Need More Info Extremely hostile AI while running own Kingdom

[swally0ne]

Summary:
This thread is adressing an issue i see showing up with 1.8.0.
some of the things are known mechanics which are doing their part alongside with new mechanics like supporting armies during siege.

The ai is constantly bugging with war declarations.
throughout 4 different complete playthroughs (getting all settlements) of 1.8.0, i always had the feeling of fighting an ai that is extremely sweaty with mechanics the player isn't able to reach out to:
The ai is constantly bugging with war declarations. starting with your first settlement, the multiple factions tend to declare war on you, leaving the player nearly unable to react to anything necessary, like increasing influence, getting mercenaries, or vassalls. the distance between the player and other factions seem to have a lower impact than before. i started with tirby castle and the northern empire, with closest place being epricotea, declared war on me and showed up. alongside with battania, vlandia and the western empire. all of the factions mentioned stopped any other war. just to go against:

tirby castle and one-two parties.

-during war, the enemy ai is able to recruit extremely fast, making them able to come back in no time and giving you a short window to have low tribute costs.
-lords escape out of prison fast
-after war declaration, enemy armies are immeadeatly in front of your places as soon as they are out of your sighting range. yet i can not confirm, but it feels like they are spawning.
-several war declarations result to the player being forced to peace-treaties alongside with heavy tribute payments.
-you are simply not able to hold against 3 different factions at the beginning of your created kingdom, concidering all the requirements which are necessary to progress.
-the decission making within your kingdom lords is far from reasonable as soon as you have a fair ammount of vassals. if you win wars, they want you to peace out (still with tribute payements), if you are struggling, they want you to make more war. it shows up very often(yet not always) that they do the exact opposite than you would do. it leaves the impression that your vassals still try to support the enemy ai.

That whole package is giving the player a feeling of playing against something/someone that is reaching out to what someone would call "cheats". In context of ai behaviour it would be more accurate to call it "mechanics the player is not able to reach out to".
Playing against something/someone that uses "cheats" never feels good. in 1.8.0 that feeling comes up very, very often.

i know that a lot of ai mechanics have to be there for balancing reasons, but combined with the new mechanics and the reinforcement issue on the battlefield the whole gameplay never felt that painful and out of reach for casual players.
I think this is very concerning and is limiting the fun to play this game on a larger conquest.

I wish you only the best for the upcomming release and iam very excited to see what is about to come!
25 days left!

How to Reproduce: create a kingdom.
Have you used cheats and if so which: no
Scene Name (if related): calradia
Media (Screenshots & Video):
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[Gadheras]

They decleare on you because you are WEAK... And prone to decleare if you already in a war.
Try grab more settlements before you create your kingdom. Stack their garrisons with troops. That count towards your strenght... Try have max possible numbers of companion parties once you hit the kingdom button too. It help have a lot of cash so you can pay for peace to give you some breathing room as well.

 

[swally0ne]

They decleare on you because you are WEAK... And prone to decleare if you already in a war.
Try grab more settlements before you create your kingdom. Stack their garrisons with troops. That count towards your strenght... Try have max possible numbers of companion parties once you hit the kingdom button too. It help have a lot of cash so you can pay for peace to give you some breathing room as well.

thanks for the help except for the fact that:

more garisson=less money/-daily income
more garisson=dont matter if its 2500 attacking (new mechanic of several armies helping each other)
more party leaders=less money
no kingdom=no army
no army=no settlement rescue defense
more settlements=more points of attack
all combined=outcheese it so you may can play it=different approach, same problem.

your approach is requiring about 2million at least to go forward.

the things i mentioned are about something different here.

i understand the reason why things are happening, i just doubt that it is good the way they are happening.

 

[Gadheras]

thanks for the help except for the fact that:

more garisson=less money/-daily income
more garisson=dont matter if its 2500 attacking (new mechanic of several armies helping each other)
more party leaders=less money
no kingdom=no army
no army=no settlement rescue defense
more settlements=more points of attack
all combined=outcheese it so you may can play it=different approach, same problem.

your approach is requiring about 2million at least to go forward.

the things i mentioned are about something different here.

i understand the reason why things are happening, i just doubt that it is good the way they are happening.

I never go kingdom before I'm clan tier 5. I try to have at least 4-5 fiefs before I do. Prior to even think about this I use to play as a merc and go from one war to another building standing and a huge war chest I need for when I go kingdom. With 3 companion parties and my own, and enact the policies that will seriously increase my party size. I should be able to form an army of 1k+ from just my own clan. Now if I have garrisons maxed in my fiefs and someone come attack them. My army + the defenders of the fief should be able to go toe to toe with the attackers.

