed / 180% modified speed))

So I suppose naval forts being free may actually be relevant.....

 

[BarrosRodrigues]

If you wanted to have it avoid uselessly sinking money into a bad deal that is the most recent pet "feature", yes.

But then you wouldn't get nations with 15-20 level 6-8 forts in the late game to constantly try to siege through, almost all of them free. It's more "fun" to have those free forts there, supposedly, despite that any strategy in utilizing them is cost-prohibitive to the player by design.

So what? Would you prefer to see AI nations on the verge of bankruptcy due to being so bloody retarded? All that it takes are a few rebellions that increase the local autonomy and a few forts for the AI to never recover again because its building priorities like pretty much everything else are garbage. PDS does not even care enough with making it build better which is easy (by comparison with all the other AI problems) let alone make the game more challenging without using cheats (that is a lot of work you know). IMO this will only become a big issue if the AI builds forts in every other province which might even be possible for the richer countries. We will see.
Very negative post but 100% truthful too.

Edit: Btw Can we please add a straight between Lisboa and the "Thirteen Colonies" too to solve another AI issue?

 

[Chaingun]

Yes, it is obvious that I as an AI programmer have no interest in improving the AI whatsoever.

Now, if there were 10 more AI programmers on EU4 we could indeed speed things up by a factor 2-3 or so.

 

[Thanik]

1. So I guess with this "free fort mechanic" regardless of bonuses AI have now, all fun/challenge with war is gone now?

.

2. Please add the best new script to AI -> in first day of game, he should declare war on human. Every player will be happy with this "smart" move

 

[BarrosRodrigues]

Yes, it is obvious that I as an AI programmer have no interest in improving the AI whatsoever.

Now, if there were 10 more AI programmers on EU4 we could indeed speed things up by a factor 2-3 or so.

I did not said that at all and besides my post was not directed at you personally since you are new and seem to be very interested in making it better (...) but it is more than obvious that the AI does not receive the love it deserves by PDS and building priorities is just a small example. I mostly see workarounds for the problems that sometimes even make the games lose depth and look silly (...)

 

[net.split]

If you're in the business of modding anyway, turn off that cheat and simultaneously tank the costs of forts. Reduce their building cost to something like 1/5 - 1/4 or so of the current costs, and slash the upkeep costs to around 1/4 - 1/3.

Suddenly everything improves. Forts are no longer "lol no" from the player's perspective, and the AI is better able to handle the costs when they are in fact much more reasonable. After all, the opportunity cost of a building slot is already kind of substantial.

Well, the pathing problems don't improve, but that's a topic for another thread.

One other quick note -- if you do this, you probably want to reduce fort levels as well. I went with 1/2/3/4 in my last game, and this worked fine. Eliminates the late-game siege problem, especially for the AI. You don't have to be this aggressive, though. Something like 1/3/4/6 or 1/2/4/5 should work reasonably well, too. Just depends on the particular flavor you want.

 

[Grand Historian]

I could write a long explanation but you will have to trust me when I say simple solutions have been tried. (The current AI is also indeed simple but a fair bit more complex than what you describe here.) For a start, consider that country income is not a fixed number but often varies from month to month.

Not to beat a dead horse, but what about reducing the base cost of Fort Maintenance instead (and subsequently having late game Mil-Tech give Siege Ability)?

 

[Ternega]

Not to beat a dead horse, but what about reducing the base cost of Fort Maintenance instead (and subsequently having late game Mil-Tech give Siege Ability)?

You are asking AI programmer about game design. He already, in this very thread, noted that it's not his job/decision/responsibility.

 

[funguide]

Again I feel like I'm beating a dead horse when mentioning fort maintenance. But it might be helpful to just give the max level capital fort for free to every country. And a few forts at reduced cost based on development.

@Johan Fort maintenance is too high.

for example
Say every 100 development give you another fort at 50% reduced cost. Something like this might work. Testing needed.

 

[Swami]

Wait I can build forts in the land of my vassals. So you're saying that if I would cut up my vassal through my lands, with the most ugly bordergore ever, I could have free forts through my entire country and it wouldn't bankrupt my vassal either?

