Matrix Games Forums

I've been looking for a while at this game, Total Operational Art of War, and Campaign Series. Generally, this is the game that people recommend to buy but some have cautioned the AI turn taking time might be an issue. How bad is this?

This really depends on a few things: PC speed, number of AI players, size of map.

The more AI's there are the more time between your turns.

The larger the map the longer units survive so the more units there are in a game, the longer it takes each AI to do it's turn.

The slower your PC, the longer it take the AI to think and move each unit.

Not really a very satisfying answer, but there you are. On my home PC, P4 with 1GB ram, large random games take about 5-6 minutes between turns at about mid game. On my work laptop, Core2Duo with 4GB ram, it takes about 2 minutes.

I have a dual core system and it takes a LONG time. 10 minutes is a norm for me. Already had this conversation and already posted my specs. I defrag once a month and do other maintance at that time. I have current drivers. If the AI takes 100 turns it will be about 7 to 10 minutes for me. More turns, even longer.

My pc is not the newest but for AT it's ok. Normally I have to wait a few mins for the next round. I'll make myself a coffee or idy up my flat.
But today I think my pc/AI has gone haywire.
Seems to be taking hrs.
Ai turn 1377?? Still counting. Is this normal??
Russia Winter 41/42. Axis about to start rolling again.

Whats going on behind their frontline???

I don't get this. I have my business laptop, it's a year old, but no gaming machine. Won't play Europa universalis 3, won't play Medieval Total War 2, I also got a warning after installing this game, saying i didn't have enough something (memory probably), But a turn is less than 5 minutes. And even if it is 5 minutes. Who cares? I'm a bloody week waiting for my PBEM turn, Just minimise the game, and pop in here in the minute or two the AI is playing for.

Have you guys optimized your virtual memory? What is the speed of your hard drive(s)? Have you tried setting your virtual memory usage more of "cache" as opposed to "programs"??? Just a thought as when I have sluggish games I try moving around how my virtual memory works or increasing it and even sometimes decreasing it. I've read and heard that using 1-1/2 times your memory in both min and max settings helps with some games as well. I use the 2-1/2 times method sometimes and have 1gig of ram so it's around 3750 min and max, but, in some cases have had it as low as 2250 min/max. Might give it a try and report back to us.

Put a thread on the support.
Vic said it was probably a bug that caused the problem.
We'll see.

yes you where still running v1.10k. I am almost sure this was one of the bugs we catched in the public beta testing phase and it should not occur in v1.10L.
 
kind regards,
Vic
 

Huge random map with 6 AI
Dell XPS2 Laptop: Intel Mobility 2ghz, 2g ram, winxp, Nvidia 6800 Ultra
mid game takes ~130+ ai moves per turn = ~15-20 minutes wait
 
A long time!  I only play AT when I multi-task.  Play a turn, click "next turn" and go do something for 15-20 mins and come back for my turn. 
 
It would be nice if this could be optimized to be quicker[;)]

It's not so much that the AI turn is slow (although obviously it is). It's that you have nothing to look at while the AI is moving. The screen shot posted by British Exil is exactly what you see. Try staring at it for 5 minutes out of every 15 and you'll get the idea. On TOAW and many other games, you can have quite long AI turns, but it's not tedious as you get to see the AI moves and attacks.

After 5 - 10 minutes of effectively a blank screen, with AT you then have to replay the opponents move to figure out what they did. This can take another 5 minutes. If you could see the AI move as it happened, this would be a huge improvement. Opinions obviously vary, but this is the single improvement I want to see in AT.

I understand the idea of going of a tidying the house, making tea etc when the AI is err.. 'moving'. It just doesn't work for me as I find my concentration and flow of thought is broken. I'm just not a good multi-tasker (I believe I'm not the only one, but it's such a buzz word these days) and I find that both tasks get done to lower quality and I enjoy them less due to being 'fragmented' between the two.

At least the AT AI actually does something, contrasted to another recent game where the Union AI takes 8 minutes to decide it'll just do nothing.[;)]

Might be a great game but that's definitely a turnoff for me guys.  Thanks. 

Too bad. This is really a great game. Personally, I have no problems with waiting on the AI... But, tastes are different, I guess. Anyway, I think you'll miss quite a lot by letting this one slip past you.

Cheers!

I've seen the AI logs, It deals with quite much information

If you play normal sized maps with only one opponent like the Gothic Line or Africa 41 scenario then the AI does its turn in like 20-30 seconds on my machine.
 
The thing is that big or huge map size multiply the calculations and adding for example 6 AIs multiplies the calculating time by 6.
 
So if you want to have quicker scenarios you'll have to avoid huge maps with loads of AIs.
 
Kind regards,
Vic

Playing World of Warcraft, when I get on a flight, I log out, check email, matrix, whatever....I fly a lot, I minimize a lot.....same with this game...although I do wish the turns were faster, if they aren't, I just play one on one games between the long turned many AI games.

I just minimize the game when the ai is taking awhile for it's turn and come read the forums.

Bottomline - IMHO, AI taking long turns should *not* be the reason to decide whether or not to buy the game. There are other aspects much, much more important!

Just my 5 cents.

ORIGINAL: Lipa

Too bad. This is really a great game. Personally, I have no problems with waiting on the AI... But, tastes are different, I guess. Anyway, I think you'll miss quite a lot by letting this one slip past you.

Cheers!

It's been between this one, Operational Art of War, and the Campaign Series and it seems the other two games don't have that kind of wait period. Perhaps I'm wrong?

ORIGINAL: rowech

ORIGINAL: Lipa

Too bad. This is really a great game. Personally, I have no problems with waiting on the AI... But, tastes are different, I guess. Anyway, I think you'll miss quite a lot by letting this one slip past you.

Cheers!

It's been between this one, Operational Art of War, and the Campaign Series and it seems the other two games don't have that kind of wait period. Perhaps I'm wrong?

TOAW can take as long or longer on very large scenarios.

The complexity and sheer number of possibilites in this game make me boggle that one could make AI work effectively at all.

The AI can be fast.
The AI can be good.

Pick one.