How does the Difficult change the strength of the AI

posted on April 2nd, 2011, 11:28 am

Hi, i am new to this mod. I discovered this mod a few days ago an i fell in love with it. I thougth i will never again get my old Armada 2 cd out of the box, but this jewel reanimates my old beloved.

Actually i am only playing/testing against the AI. I know that a game vs the AI can´t be compared to a game vs Human players.
Nevertheless i am interested how the difficult adjustment change the strengt of the AI ships. I think i can imagine that in stock Armada the AI gets bonus to firepower and resistance in dependency to the difficult.

I want AI ships that are exactly that strong like the ships of a human player, what to pick for this ?

Sorry for my bad english 

posted on April 2nd, 2011, 11:39 am

Welcome to the forum.

Difficulty mainly changes the time/resource cost of the AI ships; they cost 10% and build in 60% of the time a human ship would on Merciless level. Firepower I don't think changes in Instant action games, only Single player campaigns.

The advanced settings tab has slider that change the cost and firepower of AI ships.

posted on April 2nd, 2011, 11:48 am

welcome to the forum, hope you enjoy your time here.

tyler hit the nail on the head, the fleetops ai gets harder by making it cheat and spam more ships. its vastly different to mp, and mp is the priority.

posted on April 2nd, 2011, 9:35 pm

Hi and welcome to the community

Yep, the AI is ment to be a challange to defeate and - besides cost reduction as already mentioned - it also gets more aggressive and protective on higher settings.

For competitive play, i recommend using Tunngle and fighting real human opponents

posted on April 2nd, 2011, 10:51 pm

i pretty much play AI.

in order to give you a challenge, you have to play something above hard. merciless will be the only thing that gives you a challenge probably. after you beat that, play against two AIs, if you want to give yourself an ally as well go for it.

I have yet to beat borg merciless... seems almost impossible at normal settings. but other than that, can give  yourself two hard AIs, or three normals. and yes, also can toggle the stats for how hard/easy the AI gets it.

posted on April 2nd, 2011, 11:21 pm

i pretty much play AI.

in order to give you a challenge, you have to play something above hard. merciless will be the only thing that gives you a challenge probably. after you beat that, play against two AIs, if you want to give yourself an ally as well go for it.

I have yet to beat borg merciless... seems almost impossible at normal settings. but other than that, can give  yourself two hard AIs, or three normals. and yes, also can toggle the stats for how hard/easy the AI gets it.

If SP is all you are concerned about then check this thread out
Star Trek Armada II: Fleet Operations - Better Single Player AI

Ive not worked much on it in a while, but it DOES make the AI more fun as you dont have to deal with 5 tac cubes 5mins into the game.

I dont think more than the first page will be worth reading, as the bulk of the posters on these fourms tend to be prettty hostile if you try to do something SP based, as you'll see in that thread.

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:17 am

If SP is all you are concerned about then check this thread out
Star Trek Armada II: Fleet Operations - Better Single Player AI

Ive not worked much on it in a while, but it DOES make the AI more fun as you dont have to deal with 5 tac cubes 5mins into the game.

I dont think more than the first page will be worth reading, as the bulk of the posters on these fourms tend to be prettty hostile if you try to do something SP based, as you'll see in that thread.

no offence tok  but ive been in an AI game vs the borg with unlimited res  for the last 10 mins and the ai hasnt built much  and that was the only way i could think of that the ai could get 5 tac cubes in 5 mins  not even a shpere as come out yet  and i have a fleet capable of mincing its base in seconds....   

ill try double res    (for some reason unlimited doesnt work well for the ai it seems...)

but im saying it now theres no way in hell the ai is putting out 5 tac cubes in 5 mins (cant be done anyway as the ai needs certain things to start and that alone takes 2.5mins  so 5 tac cubes taking atleast 1min to build from just 1 uplink in 5 mins is not possible    SCOUTcubes yes  tac cubes not a chance)

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:21 am

Has anyone beaten the ai on merciless? If so, how do you do it?

Is there anything to change the settings so the game is still fun and the computer cannot cheat?

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:24 am

Change the sliders so that AI cost/time is set to 2. I did that, and have killed multiple merciless-level Borg in a 3-on-1. Changing the sliders is your best bet.

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:33 am

Has anyone beaten the ai on merciless? If so, how do you do it?

Is there anything to change the settings so the game is still fun and the computer cannot cheat?

im doin it now with double res vs borg as feds    i skiped the small yard and research and got 2 large yards doing E2s  (with normal res 1 small yard and chass lvl 1 get some intreps  then upgrade to large yard asap and pump out e2s)   

i havent modified anything to do with the AI build costs/order  from how it was installed

oh and tok  still no tac cubes  tbh i dont ever see tac cubes by the ai unless they have been in a game for more than 20 mins with atleast 3 moon pairs

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:35 am

Tyler what are sliders and can you give me directions on how to change it?

Will changing it ruin the game when I go multiplayer like crash it or ?

Lastly, I got tact cube in a HARD game..............$%&*(@!Q#@$! hahahahha

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:38 am

how long did it take for that cube to come out mkman? 

coz i see no way for the AI to get a tac cube within the first 10 mins of a game unless the build order is changed to 3 scout cubes an assim then tac cube  thats teh only way i can see it happening

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 12:41 am

Tyler what are sliders and can you give me directions on how to change it?

On the game setup screen, select the 'Advanced' button (just above 'Launch') and the sliders are called AI Build Time/Cost Handicap. Move them all the way to the right.

Will changing it ruin the game when I go multiplayer like crash it or ?

It shouldn't affect multiplayer, since the game settings are chosen by the host.

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 1:03 am

alanalpha this was like 1-2 hrs into the game LOL. There was a ton of spheres, assims, dodes, and tacts coming at my base so I hit escape and quit the game. ahhaha

Tyler, thank you! Gonna try it now!

[alanalpha]

posted on April 3rd, 2011, 1:20 am

Last edited by alanalpha on April 3rd, 2011, 1:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

i find the romulan AI a tuffer opponant to beat than the borg tbh coz of all them warbirds the ai can spam when its balanced to only building from max 2 yards in mp (ai spam from 5 large yards   scary stuff)


tok'ra   if u use teh tac cubes in 5 mins from ai again post a replay of it actualy happening pls kthxbye


ive done games vs the ai borg as all races  and never seen in a 1 vs 1 tac cubes   (the highest ive seen is piramid)   only time ive seen a dimond or cube in an ai game is when its been goin on for over an hour with the ai having 3+ full moonpairs in a 2vs2 upwards 

i have never seen in any AI games 5 tac cubes in 5 mins


*EDIT*
jsut did a AI multiplayer game on duel 2 1.2    feds vs borg    after 15 mins borg got cubes (now currently paused)    the only way this happend is coz i set the sliders all the way to the left so that they spend NOTHING on ships and ships pop out like a hose    its kinda funny  might try a rom vs rom game after see how it goes lol