Helping the AI

[stuman]

I am playing against the AI ( in this case against the Allies ). Periodically I give the AI a helping hand by stopping a few really dumb moves, by rerouting a few convoys, by training some otherwise dormant air assets, etc. Does helping out, perhaps too much, significantly disrupt the scripts ?

[Platoonist]

I don't know about breaking scripts, but I've always found helping the AI futile and paradoxical. (I'm saving you now so I can crush you later.) Plus, it seems whatever assistance I try to render, it revokes in short order. You can only hold its artificial hand so much and the game is lengthy enough as is without occasionally playing both sides.

One thing I did learn from playing the Allied AI in the grand campaign game is that it really can't properly coordinate all the complex elements that make up a successful amphibious offensive in the later war period and I'm certainly not going to do all that work for it so it can then countermand it. I do get the sense it does better with invasions in the shorter scenarios where it's all scripted beforehand.

[Yaab]

stuman, I prop Japanese AI on Normal by using three house rules:

1) non-universal supply
2) no fuel in xAKs as cargo
3) no 2E or 4E bombers can bomb frontline hexes

Have you tried moving US-made supplies from PH to Luzon in December 1941? It is really tricky even against Japanese AI.

ad rule 1

Five supplies pools:
Commonwealth: British, Australian, Indian, Burmese, New Zealand and Canada units
American: USA and Phillpines (US-made supply also must be sent to China for US-equipped Chinese corps)
Chinese: China
Soviet: Soviets
Dutch: Dutch

Soviet and Dutch are a non-issue. Dutch fall early, Soviets activate late. Thus, you really have three supply pools to worry about.

Some ramifications:
Luzon can only be boosted by US-made supplies from PH or CONUSA. You can minutely boost Luzon by bringing more resources for Manila LI, so holding Manila becomes crucial. Commonwealth cannot fly Commonwealth supplies to China - you need to move US-made supplies to India first. Burma Road cannot be boosted by Commonwealth supplies - you need to bring US-made supplies to Rangoon (good luck with that).Pilot training takes longer, because you need to train all 1Es in Ground attack. In absence of 2Es and 4Es, saving field artillery is crucial. Supplying LCUs is crucial, so they can shoot their artillery etc.

Basically, even the good, old scen001 plays totally different.

[RangerJoe]

Yaab, one problem that you might encounter is that the non-US forces won't get the C rations which they so enjoyed in Burma, not to mention the Hormel Spam. Many of the Allied land units also used US made equipment like the Stuarts, Grants/Lees, Shermans, plus other vehicles not to mention the artillery and radar sets. So food and ammo from the US would be needed by the Allied units.

One thing to do for the Japanese AI would be to increase the aircraft engine production, the vehicle production, and possibly the LI/HI production. If you want to, you could also edit the cost of producing/repairing the LI as well. Using the point system for modifying the scenarios, if you want to change anything for the Allies you could also give more advantages to the Japanese AI as well, such as oil production in the Home Islands.

I don't know if the AI will continue the path of aircraft research with the research facilities or if they put them into production. However, a player could use the editor to fully repair the research factories for the AI. So even if the AI still uses the air units rather stupidly, they will do so with the absolute best aircraft as soon as possible.

[stuman]

Great points guys, thanks. I am inching closer to finally playing PVP with me taking the Japanese side. I am learning a lot.

[Sardaukar]

Also, playing with 2-day turns helps AI a bit, since you cannot react as fast as AI can then.

[BananaConvention]

Great points guys, thanks. I am inching closer to finally playing PVP with me taking the Japanese side. I am learning a lot.

When you're ready for this, come to my Discord and we will set you up for maximum success.

[CaptBeefheart]

Regarding supply pools, a lot of American vets in SW Pac famously ate enough Aussie mutton to become sick of it. As a handicap against the AI, it sounds interesting, but in reality there was plenty of supply cross-fertilization.

Two-day turns vs. the AI is a good handicap. Another thing is to pretty much let the AI roam free in the beginning. If you want a really interesting situation, you can run Computer vs. Computer on Continuous and stop it with an F10 (or maybe F9?) a few months in. You'll have a challenging situation to deal with. Also, you should check out the Ironman scenarios, as those give the AI side more toys, thus they'll be a threat for a longer period than a stock scenario.

Cheers,
CB

[RangerJoe]

Regarding supply pools, a lot of American vets in SW Pac famously ate enough Aussie mutton to become sick of it. As a handicap against the AI, it sounds interesting, but in reality there was plenty of supply cross-fertilization.

Two-day turns vs. the AI is a good handicap. Another thing is to pretty much let the AI roam free in the beginning. If you want a really interesting situation, you can run Computer vs. Computer on Continuous and stop it with an F10 (or maybe F9?) a few months in. You'll have a challenging situation to deal with. Also, you should check out the Ironman scenarios, as those give the AI side more toys, thus they'll be a threat for a longer period than a stock scenario.

