Choosing Enemy Units For Ground Battles

[K. Thor Jensen]

Hey y'all - I noticed on here that somebody was looking for a way to set up ground battle mode so that you could choose what units the AI controlled. When we coded the ground battle section we wanted the AI to offer an unpredictable challenge so we gave it a bunch of different loadouts, but I can see that it's fun to pit certain groups against each other, so:

Start a 2 player hotseat game in Ground Battle mode
For player 1, choose your own units and click OK
For player 2, choose the units you want the AI to use.
Once the game has started, skip Player 1's turn and then have player 2 go to the menu and click "Surrender." It will ask you if you want to save the game - choose no. It will then ask you if you want the AI to take over for the missing player. Click yes. Voila! A ground battle against the army of your choosing.

Enjoy!

K. Thor Jensen
Producer, Black Hammer Game.

[theswitch]

thank you, yea I asked that question, thanks for the info, I'll try it

[Ilthuain]

That's good to know.

I'm curious, what determines how ground units are initially deployed?

[K. Thor Jensen]

It depends - the AI doesn't know what you're deploying to keep it fair, but they do take into account your CO race as certain units are more or less effective agains tothers - for example, if you chose Fvost, they are more likely to pick more smaller units to counteract the Fvost special freezing activity. From there, there's a couple loadouts that they use depending on the map size as well. And, finally, there's an element of randomness in it to boot.

[Ilthuain]

Interesting.

Is there any reason player units are deployed the way they are? I've noticed that snipers tend to be in the front, infantry in the middle, and walkers at the back. I'm wondering if this has to do with how the player arranges them in the drop-forces dialoge window or if there is some constant logic to the order.


Thanks for the reply!

[praetorblue]

Hi Ilthuain,

Unless it was changed after I originally implemented it, the initial player troop configuration (after sending troops to a planet) groups like unit types. It works basically as you've stated it.

- Vance