Can AI please start moving their armies across seas?

[gronak]

For as long as I can remember, the AI have been terrible at using their navies. This is even more annoying when it makes the AI not move their armies.

Here's the story: Spain declares war on France calling in me and GB. We outnumbered the French army significantly, so I join. A while into this war, I realise I had not seen GB fighting at all, which I know is pretty much a meme at this point (GB not crossing the channel), but is annoying nonetheless.

As can be seen in this screenshot, England has a large army but is simply too incompetent to move across to defend their land.

Now, take a look at Castile.

They have had their army walking round in circles between Choco and Guajira. Let's say they are actually moving their troops but don't have enough transports so are taking several trips (I think this is the reason), they should move their army to Europe first before declaring. France only has one island colonised in the new world, which was in the Caribbean which I have since sieged.

I have managed to find Britain's transport fleet.

They have been sitting off the coast of florida for months. What is the need for this?


This is infuriating. With both Castile and GB not helping, I have no chance to win this war which Castile declared themselves.

I hope one day the AI will be smarter with using their boats and knowing when to declare war.

 

[kacpe3]

In my current game Portugal had 0 ships with only war in last 50 years against Tapuia.

 

[Dominion]

Multiple issues are going on.

GB wasn't ready for war and doesn't know how to get its troops across yet. This can take up to 6 years, which is the highest (observed, not absolute highest!) time it'll take them to get going.
On previous patches they oftentimes didn't manage to do it at all. Maybe they still have some remaining problems that prevent them from doing it. Haven't seen that kinda stuff yet, but I've only played 8 campaigns so far on 1.22.

Spain got hit by two different things, the easier one being that a DoW where they would accumulate troops at the border isn't required by the AI if the total of all standing forces is high enough. Meaning they looked at their troops, realized it didn't suffice or the position was bad (assuming their numbers alone wouldn't have pushed them beyond that point), then looked at yours and GBs numbers, said "eh, it'll work" and declared without being in position.

Too bad they only check their position, but not yours or GB's.

Fun combination you got there. Not very fun to play, I'd assume, but fun to look at as a spectator.

 

[Vince75]

I agree, this is so annoying... It happens also all the time when Colonial nations declare war on a country but have their whole army overseas...

 

[saintlyknighted]

You could technically 'abuse' this as well. In my Navarra game I declared on Castile in ~1600 and called France in. Other than an easy wipe of a 10k stack we never saw any other engagement with Castilians and easily took over the entire peninsula (did fight Portuguese though). Way easier war tan it should have been.

 

[Equester]

Honestly better AI in general is the one thing this game really needs. But yea, troop movement over sea is something it is really bad at. Making England/GB the worst ally.

 

[kacpe3]

You could technically 'abuse' this as well. In my Navarra game I declared on Castile in ~1600 and called France in. Other than an easy wipe of a 10k stack we never saw any other engagement with Castilians and easily took over the entire peninsula (did fight Portuguese though). Way easier war tan it should have been.

I no cbed Castile as Crete and won without allies. Didn't fight any stack.

 

[Equester]

Case in point, in my current game France is at war with Austria and is losing badly, in part because for the entire war, halve of France's army have be standing still in Labourd.
And Tunis is losing a war to Tlemcen + half way occupied by rebels. Why? because their army is walking around exiled in Savoy and seem to be taking the long road home, by going through northern Italy towards the Balkans.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You could technically 'abuse' this as well. In my Navarra game I declared on Castile in ~1600 and called France in. Other than an easy wipe of a 10k stack we never saw any other engagement with Castilians and easily took over the entire peninsula (did fight Portuguese though). Way easier war tan it should have been.

It's bad enough that you can't get around it happening often. More than once I've turned against France late game, declared on them, and despite them having > 120 regiments I never saw more than 30. After freely sieging down their mainland unopposed a few times they obviously have less after 2 100% war score wars...sometimes these nations die without even one major battle.

They also make for terrible/inconsistent allies. I've seen France just stand there in wars vs the Ottomans...despite that Gibralter crossing --> Egypt was a clear, open path controlled entirely by me (so they had access the second they joined the war). Then they get access to Ottomans through Europe and sometimes move, sometimes don't. Sometimes Ottomans/other enemies go siege them and let me siege them freely.

 

[Equester]

yea bitterly losing a war you should have won, because your ally's forces just stood still or even worse walks back and forth between the same two provinces is the worst. The later is worse, since it seems like the ai is mocking you .
Sometimes reloading the game solves this, but not always.