NIce... I can find ways to exploid this I think And I imagine this would be very usefull in multiplayer

 

[Frogbait]

Yes, it is obvious that I as an AI programmer have no interest in improving the AI whatsoever.

Now, if there were 10 more AI programmers on EU4 we could indeed speed things up by a factor 2-3 or so.

Just have a quick question. Why does Garrison size have no impact on how many forces are required to siege a fort? It's how it worked before the addition of forts and the x3 rule.

Also, please keep in mind that the 2 big reasons why forts are rather impractical right now in SP:
1) There is a much bigger penalty for having forts than not. War exhaustion and war score are basically non-existent when a province is not fortified. Blockading ironically enough is the most effective way to force war exhaustion on an enemy if the only fort available is the capital fort and it's not under siege. And well, common tactics right now are to move capital to an island or strait and just park a massive fleet in the sea title so it's unseigeable.

2) Fort costs are extremely high for an arguable net loss to your country during SP. the fact that it's arguable should indicate the problem.

Essentially if you want to fix forts you need to make them have clear advantages to unfortified provinces and not make them cost essentially 2-3 economic focused provinces to break even.

This has gotten a bit longer than I intended, but I have one more question/request. Would it be possible to "mothball" individual armies like you can with Navies?

And on the topic of Navies, please when upgrading ships make it cheaper to upgrade than build new ships. It's kind of ridiculous that there is a huge double standard when it comes to land v fleet upgrades. A simple solution imo is to put half of the cost of the ship against the upgrade.

 

[Arumba]

Just have a quick question. Why does Garrison size have no impact on how many forces are required to siege a fort? It's how it worked before the addition of forts and the x3 rule.

Afaik this used to be the case but now ideas that increase garrison size correctly increase required troops. Unless you mean weakened garrisons requiring fewer troops to siege?

Edit: Just tested it, and yes its working with ideas. Though annoyingly it rounds down and many ideas provide fractional increases to the base size. For example, +25% on ming gives 9*1.25=11.25 required soldiers, which rounds down to 11. Wish all modifiers will multiples of 1/3 so that wouldn't happen. If it was +33% garrison size then it would be 12 troops. Round numbers... nice...

 

[Pellucid]

This would be so easily fixed by making unmaintained forts have very low garrisons, and giving a siege ability bonus that scales inversely with the current fort garrison.

 

[Frogbait]

Afaik this used to be the case but now ideas that increase garrison size correctly increase required troops. Unless you mean weakened garrisons requiring fewer troops to siege?

Edit: Just tested it, and yes its working with ideas. Though annoyingly it rounds down and many ideas provide fractional increases to the base size. For example, +25% on ming gives 9*1.25=11.25 required soldiers, which rounds down to 11. Wish all modifiers will multiples of 1/3 so that wouldn't happen. If it was +33% garrison size then it would be 12 troops. Round numbers... nice...

Basically both counts.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

So what? Would you prefer to see AI nations on the verge of bankruptcy due to being so bloody retarded? All that it takes are a few rebellions that increase the local autonomy and a few forts for the AI to never recover again because its building priorities like pretty much everything else are garbage. PDS does not even care enough with making it build better which is easy (by comparison with all the other AI problems) let alone make the game more challenging without using cheats (that is a lot of work you know). IMO this will only become a big issue if the AI builds forts in every other province which might even be possible for the richer countries. We will see.
Very negative post but 100% truthful too.

Edit: Btw Can we please add a straight between Lisboa and the "Thirteen Colonies" too to solve another AI issue?

I'd prefer AI cheats/bonuses that cause existential threat or real difficulty (or failing that, functional bonuses like the ability to see demographics player can't necessarily access) to AI bonuses that cause stalling. Free forts are like giving a deity AI in civ V a ton of extra city hit points, but not giving it the usual bonus extra techs/work/settler.

