Difficulty Levels - Unpublished info

[Batavian]

ORIGINAL: GordianKnot

Normal dificulty actually gives YOU a combat bonus IIRC.

I have seen others say this. Is it true? The manual doesn't say this.

Here's what the manual says:

Easy: AI suffer a -2 attack disadvantage
Normal: AI gets 200 transport level
Challenging: AI gets 50 supply and 200 transport
Hard: AI gets 75 supply, 200 transport, +2 attack advantage
Impossible: AI gets 100 supply, 200 transport, +4 attack advantage

What else doesn't the manual say about difficulty levels?

[Dalwin]

As far as I know, the bit you just quoted from the manual is accurate. You can look at combat details and see whether or not a bonus is being applied to either side.

I believe those people who recall that the human gets a combat advantage at normal level are recalling incorrectly.

[Batavian]

Joel wrote this...

ORIGINAL: Joel Billings

The AI is as smart as it can be at Normal, but it will not use certain grand strategies until it is give some of the benefits of the higher difficulty levels. If you are an experienced strategy gamer, you will ulitmately need to give the AI benefits to keep the game competitive. Some games hide the benefits better than others, but I have never played a computer game that allows you to play all sides that did not require help. We allow you to see the various benefits we give the AI in the different play levels, so you can change those that you don't like. We strongly suggest that once you become familiar with the game, you give the computer some supply and transport help. Although the AI does a lot in GGWaW, it just isn't close to being as good as a good human opponent. If you give it a few advantages, it will give you a good fight.

Joel gives some tantalizing clues like...

"will not use certain grand strategies unless at higher difficulties"

or

"Some games hide the benefits better than others"

Maybe he and others want to keep this secret lest it ruin the fun or other reason, and that's understandable. Others may want to know exactly what they are up against so they can balance the AI as they see fit versus their skill level.

GGWaW does do a better job than most of allowing one to modify AI characteristics but if its true that Normal = -1 disadvantage for the AI, I was wondering about other unpublished things. For instance, most know that "Fog of War" does not apply to the AI. Are there any others?

[Dalwin]

We he says some games hide the AI advantages better than others, he clearly means games other than WaW. He is saying that WaW lets you know clearly what advantages are being given to the AI so that you can adjust them as you see fit.

The way I see this quote, you are interpretting it the exact opposite of how it is meant.

A lot of what he is saying is referring to strategy game AIs in general and not to the AI in this game.

[Joel Billings]

ORIGINAL: Dalwin

We he says some games hide the AI advantages better than others, he clearly means games other than WaW. He is saying that WaW lets you know clearly what advantages are being given to the AI so that you can adjust them as you see fit.

The way I see this quote, you are interpretting it the exact opposite of how it is meant.

A lot of what he is saying is referring to strategy game AIs in general and not to the AI in this game.

Right. Only hidden things in GGWaW are:

1) computer doesn't use fog of war (not hidden on purpose I just missed getting this clearly in the manual, and actually the game options change to show you that it is not playing with FOW)

2) Gary has the AI using certain strategies only if he sees certain advantages are being given to the AI. I don't know the detailed list and wouldn't want to publicize it if I had a list. I know at very hard there are some and I think at hard there are some, and some might happen on custom depending on your custom help settings. This is the only way the AI gets "smarter" at the higher levels.

All other AI advantages I know of are listed on the game options screen.

We have found several key analyzer quirks/bugs and Gary has spent time on the AI, so the next patch should play better (the better the analyzer, the less chance the AI will make a stupid attack).

[IDrinkBeer]

We have found several key analyzer quirks/bugs and Gary has spent time on the AI, so the next patch should play better (the better the analyzer, the less chance the AI will make a stupid attack).

Humans, of course, can ignore the analyzer and continue with their stupid attack... [:D]

[Batavian]

The statement about having a combat bonus on normal difficulty was what prompted the question about possibilities of other un-documented differences. If it is un-true, then I would not have wondered about any other un-documented modifiers.

I agree 100% on not disseminating the AI strategies. What fun would that be?