Inconceivable AI cheating

[PhoenixReborn]

I'm not really seeing any difference at this point from H3. I've just finished playing 2 multiplayer maps [no scripting] against the AI and in neither game [total of 10 AI opponnents] have I seen any hero cast a spell above level 3 and haven't seen a single "mass" spell yet.

I was hoping to see at least one mass haste, a mass slow, a meteor shower or SOMETHING. As a matter of fact the ONLY level 2 spells that I distincly remember seeing are Raise Dead and maybe Ice Bolt ....

While I personally think that it should be "easy" to script the AI to build a great hero and cast cool spells in combat my [very limited] play time with the game so far isn't showing many signs of promise.

And I've only been playing multiplayer maps against the AI since I got the game and magic is often the reason I lose. Whether it's because the enemy is casting mass spells like haste or a mass destruction spell that I couldn't catch the name of (Banshee howl?) or simply phantom imaging all over the place.

Indeed, I just lost a battle because the enemy hero was able to continually resurrect his emerald dragons, and I didn't have enough firepower to take out all of his units.

My biggest AI complaint is that they take forever assaulting a castle.

[Erist]

I'm not really seeing any difference at this point from H3. I've just finished playing 2 multiplayer maps [no scripting] against the AI and in neither game [total of 10 AI opponnents] have I seen any hero cast a spell above level 3 and haven't seen a single "mass" spell yet.

I was hoping to see at least one mass haste, a mass slow, a meteor shower or SOMETHING. As a matter of fact the ONLY level 2 spells that I distincly remember seeing are Raise Dead and maybe Ice Bolt ....

While I personally think that it should be "easy" to script the AI to build a great hero and cast cool spells in combat my [very limited] play time with the game so far isn't showing many signs of promise.

And I've only been playing multiplayer maps against the AI since I got the game and magic is often the reason I lose. Whether it's because the enemy is casting mass spells like haste or a mass destruction spell that I couldn't catch the name of (Banshee howl?) or simply phantom imaging all over the place.

Indeed, I just lost a battle because the enemy hero was able to continually resurrect his emerald dragons, and I didn't have enough firepower to take out all of his units.

My biggest AI complaint is that they take forever assaulting a castle.

And im just lost a battle because AI magic hero casted meteor shower on my troops

I think some of you are overeacting a bit with the AI... Of course its not your fault... i think it comes from the 3 biggest mistakes of HeroesV (at least for me) lack of documentation, lack of non-scripted pure strategy SP maps and an amazing lack of communication between the devs and the fans...

Lets talk about the AI for example, scripted maps cannot be a AI test... there were scripted maps in H3 too , some of them crappy unbalanced ones, but nobody screamed about AI ... mapmakers were the target of the rants.

Another point i think people is not getting is about difficulty levels... Heroes AI difficulty level design was always stupid (both NWC and Nival ones). AI was designed to do stupid stuff on purpose on low levels (do not ask me why, its the only strategic game i know wich do not design one AI then uses player/AI cheats to increase/decrease difficulty). So yes H5 AI will not cast meteor shower on normal because its not allowed to cast it.

Ill paste some H3 Complete tooltips about difficulty levels as example:
Easy: The player starts with a large advantage in resources, and the computer play poorly
Normal: The player starts with a moderate advantage in resources, and the computer plays reasonably well
Hard: The player and the computer start with the same resources and the computer plays to the best of its ability
H5 got only only 3 undocumented levels so its normal some of you thinks the Ai will play at his best in normal.

About cheating, i dont care about not gamebreaking AI cheats (more res, no FOG, free "visions" (whatever is called in H5)), but i agree i wont like others( different cobat rules, increase weekly growth, different creatures stats or stuff like that). The few strategy SP maps i played couldnt notice the bad ones (for me)

[Curio]

The problem is, hard in H5 shouldn't mean they get special combat rules, like zero mana spells. >_< But yes, in the tradition of the other difficulty settings of the HoMM series, I don't mind if they have resource bonuses, and I start with less on harder modes.

I really hope the future patch means to address all these things. I mean, in the mean time, it sort of works, and I guess a cheating AI is somewhat of a substitute for a much more complex AI script time wouldn't allow.

[Alamar]

I've been playing all of my games on heroic difficulty level so far so the AI doesn't have an excuse to play its best.

Early this morning I finisheld up another game against the AI on what should be a non-scripted multiplayer map. Out of the 7 AI opponnents only 1 cast a spell above Level 2 and that was repeated Meteor Showers from an AI hero [Dungeon] that started with the destruction skill as one of their starting skills.

I'm even a little disappointed by the AI's troops manuevering and use of creatures on the combat screen. I was outnumbered in L7s by 50%, outnumbered in L6s by 500%, outnumbered in L5s by 100%, and roughly equivalent numbers of L4s in "the big battle" at the end of the map. If the AI had simply "bum rushed me" I would have been toast. I would also have been easy to beat if the AI had bothered to cast anything other than basic divine might [Mass Hate, Mass Divine Might, ...]. However the AI decided to stay in its castle and let my archers whittle their numbers down to where I was on even footing at higher levels ... which meant that my advantage in L1-L3 creatures was the deciding point.

[PhoenixReborn]

I agree that castle battles are the weakest spot of the A.I. right now.

Incidentally after every saying how weak the Inferno is, I was surprised at having the easiest castle sieges with Inferno.

I've seen the enemy develop good heroes, I don't know why others aren't seeing it.

[Alamar]

I agree that castle battles are the weakest spot of the A.I. right now.

Incidentally after every saying how weak the Inferno is, I was surprised at having the easiest castle sieges with Inferno.

I've seen the enemy develop good heroes, I don't know why others aren't seeing it.

Is there any chance that I'm just getting horrible luck [seen only 1 hero that seemed proficient at magic] or is the issue of the AI building a good hero just more random chance than anything else?

[PhoenixReborn]

You raise a pretty good point, randomness! I know I don't always get the skills I want, maybe the enemy heroes don't either. Also, I've been playing on the multiplayer maps which may have something to do with it. Chain lightning hurts.

[5il3nc3r]

it seems their heroes, when they level up, focus mostly on primary skills, no matter what they are. Many times, I saw an enemy hero I killed that I could hire later that had filled his 6 skill slots, which were pretty much random, and pretty much no secondary skills (abilities).

They really need to work on their AI

5il

[Alamar]

it seems their heroes, when they level up, focus mostly on primary skills, no matter what they are. Many times, I saw an enemy hero I killed that I could hire later that had filled his 6 skill slots, which were pretty much random, and pretty much no secondary skills (abilities).

They really need to work on their AI

5il

I would think that picking a good skill mix should be "easy' for the AI. It's not like it can't know what spells are coming up in the spell guild, how large the map is, etc.

For all I care building a good character should be one of the "cheats" that the AI can use in heroic mode. I.E. instead of just relying on random luck it should use one of several templates and let the template decide what skill/ability they get at a certain level.