Before you start your own kingdom you can pritty much decide who you want to wage war on and no one else can start war with you and attack your fiefs. It give you time to build them up, and establish a good foundation for your future kingdom. You can spend time and grind down the one you wage with. Keep hold the lords prisoners in your party, you can remove their capacity to field parties of any value by capture their lords. You can siege castles and even towns and starve the defenders down to just militia, knock a hole in the walls and just walk in..

The more fiefs you got and the more troops in your garrisons the better to start with, because it adds to your total strenght. Over time when you recruit more clans and grow bigger you can trim down the garrisons and get ridd of some dead weight that wreck havoc on your budget.

Once you start a own kingdom you paint a bullseye on your back. Everyone want to kill a upstart... Not everyone want to attack a strong one though.

 

[swally0ne]

I never go kingdom before I'm clan tier 5. I try to have at least 4-5 fiefs before I do. Prior to even think about this I use to play as a merc and go from one war to another building standing and a huge war chest I need for when I go kingdom. With 3 companion parties and my own, and enact the policies that will seriously increase my party size. I should be able to form an army of 1k+ from just my own clan. Now if I have garrisons maxed in my fiefs and someone come attack them. My army + the defenders of the fief should be able to go toe to toe with the attackers.

Before you start your own kingdom you can pritty much decide who you want to wage war on and no one else can start war with you and attack your fiefs. It give you time to build them up, and establish a good foundation for your future kingdom. You can spend time and grind down the one you wage with. Keep hold the lords prisoners in your party, you can remove their capacity to field parties of any value by capture their lords. You can siege castles and even towns and starve the defenders down to just militia, knock a hole in the walls and just walk in..

The more fiefs you got and the more troops in your garrisons the better to start with, because it adds to your total strenght. Over time when you recruit more clans and grow bigger you can trim down the garrisons and get ridd of some dead weight that wreck havoc on your budget.

Once you start a own kingdom you paint a bullseye on your back. Everyone want to kill a upstart... Not everyone want to attack a strong one though.

really thanks a lot for the explanation.
in addition to that i just found a youtube video which is helping me a lot about the problem of creating a kingdom:


anyway though
this thread is about adressing the problems which come along with it.

i also dont want to repeat again what i said in the previous.
wish you a nice weekend!

 

[Gadheras]

Try this one -)

 

[Zorion_no]

My tips of the day when starting your own "kingdome" is dont.

So here's what you do, you find a city that is rebelling - take it from the rebels.
Now you are at war with a rebel-kingdome which after they lost their hold before they become permanent will be gone in a few days after the loss.
Sometimes you need to hunt down the 4 vassals and just release them, and they will despawn instead of comeing back and voila your enemy is gone.

However what you never do with your new spanking town is to declare a kingdome!
Just be a "free town", and look at all that dinars comeing your way.
Get a good steward for your town, and do whatever sandbox things you want.

Since you arent a kingdome - other kingdomes cant declare war on you..
Now you just sit back and build your town and army up.
Get 3 clanmembers to lead fairly big parties or average.

When you feel you are ready, go for it and declare yourself a new kingdome.

By doing the method I mentioned you can rank up clan and steward skill and have 100's of troops in your party.
Have the right workshops in your town to boost income.
Have the town and villages beceom prosporus to fund your armies etc. (atleast have 1mil imo before you go King)

I do however agree that the AI overall is way too ganky.
As you mentioned there is still those where they share borders with you at all, that they will still declare war.

In your example with Tirby Castle and its location, the only faction that should declare war on you is Vlandia.
Maybe others if they control those other 2 towns nearbye or that 1 castle just around the mountain(the other Vlandia starting one, which I dont recall the name of)
I wish the AI was abit more "reasonable" in terms of who they can declare war on, and less predatory - overall my biggest gripe with the vanilla game is just this that the AI is warmonger only.
No time to do sandbox things or not enough once you "commit" to a kingdome your own or as a vassal - endless/chain wars with little to no peace.
Should be better mechanics to instigate war and peace, like Warband had its quest.

That said - alot of theese issues is solved already though by modders with various diplomacy mods so theres that

 

[Farah]

really thanks a lot for the explanation.
in addition to that i just found a youtube video which is helping me a lot about the problem of creating a kingdom:


anyway though
this thread is about adressing the problems which come along with it.

i also dont want to repeat again what i said in the previous.
wish you a nice weekend!

Did you... Did you just link one of our own videos from a few months ago and claimed to have "just found it"?

 

[TechnoSarge]

I think the complaint is entirely reasonable.
The AI is now set to beat you down if you are TOO POWERFUL, as well as too weak. I haven't even started a kingdom... I work for Vlandia... but 4 is about the minimum number of wars the AI allows us. When we make peace, another faction we beat down a month ago declares war again, so we can get a nice, healthy 4 wars going again. But seriously: we've had as many as SIX simultaneous wars. I'm seriously thinking of putting BL aside until the devs figure out some other way to address late-game.