Cheers,
CB

New Zealand also supplied a lot of food to the American military forces, not to mention what the military people ate on the economy.

[Arkham]

Regarding supply pools, a lot of American vets in SW Pac famously ate enough Aussie mutton to become sick of it. As a handicap against the AI, it sounds interesting, but in reality there was plenty of supply cross-fertilization.

Two-day turns vs. the AI is a good handicap. Another thing is to pretty much let the AI roam free in the beginning. If you want a really interesting situation, you can run Computer vs. Computer on Continuous and stop it with an F10 (or maybe F9?) a few months in. You'll have a challenging situation to deal with. Also, you should check out the Ironman scenarios, as those give the AI side more toys, thus they'll be a threat for a longer period than a stock scenario.

Cheers,
CB

New Zealand also supplied a lot of food to the American military forces, not to mention what the military people ate on the economy.

I am re-reading 'The Conquering Tide' by Ian Toll (great book if you haven't read it), and he spent some time talking about New Zealand, especially the problems American troops had with their stevedore unions before the invasion of Guadalcanal. Apparently there were so many work stoppages and strikes the marines basically had to push them out of port as gunpoint and load/unload all the cargo ships themselves.

[RangerJoe]

Regarding supply pools, a lot of American vets in SW Pac famously ate enough Aussie mutton to become sick of it. As a handicap against the AI, it sounds interesting, but in reality there was plenty of supply cross-fertilization.

Two-day turns vs. the AI is a good handicap. Another thing is to pretty much let the AI roam free in the beginning. If you want a really interesting situation, you can run Computer vs. Computer on Continuous and stop it with an F10 (or maybe F9?) a few months in. You'll have a challenging situation to deal with. Also, you should check out the Ironman scenarios, as those give the AI side more toys, thus they'll be a threat for a longer period than a stock scenario.

Cheers,
CB

New Zealand also supplied a lot of food to the American military forces, not to mention what the military people ate on the economy.

I am re-reading 'The Conquering Tide' by Ian Toll (great book if you haven't read it), and he spent some time talking about New Zealand, especially the problems American troops had with their stevedore unions before the invasion of Guadalcanal. Apparently there were so many work stoppages and strikes the marines basically had to push them out of port as gunpoint and load/unload all the cargo ships themselves.

Yes, the union members did not want to hurry up and secure their lines of communication from the Japanese.

[PaxMondo]

Great points guys, thanks. I am inching closer to finally playing PVP with me taking the Japanese side. I am learning a lot.

Well, playing as the IJ, here are some tips:
- Always play on VH. Anything lower, you are handicapping the AI. At VH, it is as close to even as you can get.
- about 1/month, play H2H for 2 - 3 turns. During this H2H time, the IJ cannot start any new offensive. For the allies what you need to do is:
- Adjust leaders. The AI can only use what is set in the scenario, and then randomly chooses the others. That generally means that it absolutely has the wrong leaders in the wrong places. I generally just focus on HQ's, but feel free to go as far as you wish.
- Adjust pilot exp. The AI doesn't know to put the best pilots on CV's and other critical assets like 4E bombers. So do some pilot swapping to get exp and skills in these units fixed.
- Avoid moving units. The AI will just want to bring them back, and it will generally do so.
- IF the AI is stuck on a trigger (like attacking a base repeatedly with too few or too weak units), then you need to sit back do some thinking.

This generally, but not always, happens when you do a deep end about (meaning taking a target while skipping a number of bases in between. EX: taking Palembang from Miri. If this happens, well you just learned you can't do that in an AI game. Congratulate yourself on a game won, because in this case the game is pretty much over as the AI is broken at this point and it's just a matter of time before it runs out of devices.

However, sometimes it can happen even if you are attacking very methodically, like going across the north coast of Sarawak from Jesselton to Beaufort. If this happens, degrade the allied units in the immediate area as best you can: worst pilots/commanders/aircraft/etc to minimize quality losses. Then get your next attack going ASAP. Frequently, once you take the next base in succession (Brunei) this will get the AI out of the rut, and it comes back fine. The units/devices lost by the allies were minimized by you, and if you are playing Ironman then the allies will have plenty of better replacements, so relatively little negative impact. The AI will recover actually fairly quickly.

[stuman]

Great points guys, thanks. I am inching closer to finally playing PVP with me taking the Japanese side. I am learning a lot.

Well, playing as the IJ, here are some tips:
- Always play on VH. Anything lower, you are handicapping the AI. At VH, it is as close to even as you can get.
- about 1/month, play H2H for 2 - 3 turns. During this H2H time, the IJ cannot start any new offensive. For the allies what you need to do is:
- Adjust leaders. The AI can only use what is set in the scenario, and then randomly chooses the others. That generally means that it absolutely has the wrong leaders in the wrong places. I generally just focus on HQ's, but feel free to go as far as you wish.
- Adjust pilot exp. The AI doesn't know to put the best pilots on CV's and other critical assets like 4E bombers. So do some pilot swapping to get exp and skills in these units fixed.
- Avoid moving units. The AI will just want to bring them back, and it will generally do so.
- IF the AI is stuck on a trigger (like attacking a base repeatedly with too few or too weak units), then you need to sit back do some thinking.

