AI Overkill ?

[Xtorma]

Hmmm.

[Lancer]

You bet there's AI overkill. Let's note what's happening in Ireland-World 2:

1. Wolves: I'm running up against intimidating dens containing over 330 wolves. The average is now peaking over 100 and they are densely packed around the cave. These toothed guys bite harder than ever through iron armor. What's more, kill one den and another is there in a few hours of equal size or bigger. One would think, logically, that as the human population density increases that the wolves would be fewer due to predation. Not so in World 2 at this time. Instead of heading for extinction, as occurred in real history, the wolves are proliferating like *. The only good thing about wolves is that they don't leave their den to attack your citizenry in the streets of your village. They merely suppress your ability to replenish your army which they chew up and then depress the rate of gaining new peasants to replace the casualties. Really, a den with 330 wolves? Talk about artificial constructs in game play.

2. Bandits: These have the same characteristics of wolves. Their fortifications are becomming more sophisticated and no sooner do you eliminate a camp than another appears in its place. Their proliferation is not as great as wolves but their effect is similar-casualties, depressed rate of population growth, short relief from their effects.

3. AI Castles: Ah, here is the main event. The castles are very difficult. One cost me seven armies, parish and personal, to eliminate. It nearly wiped out my parish treasury and cost me entire village armies which with the proliferation of wolves, bandits and persistence of tent people, were exceedingly hard to replenish. What is particularly aggravating about the AI castles is while it takes you potentially game hours or days of concentrated effort to replace your armies, repair your castles and replenish your gold, the next AI Castle pops up in your parish within hours of the last one destroyed. It's fully built and populated to the tops of its parapets with crack troops and all the weaponry possible. Sometimes it's less sophisticated than its predecessor, but this is a rarity.

While it's true these are honor point opportunities, the costs to manage these enemies are these: 1) lots of game men and material, 2) lots of time, 3) huge anchor on ability to develop villages, and 4) eventual player frustration. The elements of "player frustration" caused by the huge, perpetual, persistent proliferation of AI enemies should be particularly worrisome to developers. After I expended seven armies attempting to eliminate a difficult Wolf castle and finally succeeded, a new AI castle was in the parish within 8 game hours of the destruction of its predecessor. It was fully built and loaded as I described above. The immediate reaction was frustration, anger, no sense of reasonable relief or accomplishment, and no chance to replenish the men, materials and gold it cost me as the Parish steward and village lord to get rid of the castle. All I could do was sit back and wait DAYS to rebuild resources and constantly repair my castles while the happy AI castle went about its usual business of destroying the work of game players relentlessly one or two at a time.

Developers might say, "Well, it would be easier if the Parish worked together, pooled resources and dealt with it that way." Wishful thinking. In this phase of the game, with villages heavily developed, players are dropping out of the game to do other things. And this is happening just as the AI enemy count and difficulty is at an all time high in World 2 (Ireland at least). This is exceedingly hard on the more loyal game players who are left after the frustrated (or bored) players leave the game. The greatest enemy of computer games is player frustration and loss of a sense of sustainable success. I strongly recommend that the game parameters be adjusted to reduce the AI enemy proliferation rate. In particular, if its good for tents to have a waiting period before reappearing in a Parish (though I sense the pause is reduced from what it was in the beginning) the same should be true for all AI enemies. Wolf dens must be reduced in quantity of wolves. In particular, AI castles should not reappear, no matter whether Snake replaces Wolf or Pig replaces Rat, until a time period measured in complete game days passes. I do not suggest a change in the tent people parameters as these are reasonable time-wise and rank-driven as to power of the attacking force anyway, as I understand it. And lastly, bring back scouting targets like pitch and others of the more rare commodities. While some of us have villages producing these resources, the proliferation of AI castle attacks and the like are draining these resources faster than they can be replenished. As such, the game is out of balance currently for the normal, experienced player.

These are my thoughts. As always, I offer them with the hope they will make this game more attractive and longer-lived among its competitors and players. There is so much more which can be added to this game to spur interest with its variety that as a diamond in the rough, Stronghold Kingdoms is limited by nothing but developers' time and talent alone. There is plenty of it around in Firefly which needs only to be applied to make this game one of the best around. Keep on trying and keep on listening.

Lancer

[Afterthought]

Overkill? you guys are nuts, the AI were put into this game as an alternative to pvp for people who wanted "safe" combat. Reading that they're overpowered is hilarious, over 7 armies to kill a single castle? Are you using armies of like 200 guys?

