AI still falling for the same old tricks?

[IZob]

One of the biggest tricks in the books (and by biggest, I mean: obvious, but also easiest to pull off): draw the enemy onto an island, and then surround that island with ships. If the enemy have no ships, and all the land bridges are all blocked, the army cannot escape. If you manage to trap a large army of the enemy, its a significant advantage.

In EU3, against the AI, it is a pretty easy manoeuvre to pull off. But will the AI make the same silly moves in EU4?

Today I watched Quill's 11th preview video of England. Quill is playing in the "preview version" that is quote:

Quill: a month old compared to people who currently in the beta.

Now, I don't know how long ago Quill played England in the 11th preview (it could have been a week ago, or it could have been a few days ago), and I have no idea how old the Beta is. For all I know, the Beta could be many months old and perfected for release. Meaning this problem could be delt with. And, I shouldn't judge the preview version, or even the beta version, before the game is released. Or should I? We are getting pretty close the the release date, and the comment: "The AI is improved significantly", isn't enough to remove this concern IMO.

So what I witnessed in the video was AI Saxony attacking AI Denmark and Saxony getting their army trapped on one of Denmark's islands. Denmark (and in particular a Denmark that inherited Sweden) has a large fleet. Every local nation should know that, especially a nation like Saxony. Its not too hard to realise that, when the enemy has a lot of coastal provinces, and islands, they are going to have some ships. Saxony still went to war, along with parts of the HRE, including: Novogorod, France, etc, against: England, Denmark and one other nation. Saxony could only really hurt Denmark by occupying their homeland (i.e.: Denmark propper). And yet they attempted to cross the channel along those small islands to reach Sweden.

Why didn't the AI (Saxony in particular) realise:
a) Denmark and England both have large fleets.
b) Denmarks fleet was near by and able to trap the army/prevent it from crossing.
c) Saxonys allies did not have any ships (or at least, not enough to break the blockade).

Sure Saxony could be been "trying" to cross, but any reasonable general would know, its not worth risking the utility of 23k solders (i.e.: your largest army), when there is the likely chance the enemy navy will not be defeated.

So paradox please explain. Am I being paranoid? Overly concerned about a preview version that is not even part of the Beta? Or is this the nature of the "improved" AI? I understand it may be hard to demonstrate, that this kind of problem has been resolved. So a simple, "yes we are aware of...", or, "yes this has been resolved...", would suffice.

 

[drake000666]

I do not see them making a perfect AI just yet, we just have not got to that level yet in our technology and if they did make the AI that good the game would run so slow on our computers we would not even want to play it

I think the best you can do is not take advantage of the AI in this way and others to make the game harder for yourself

 

[irishsword7]

I'm more worried about the AI handling loans/inflation (which completely and utterly destroyed EU3 for me), disbanding mercs and the such after hiring and also choosing to do things such as split up their forces to siege more than one province or go to attack your small army that is about to take their capital instead of sitting an entire 30k stack on a worthless province. Not even all my concerns.

 

[Red_warning]

I think intuition like this is hard to create for any AI, it's a very human thing that's hard to artificially replicate. At best you will have the AI "roll" about whether it should risk crossing straights, and if the roll fails then it wont ever attempt it no matter if the coast is, literally, clear or not.

 

[Delta107]

we just have not got to that level yet in our technology

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?702095-POTD-Voting-2002-to-2012
See Emurgency POTY Do we really want EU to have a really advanced AI?

 

[anubisfike]

Well this is disappointing.

 

[jockedahl]

Seems difficult to code though. The risk would be that you would end up with an ai that would never cross a strait. Would be nice if they could like start sieging provinces on their side, then send their navy to the strait. If they win they cross, if they lose they stay put or something.

 

[BobbyDylan]

Seems like the AI just outplayed the AI. Honestly... I could have just as easily done the same thing.

 

[Slaxl]

I may have missed something but what is the problem exactly? I would think it would be a greater problem if Denmark had the opportunity to trap the enemy's army like this but didn't see the opportunity. I think Denmark did quite well. While Saxony should try sieging Denmark proper first, Jylland, Slesvig etc, I assume it was making its way to their capital? Or perhaps it had a seperate war objective it wanted to siege first? I suppose that would be important to know first, what the Saxons were planning, but otherwise I don't think it's worth getting too upset with just yet. Perhaps a CK2 style mercenary system for hiring fleets when you're a landlocked country to be able to ferry your troops across these islands, rather than making those crossings bridges where anyone can walk from island to island. You can't walk from Calais to Kent, or Northern Wales to Meath, so why from Slesvig to Fyn? That way there would have to be a naval battle to be able to cross. Seems plausible to me.

 

[anubisfike]

I may have missed something but what is the problem exactly?

Well apparently you missed the entire point. First of all, Saxony completely ignored the mainland Danish provinces that were essentially unguarded and theirs for the taking. This is quite frankly almost unseen even in EU3. Taking them would have helped them with any potential later attacks into the Danish islands by easing up on the attrition and would have given Denmark some WE, reduced tax income and reduced manpower, while increasing Saxonys WS. Second of all, the AI completely disregards the fact that Denmark has a very potent and dangerous navy and Saxony decided then that crossing a strait, even though the Danish navy was in the same sea zone (in port), was a good idea. This means that their entire army is essentially useless or, in the worst case scenario, dead within a few months. This is an enormous setback and the AI simply shouldn't ever cross a strait if they can't have any possibility of defending it. In other words, a landlocked AI without a navy should not, under any circumstances, cross a strait that is guarded by an enemy fleet.