This generally, but not always, happens when you do a deep end about (meaning taking a target while skipping a number of bases in between. EX: taking Palembang from Miri. If this happens, well you just learned you can't do that in an AI game. Congratulate yourself on a game won, because in this case the game is pretty much over as the AI is broken at this point and it's just a matter of time before it runs out of devices.

However, sometimes it can happen even if you are attacking very methodically, like going across the north coast of Sarawak from Jesselton to Beaufort. If this happens, degrade the allied units in the immediate area as best you can: worst pilots/commanders/aircraft/etc to minimize quality losses. Then get your next attack going ASAP. Frequently, once you take the next base in succession (Brunei) this will get the AI out of the rut, and it comes back fine. The units/devices lost by the allies were minimized by you, and if you are playing Ironman then the allies will have plenty of better replacements, so relatively little negative impact. The AI will recover actually fairly quickly.

Those are some helpful points. In my current "learning" game as the Japanese I have been going rather slowly, and have been attacking only historical targets. I am still messing up a bunch, but at least the AI has been responding fairly consistently. I am going to push on to 1945 in this game and then decide whether to go for one more game against the AI or jump into a PBEM.

[PaxMondo]

If you have the time to play PBEM, do so. And do so as soon as you can get a game. Playing the AI you will learn too many bad habits that are hard to unlearn. You should be able to find a similar opponent and learn the game together. ENJOY!!!

[Yaab]

Yaab, one problem that you might encounter is that the non-US forces won't get the C rations which they so enjoyed in Burma, not to mention the Hormel Spam. Many of the Allied land units also used US made equipment like the Stuarts, Grants/Lees, Shermans, plus other vehicles not to mention the artillery and radar sets. So food and ammo from the US would be needed by the Allied units.

One thing to do for the Japanese AI would be to increase the aircraft engine production, the vehicle production, and possibly the LI/HI production. If you want to, you could also edit the cost of producing/repairing the LI as well. Using the point system for modifying the scenarios, if you want to change anything for the Allies you could also give more advantages to the Japanese AI as well, such as oil production in the Home Islands.

I don't know if the AI will continue the path of aircraft research with the research facilities or if they put them into production. However, a player could use the editor to fully repair the research factories for the AI. So even if the AI still uses the air units rather stupidly, they will do so with the absolute best aircraft as soon as possible.

True, but the game lumps ammo/replacement devices/avgas/bombs and food/building materials in SUPPLY. A US LCU in India could get food/building materials locally in India, but cannot get a spare Sherman or 105mm arty ammo. What I do is I move non-combat US LCU (HQ, BF, air recon, engineers etc) to India so they can enoy Commonwealth supply there, but when I move combat US LCU (inf div, arty, combat eng, bombers etc) to India I also send an accompnying convoy with US-made supplies with them.

I do it to help the Jap AI by straining my logistics.

[RangerJoe]

Yaab, one problem that you might encounter is that the non-US forces won't get the C rations which they so enjoyed in Burma, not to mention the Hormel Spam. Many of the Allied land units also used US made equipment like the Stuarts, Grants/Lees, Shermans, plus other vehicles not to mention the artillery and radar sets. So food and ammo from the US would be needed by the Allied units.

One thing to do for the Japanese AI would be to increase the aircraft engine production, the vehicle production, and possibly the LI/HI production. If you want to, you could also edit the cost of producing/repairing the LI as well. Using the point system for modifying the scenarios, if you want to change anything for the Allies you could also give more advantages to the Japanese AI as well, such as oil production in the Home Islands.

I don't know if the AI will continue the path of aircraft research with the research facilities or if they put them into production. However, a player could use the editor to fully repair the research factories for the AI. So even if the AI still uses the air units rather stupidly, they will do so with the absolute best aircraft as soon as possible.

True, but the game lumps ammo/replacement devices/avgas/bombs and food/building materials in SUPPLY. A US LCU in India could get food/building materials locally in India, but cannot get a spare Sherman or 105mm arty ammo. What I do is I move non-combat US LCU (HQ, BF, air recon, engineers etc) to India so they can enoy Commonwealth supply there, but when I move combat US LCU (inf div, arty, combat eng, bombers etc) to India I also send an accompnying convoy with US-made supplies with them.

I do it to help the Jap AI by straining my logistics.

The game has CD units to dump supplies and fuel as well as devices at Cape Town and later Aden. Where do those ships carrying those items get loaded?

[Yaab]

Agreed, some of them carry Lend-Lease device (Grant tanks) so you can argue they have US-made supplies. Still you have to move this US-made supply to Bombay.