 

[Gadheras]

I think the complaint is entirely reasonable.
The AI is now set to beat you down if you are TOO POWERFUL, as well as too weak. I haven't even started a kingdom... I work for Vlandia... but 4 is about the minimum number of wars the AI allows us. When we make peace, another faction we beat down a month ago declares war again, so we can get a nice, healthy 4 wars going again. But seriously: we've had as many as SIX simultaneous wars. I'm seriously thinking of putting BL aside until the devs figure out some other way to address late-game.

Funny though. People complain if the AI Start to steamroll the map... If the AI start shower you in wars to avoid you do the steamrolling its bad? Quite sure if you had six wars going working for Vlandia... You had your own lords vote to start wars, you are not just on the receiving end of wars.

 

[swally0ne]

Funny though. People complain if the AI Start to steamroll the map... If the AI start shower you in wars to avoid you do the steamrolling its bad? Quite sure if you had six wars going working for Vlandia... You had your own lords vote to start wars, you are not just on the receiving end of wars.

yet you still dont get that this is just a report of clearly unbearable mechanics. i dont ask for anything.
also if you go the way you mentioned, strange war declarations wouldnt stop. ai wouldnt stop full aggro you while leaving others alone. ai still would reach out to an big ammount of a mechanics the player cant. resulting to the player getting treated different than ai in between situations. its clear. and that is making your arguments of " If the AI start shower you in wars to avoid you do the steamrolling its bad" just out of place, or have you seen a kingdom of the size/power of any faction ever being at war against 5 different factions, just because it recently took a place with 30 garrison left? paying ****load of tribute to get out? only happens to the player.
on top of that your own fac ai wouldnt stop to go with stupid decissions windling down your influence.
at least this is my experience, with 4 different complete playthroughs (means getting all the settlements) on 1.8.0 with 4 different approaches (vassal, independent, sniped, one sett start, multisett start) and similar outcomes which are all clearly different compared to 1.7.2



partly there is a clear, not mentioned, change between the versions, making the game clearly more sweaty. the hostility rised. and this is what i am adressing. nothing else.

but obviously you dont seem to have an eye on that since the start of this needless discussion. you just throw your five cents into it and give answers to questions nobody ever asked. my friend i understand how it works. yet the problems mentioned above and at the beginning of the thread still exist.

i know that a lot of ai mechanics have to be there for balancing reasons, but combined with the new mechanics and the reinforcement issue on the battlefield the whole gameplay never felt that painful and out of reach for casual players.
I think this is very concerning and is limiting the fun to play this game on a larger conquest.

the report is about issues and not a request about help, as the ifs, whats, whys are widely known.
i really appreciate you trying to help, but it's really not about that and i think we do misunderstand each other a lot. nothing but ♥

Try this one -)

yep. basically the same as the other.

 

[Gadheras]

yet you still dont get that this is just a report of clearly unbearable mechanics. i dont ask for anything.
also if you go the way you mentioned, strange war declarations wouldnt stop. ai wouldnt stop full aggro you while leaving others alone. ai still would reach out to an big ammount of a mechanics the player cant. resulting to the player getting treated different than ai in between situations. its clear. and that is making your arguments of " If the AI start shower you in wars to avoid you do the steamrolling its bad" just out of place, or have you seen a kingdom of the size/power of any faction ever being at war against 5 different factions, just because it recently took a place with 30 garrison left? paying ****load of tribute to get out? only happens to the player.
on top of that your own fac ai wouldnt stop to go with stupid decissions windling down your influence.
at least this is my experience, with 4 different complete playthroughs (means getting all the settlements) on 1.8.0 with 4 different approaches (vassal, independent, sniped, one sett start, multisett start) and similar outcomes which are all clearly different compared to 1.7.2



partly there is a clear, not mentioned, change between the versions, making the game clearly more sweaty. the hostility rised. and this is what i am adressing. nothing else.

but obviously you dont seem to have an eye on that since the start of this needless discussion. you just throw your five cents into it and give answers to questions nobody ever asked. my friend i understand how it works. yet the problems mentioned above and at the beginning of the thread still exist.



the report is about issues and not a request about help, as the ifs, whats, whys are widely known.
i really appreciate you trying to help, but it's really not about that and i think we do misunderstand each other a lot. nothing but ♥


yep. basically the same as the other.

Basically the same as yours you could say.. Why I found the other one and linked.... as it does deal with things you have issues with.

 

[Zorion_no]

Funny though. People complain if the AI Start to steamroll the map... If the AI start shower you in wars to avoid you do the steamrolling its bad? Quite sure if you had six wars going working for Vlandia... You had your own lords vote to start wars, you are not just on the receiving end of wars.

Actually imo you are wrong, for those of us who suffer this issue - it means that we will steamroll the AI, but we typically are focused on the war constant and cant "get cool downs to do other tasks etc".
My solution was to install diplomacymods and boom - longer peace duration to start - the 30 day that is ingame atm is way to short.