The fact that Denmark took advantage of this (as an AI) is not at all part of the problem. It's good that they do but they did that in EU3 already.

 

[Enewald]

He who makes the fewest mistakes wins the war.
And remember, war is a continuation of diplomacy. If excel at diplomacy, there ought to be no need for war in the first place.

Defense is always superior in relation to attack, therefore an AI that is forced to attack is always at an huge disadvantage, hostile terrain, attrition, supply lines, reinforcing on foreign land, terrain favouring defense...
In all Paradox games, luring the enemy to attack you and then focusing your own power into annihilating said enemy thrusts by carefully placed encirclement tactics should overcome any attacked.

Eu1, Eu2, HoI, Ck, V1, HoI2, Eu3, HoI3, V2, Ck2, Eu4... a human mind should always win versus AI unless the AI has 10 times more resources, and then a mastermind might still overcome the AI.

And this is why we love pair of ducks.

 

[Chamoisking]

There's a cheap trick that players can use in EU3 or V2: Move your army to province A, the AI will move their army to province A to intercept you, then you cancel your army half way. If they continue to move to province A, they waste their time moving there. If they don't, you successfully delay them. This trick can be used in desperate situation like Granada fighting Castille in EU3. I hope EU4 will fix it.

 

[Thetitan]

What every single one have missed is that there is a new waterline for troops to walk. From Lübeck to Ven (the island the Saxon army is on). It did NOT move the way shown by arrows on the map, it just walked there from Lübeck. So it did not "miss the opportunity" to siege a lot of other lands, it just went for the land closest to it. If it indeed was going for the capitol, that was the shortest route.

I know this line is very hard to make out, due to a lot of information and especially the city itself growing into the spot it is shown, but check other angles in that video and you will spot it.

Edit: Check 22:22 in video 11, very clearly a red dotted line.

 

[Badger Baron]

Well apparently you missed the entire point. First of all, Saxony completely ignored the mainland Danish provinces that were essentially unguarded and theirs for the taking. This is quite frankly almost unseen even in EU3.

Maybe I'm misremembering, isn't the province progression in EU3 like this: Holstein->Schleswig->Jylland->Fyn->Sjaelland? While in EU4 there's a Lübeck->Lolland->Sjaelland connection as well. That might explain why the AI did what it did, since it now has a quicker path to Sjaelland.

Taking them would have helped them with any potential later attacks into the Danish islands by easing up on the attrition and would have given Denmark some WE, reduced tax income and reduced manpower, while increasing Saxonys WS. Second of all, the AI completely disregards the fact that Denmark has a very potent and dangerous navy and Saxony decided then that crossing a strait, even though the Danish navy was in the same sea zone (in port), was a good idea. This means that their entire army is essentially useless or, in the worst case scenario, dead within a few months. This is an enormous setback and the AI simply shouldn't ever cross a strait if they can't have any possibility of defending it. In other words, a landlocked AI without a navy should not, under any circumstances, cross a strait that is guarded by an enemy fleet.

Yeah, that seems like the simplest solution.

The fact that Denmark took advantage of this (as an AI) is not at all part of the problem. It's good that they do but they did that in EU3 already.

In my experience, that hardly ever happens, it's like the Danish AI totally craps itself trying to figure out what to do about all those straits and islands. Combine that with it being super aggressive in the HRE, and utter disaster is probably the fate of Denmark in 80% of my games. In that regard I'm quite happy seeing them do better here, but the reason for them doing better is certainly not ideal.

 

[Jay85]

Yea, the ships should just stop dancing around and blockate properly.

 

[Thetitan]

Yea, the ships should just stop dancing around and blockate properly.

The problem with those sea zones, is that if the fleet stays to blockade the ways south and west, the army will be able to walk north, and siege Copenhagen. So what that navy did, was cover all possible ways for the army to move.

Edit: To prevent the saxon troops, it would have been enough to stay in one zone, true, I didnt check the zone right, BUT Denmark have rebels in Skåne, that took some prio off the ships as well.

 

[Jay85]

The problem with those sea zones, is that if the fleet stays to blockade the ways south and west, the army will be able to walk north, and siege Copenhagen. So what that navy did, was cover all possible ways for the army to move.

That's true. You can always spilt the navy, though. (Assuming you have superior numbers)

 

[Duke Von Hannover]

I don't see a problem AI Denmark won a war against most of Europe because of good naval placement and you complain that the AI incharge of the European armies should have done a better job? Personally im impressed with the fact that the Danish AI was capable of getting a white peace from this war, what would have been more impressive was Denmark splitting it's navy trapping the Saxon army, and then navally transporting its army back into Europe to siege Saxony, however i'm hoping that's what Wiz's improvements might cover xD

 

[KGrob]

It seems likely that the AI in EU4 will be improved somewhat over EU3. I'm sure a few bugs will remain although history tells me that Paradox attempts to fix many of those in subsequent patches. Regardless, I'm sure there will exist a few "gamey" sort of things that can be done to confuse the AI. I tend to avoid taking advantage of those sorts of accidental exploits because it takes away the fun for me.