[GS] AI Use of Hwacha

bitula

Prince
Joined
Nov 15, 2010
Messages
542
Yesterday, when I invaded Korea with chariots, archers, swordsmen, several Hwacha was defending. They did nothing so I just slowly took them out. I then thought it is probably a very week ancient era unit. More than 30 turns later I upgraded to crossbowman and after conquering the 5th city a lonely hwatcha decided to shoot, and uhnn..., what..., one-shot an almosst fully promoted crossbowman (then I read the civilopedia entry and got informed). Is this an AI bug or an RP feature :)? This game made no sense, since she could have elminated my whole army long ago, so I just quit playing and started another game...

Edit: I cant edit the title, a moderator please change the title to include AI. (like AI Hwacah). THx!

Moderator Action: Title edited. leif
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I've had it happen too that AI units do nothing or at least nothing useful. Don't think it's related to the Hwacha.
 
It has always been the case, It does seem that if you attack with overwhelming odds the AI does its best but if you are weaker it decides not to be as nasty to you. Regardless it has always been there that units and cities refuse to shoot you from time to time. So much of the game sucks, just nice graphics and sounds to suck you along a journey of surprises.
 
I also, but it was usually when I had an overwhelming army. This wasn't the case here. Her army with Hwatcha was superior. Also, catapults do nothing when defending, but that is another issue, since this is a ranged unit.

It has always been the case, It does seem that if you attack with overwhelming odds the AI does its best but if you are weaker it decides not to be as nasty to you. Regardless it has always been there that units and cities refuse to shoot you from time to time. So much of the game sucks, just nice graphics and sounds to suck you along a journey of surprises.

Oh really? So far I experienced the opposite, as seen above. Well I would really take out that "AI charity feature", it doesn't make any sense. At least take it out on Deity (game was on Deity)! For lower levels it could be fine so as not to scare away beginner players. But on Deity????
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I have accidentally walked an archer past an enemy Hwacha on immortal without harm. Whether intentional or not it seems we all have similar stories. My biggest bugbear was two city centres can fire on you but only one does.
I no longer have this issue in my life and it feels quite nice.
 
The AI is really bad in using using units in any form that's not a carpet of doom, so I don't see the specific issue here :D
 
Could be also related to the fact that Hwacha is considered by AI as a siege unit but since it has 0 bombard strength then AI could calculate damage to be 0 and not use it. Or it is simply not selected for defense operations because siege units are optional for them.
I have a fix in Real Strategy that makes it a normal Ranged unit.
Code:
DELETE FROM UnitAiInfos WHERE UnitType = 'UNIT_KOREAN_HWACHA' AND (AiType = 'UNITTYPE_SIEGE' OR AiType = 'UNITTYPE_SIEGE_ALL');
 
It has always been the case, It does seem that if you attack with overwhelming odds the AI does its best but if you are weaker it decides not to be as nasty to you. Regardless it has always been there that units and cities refuse to shoot you from time to time. So much of the game sucks, just nice graphics and sounds to suck you along a journey of surprises.

In my personal experience, AI warfare abilities vary a lot. I just had a catastrophic Deity game as India in which my neighbor was Hungary. It was a narrow/snaky continent, and I placed my 2nd (and only other) city in between Delhi and Hungary. Thinking I was clever in forward settling and blocking off direct access to Delhi, I thought Delhi was safe, so I didn't keep units there and I didn't build a wall. Then suddenly Hungary declares war and beelines right past my 2nd city. He didn't even attack it at all. All his 9 warriors and 3 slingers just head straight for Delhi, which has 1 slinger moving in to protect. He takes out Delhi and it's my fastest ever loss but a valuable lesson.

The more common experience though is the AI just sending in wave after wave of mindless units to be picked off 1 by 1.
 
The more common experience though is the AI just sending in wave after wave of mindless units to be picked off 1 by 1.
So this is typical, sit back and let the enemy smash themselves to bits on your defensive position, then take out their cities. I have even seen people say they do this on one breath and then claim the AI is not aggressive enough in the next breath.
When you go and attack a strong enemy just for fun, you find these odd no-shoot situations you will not find when the enemy has taken a siege city decision tree and still has all the requirements. The variation is what ‘mood’ the AI is in at the time (mood or mode... same thing to me)
 
Could be also related to the fact that Hwacha is considered by AI as a siege unit but since it has 0 bombard strength then AI could calculate damage to be 0 and not use it. Or it is simply not selected for defense operations because siege units are optional for them.
I have a fix in Real Strategy that makes it a normal Ranged unit.
Code:
DELETE FROM UnitAiInfos WHERE UnitType = 'UNIT_KOREAN_HWACHA' AND (AiType = 'UNITTYPE_SIEGE' OR AiType = 'UNITTYPE_SIEGE_ALL');
Oh, thanks! This should be it. I'll add it to my bug report in bugfix forum.
 
Seems my bug report got deleted? Recreated it in bugfix forums. Please dont delete it, I removed my generic remark about AI posing no serious challenge in general :) ... What is it really removed because of this?... Ohmy.
 
Last edited:
Probably AI looks at every unit as a whole, it can not take missions-decisions on a per-unit basis, like that would be the case for having one strong unit, as the Hwacha, to defend some hill position from an invading barbarian army, and do just that, defend, while use small faster units to strategically cut their back, and a third, smaller army, just go on conquering... AI should be able to split preferences, based on strategies, with different AI for each unit type, not just one Ai to govern them all. Some units should not listen to the main Ai focus, and that is not possible at current stage of implementation.
 
I seem to recall reading in the new patch notes that they fixed this issue with the Hwacha. So there you go!
 
Top Bottom