Generally, the AI in AOD is good, but I have observed some situations where a tweak or fix would be great.
Below are two screenshots of a game started as hands-off 1941 scenario. The Germans ran over USSR, Bitter Peace fired. The Japanese ran over China. The Italians were mostly defeated in Libya, but when the Bitter Peace fired and Vichy joined the Axis this allowed them to keep a province or two in Libya. When the Germans met with Japanese in India, the pressure on the British in Middle East became so strong that of course the Italians recaptured Libya and conquered Egypt. Meanwhile, whole US army was landed in Africa but somehow were unable to (or afraid) to attack Vichy, Italian or German units and just stood there, while Germans were closing in to Sudan. The only successful action of the British was recapture of Norway. They can't proceed further, because they are not at war with Finland, and the Germans don't use their transit rights to regain control of Norway. Meanwhile Japan, though being very strong (no continental enemies) is very slow at conquering Duch East Indies and other Islands because they have 1 (repeat: one) transport, which hinders their transport capability a lot. Mostly, the AI is busy with using this single transport to move garrisson divisions to every single island in the Pacific. From time to time one marine division lands somewhere and slowly conquers it's target, as often there are no enemy divisions. Hawai are empty, Guam with whole US Pacific Fleet had no divisions as well, but it took a year for the AI to try to conquer it. UK and Germany also have few transports, thus there is low chance of invasion, and the Germans have left half of France's beach provinces empty.
Also, Germans never asked the Japanese to join their alliance, so they can't exchange resources and the trade system required the Japanese to transport their goods to port in German-occupied Denmark, instead of using land route on the continent, which would be safer. Thus the Japanese can't trade their ton of rares for Germany's ton of energy and in 2nd half of 1944 both countries are running at 1IC for a day, then at 50% of their base IC for another. I guess their production and supply capacities are hurt and they would lost the war if the US was more agressive than it is. The problem is they have resources they need, they have direct land connection, yet no trade is done.
Below are two screenshots of a game started as hands-off 1941 scenario. The Germans ran over USSR, Bitter Peace fired. The Japanese ran over China. The Italians were mostly defeated in Libya, but when the Bitter Peace fired and Vichy joined the Axis this allowed them to keep a province or two in Libya. When the Germans met with Japanese in India, the pressure on the British in Middle East became so strong that of course the Italians recaptured Libya and conquered Egypt. Meanwhile, whole US army was landed in Africa but somehow were unable to (or afraid) to attack Vichy, Italian or German units and just stood there, while Germans were closing in to Sudan. The only successful action of the British was recapture of Norway. They can't proceed further, because they are not at war with Finland, and the Germans don't use their transit rights to regain control of Norway. Meanwhile Japan, though being very strong (no continental enemies) is very slow at conquering Duch East Indies and other Islands because they have 1 (repeat: one) transport, which hinders their transport capability a lot. Mostly, the AI is busy with using this single transport to move garrisson divisions to every single island in the Pacific. From time to time one marine division lands somewhere and slowly conquers it's target, as often there are no enemy divisions. Hawai are empty, Guam with whole US Pacific Fleet had no divisions as well, but it took a year for the AI to try to conquer it. UK and Germany also have few transports, thus there is low chance of invasion, and the Germans have left half of France's beach provinces empty.
Also, Germans never asked the Japanese to join their alliance, so they can't exchange resources and the trade system required the Japanese to transport their goods to port in German-occupied Denmark, instead of using land route on the continent, which would be safer. Thus the Japanese can't trade their ton of rares for Germany's ton of energy and in 2nd half of 1944 both countries are running at 1IC for a day, then at 50% of their base IC for another. I guess their production and supply capacities are hurt and they would lost the war if the US was more agressive than it is. The problem is they have resources they need, they have direct land connection, yet no trade is done.
Some goods could just be transported from Japan to Korea and from there on by train to Germany, while most resources would already be on the continent. Of course that's a severe limitation in the resource/supply system of HOI2/AOD that won't be fixed. Too bad, Japanese rares really have to be exchanged for German energy.