And they need to have better mechanics for both scenarios those who want war and those who want to stop it.
Like you know they had in Warband.. with ask a lord to get a mission to incite war, and a town's mayor to stop wars..
Basically the "chain/endless" war is just boring af when you get to it, you will either have to let the AI steamroll you, or you'll need to work overtime, and not enjoy any of the sandbox elements - basically it turns out to be a constant skirmish game once your kingdome reach a certain power.
A better solution would be like most other games have you know with "difficulty" also manageing agression lvl's.

Example in Civ if you go on the lowest setting its rare that the AI will declare war on you, on Deity -> they are you on like white on rice..

In the end though the real issue isnt the game "issue being talked about here" - but lack of communication from Taleworlds in the various threads its been adressed.

Thus for ppl who thinks the current system is lacking - go get mods, be done with the poor gamedesignchoices of the dev-team on some of their choices.

 

[five bucks]

Funny though. People complain if the AI Start to steamroll the map... If the AI start shower you in wars to avoid you do the steamrolling its bad?

The game is for the player's enjoyment first and foremost, not for being fair to the imaginary AI.

Snowballing is only a bad thing because it stops the player from interacting with factions or puts them at too big a disadvantage.

And that exact reason is also why it's a bad thing that the other factions all gang up on the player to prevent them from snowballing - because it puts them at too big a disadvantage (without using exploits).

 

[Gadheras]

The game is for the player's enjoyment first and foremost, not for being fair to the imaginary AI.

Snowballing is only a bad thing because it stops the player from interacting with factions or puts them at too big a disadvantage.

And that exact reason is also why it's a bad thing that the other factions all gang up on the player to prevent them from snowballing - because it puts them at too big a disadvantage (without using exploits).

It's like throwing a tantrum when you get to many wars on you in Crusader Kings.... Or any game where war mechanics is involved...

Put artificial limits on something is bad game design too.

The only thing the game really need imho is for peace agreements last somewhat longer. One year in the game is 120 days, so at least 60 days would be somewhat reasonable.

Would it be nice if you could sign an alliance with someone, or a non agression pact? Sure, but end of the day isn't the goal to become the ruler of the fractioned land?

 

[swally0ne]

The game is for the player's enjoyment first and foremost, not for being fair to the imaginary AI.

Snowballing is only a bad thing because it stops the player from interacting with factions or puts them at too big a disadvantage.

And that exact reason is also why it's a bad thing that the other factions all gang up on the player to prevent them from snowballing - because it puts them at too big a disadvantage (without using exploits).

lay it to rest, hes trolling or refuses to understand any of what this is about.

 

[Gadheras]

lay it to rest, hes trolling or refuses to understand any of what this is about.

So not necessary subscribe to your views and agenda is trolling?

 

[swally0ne]

So not necessary subscribe to your views and agenda is trolling?

so you refuse to understand.

 

[Zorion_no]

It's like throwing a tantrum when you get to many wars on you in Crusader Kings.... Or any game where war mechanics is involved...

Put artificial limits on something is bad game design too.

The only thing the game really need imho is for peace agreements last somewhat longer. One year in the game is 120 days, so at least 60 days would be somewhat reasonable.

Would it be nice if you could sign an alliance with someone, or a non agression pact? Sure, but end of the day isn't the goal to become the ruler of the fractioned land?

Again if you read my post - use mods.
There you can set the values on peace and you can have alliances aswell.

Diplomacy

A vanilla-friendly mod for the campaign and sandbox modes of Bannerlord. Diplomacy's goal is to provide balanced, fun, and creative options for characters to have an impact on the world, including bot

www.nexusmods.com

While the game needs to have war its just excessive much, I mean if all you want to do in a sandbox game is war - you can use the skirmish mode, or instigateing war is kind of easy anyways if you think its been to long at peace.

Basically when all you do is constant war for a 40 years ingame - it gets really stale.

 

[Gadheras]

Again if you read my post - use mods.
There you can set the values on peace and you can have alliances aswell.

Diplomacy

A vanilla-friendly mod for the campaign and sandbox modes of Bannerlord. Diplomacy's goal is to provide balanced, fun, and creative options for characters to have an impact on the world, including bot

www.nexusmods.com

While the game needs to have war its just excessive much, I mean if all you want to do in a sandbox game is war - you can use the skirmish mode, or instigateing war is kind of easy anyways if you think its been to long at peace.

Basically when all you do is constant war for a 40 years ingame - it gets really stale.

War is kinda the purpose of the game though. Unless you want to spend your time smithing, or trading, but doing that for 40 years sounds dull too. Or fight bandits, or arena fights... or do village quests..

If you don't like wars you don't have to start a kingdom either...

If you get a war you don't like you can pay them off and stop it... you have options.