The AI in each parish are stronger or weaker depending on the average rank of all players in the parish, this is so higher level players aren't bored by killing castles with like 40-50 ai in them. If your parish is all higher ranks and you're the only lowby AND steward of the parish, then the higher levels must be inactive. If they were active they'd take the parish for themselves i'm sure. Use the inactives to pillage weapons and other goods to pay for more troops, other than that i don't know advice to give.

[Junio]

@Lancer: +1

I dont do den's anymore, but need to get rid of bandits due to honor impact of -5 and of course AI castles. Well, I try to get an Rat and save him, but eventually somebody comes and kills that. I understand that, some need the achievement and doing AI enemies are also honor related, same like bandit camps and wolves. Whereas the honor gained from killing Bandit camps are ridicously low, compared to the larger ones u get....but well, I am not complaining.

But, the point is - and Lancer pointed that out very well, is the timing. You kill one, the next appears within hours. You kill an AI enemy, it will return in max of 3 days. Now, considering Afterthoughts words, if you have the big Pig, followed by the very big Wolf and then end up with the second big Wolf - your parish funds are low by that time.

And right, dont think other players would waste their troops on them. Me neither, but when funds are low u need to use own troops and I prefer using them in real battle and not for stupid AI enemies.

I would also like the idea of finding other goodies besides food, how about FP, Gold oer even cards maybe? Sure they could be randomly be rare, but would make foraging more interesting.

Considering food production, I have reached a modern world long time ago already, I produce for the bin....

[Lancer]

As Junio pointed out, Afterthought, I am not opposed to the existence of the AI Castles. Yes, they are preferred by players avoiding PvP combat. I am objecting to the frequency with which they erupt in a Parish. They should not reappear so quickly suggesting Wolf and his ilk have almost limitless resources while the player does not. Frustration leads to player irritation and eventually to players going elsewhere.

Against big, tough castles I expect to lose an army or two. The first armies usually are sent to sweep the ramparts of archers and open holes in the walls. These typically are 250 units strong. Even if the Parish was capable of fielding a 400 unit army, the drain on gold would simply be twice as fast. I took out the castle with a 375-man army after finally opening up the walls and liquidating very tough to kill massed archers on Great Towers situated all around the Keep.

[Bobkyou]

Well I'm not sure why the difficulty seems to be so harsh for a lot of you. Are you in a lot of different parishes? In the last 30 days, in 2 parishes, I've seen a total of 9 wolf castles. There were a few snake and rat castles that spawned that I didn't kill, so I'm seeing roughly 6 or 7 AI castles per 30 days per parish, around 1 AI castle per parish per 4 days. The spawn timer for an AI castle appears to be based on when the last castle spawned, rather than when it was destroyed, so you don't want to leave them sitting around for too long.

If you are in 5+ parishes, perhaps you should get more members of your parish to take responsibility.

Spoiler! :

WolfCastleSpawn.jpg (149.96 KiB) Viewed 5581 times

[Scott Gillig]

I rarely see a Rat Castle, or Snake Castle.
I see Pig Castles at least weekly
I see Wolf Castles every day.

These are new Wolf Castles. Not in each parish that I have villages but I do pay attention to the surrounding parishes for potential loot, wolf dens and Rat Castles.

There are lots of new Wolf Castles every day.

[metroman]

I see the Wolves show up instantly after removal...but the others are about a week time frame from defeat....nothing wrong with free Honor that doesn't make some one mad at you and Raze your villiages.

[Lancer]

Just to be clear, nobody is arguing against having wolves, bandits or AI castles in this game. The primary complaint is against how quickly they reappear which even in compressed game time simulations is grossly unreasonable.

One of you above, bobbykyou I think, said AI castles don't appear that quickly. Nonsense. When one castle is in a parish, it prevents (AFAIK) other castles from appearing. In early betas two castles could appear in a parish at the same time. This iteration of the game only one castle appears at a time. However, we just killed an AI castle yesterday morning in one of my parishes. A new one is there this morning. It's this rapid replacement in just one game day that's so utterly frustrating.

The more AI castles you destroy, the more that will appear.

Further, I'm not sure but that Ireland has different game parameters than other parts of World 2. For example, while England had charters for new villages which could be purchased, Ireland NEVER has had any new charters revealed and NEVER has had a village one could buy AFAIK.

[metroman]

That does sound strange....I guess there's still some timing issues...Also I've seen some Parishes have a rat run to them to make it ill...while other Parishes don't show a rat going to them to make it ill...