As I alluded to earlier in the thread, even cheaper armies are preferable if the sole design goal (and yes, I acknowledge this is a design-level issue that I'm arguing!) is to allow the AI to be more difficult to defeat. However, I think the purpose of the change is rather so that forts specifically remain a factor in the game, and it's functioning as a shoehorn solution. There is a reason that was done as opposed to simply handing the AI 50% extra tax and production efficiency or something.

Not to beat a dead horse, but what about reducing the base cost of Fort Maintenance instead (and subsequently having late game Mil-Tech give Siege Ability)?

You'd probably want to have a scaling (not linear) fort limit count then, so that the decision of where to place them remains meaningful, and occasionally difficult.

 

[Ternega]

You'd probably want to have a scaling (not linear) fort limit count then, so that the decision of where to place them remains meaningful, and occasionally difficult.

I still think that this is a very good idea, here is some reasons for why:

1. It would allow to make forts cheap enough, so long as you stay under the limit, to justifiably use in single player.
2. It would solve the issue of "too many forts", same way force limit solves this issue for army/navy size.
3. I am fairly certain that teaching AI to stay under an existent limit is far easier than teaching it to balance it's economy.

 

[FleetingRain]

So where's Johan to talk about game design here ?__?

 

[Grand Historian]

You are asking AI programmer about game design. He already, in this very thread, noted that it's not his job/decision/responsibility.

I am quite aware of that, thank you, but that does not mean that his field of knowledge lies exclusively within AI programming. Furthermore, I think it's rather impolite to just pop up on Johan's profile and ask him to change something out of the blue.

You'd probably want to have a scaling (not linear) fort limit count then, so that the decision of where to place them remains meaningful, and occasionally difficult.

What do you think would be good in terms of numbers for that?

So where's Johan to talk about game design here ?__?

I haven't really seen many of the devs replying on the EU4 forums recently (barring, obviously, Chaingun), so I do have to wonder how often they read nowadays.

 

[BarrosRodrigues]

I'd prefer AI cheats/bonuses that cause existential threat or real difficulty (or failing that, functional bonuses like the ability to see demographics player can't necessarily access) to AI bonuses that cause stalling. Free forts are like giving a deity AI in civ V a ton of extra city hit points, but not giving it the usual bonus extra techs/work/settler.

As I alluded to earlier in the thread, even cheaper armies are preferable if the sole design goal (and yes, I acknowledge this is a design-level issue that I'm arguing!) is to allow the AI to be more difficult to defeat. However, I think the purpose of the change is rather so that forts specifically remain a factor in the game, and it's functioning as a . There is a reason that was done as opposed to simply handing the AI 50% extra tax and production efficiency or something.



You'd probably want to have a scaling (not linear) fort limit count then, so that the decision of where to place them remains meaningful, and occasionally difficult.

I see your point but probably the reason is that forts impacted the AI harsher than they anticipated and it is easier to make them a non-issue (i.e. return to the balance prior to common sense) than to rebalance the whole game; besides hopefully this is only a band-aid while they try to find the time/resources to program the AI* to deal with them (permanent fix). Whatever the reason the pattern is clear PDS usually (always?) choses the path with the least amount of resistance.

*Yes I acknowledge that the AI has improved over the years but the progress is very slow and the AI is still near the brain-dead level of performance especially at a strategic level.

 

[pedrito_elcabra]

I did not said that at all and besides my post was not directed at you personally since you are new and seem to be very interested in making it better (...) but it is more than obvious that the AI does not receive the love it deserves by PDS and building priorities is just a small example. I mostly see workarounds for the problems that sometimes even make the games lose depth and look silly (...)

It's a problem with AI in general, and how it fits into the game development cycle.

Work on the AI calculations on any given feature can't really start until the feature is complete, and by then the company developing the game wants it to be released (it's ready and functional, companies are about business and making money, let's release).

This happens to all and every game developer out there. The time to improve AI would be once the game is complete and not being developed anymore - but by that time the companies behind the game cut funding and start focusing other projects.

Even ongoing games like EUIV, which are lucky enough to have a company behind like PDX who really cares about the product, fall into this trap.