In single player, the other players are controlled by AI's.
Difficulty
There are 5 levels of difficulty for the AI. Knight is the baseline - lower AI's, just squire, get penalties to their strategy, while higher AI's, Lord, King and Emperor, gain a bonus.
Difficulty | Squire | Knight | Lord | King | Emperor |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Handicap | Yes* | No | No | No | No |
Starting army bonus** | ? | No | ? | About +270 value | About +310 value |
Base Happiness Boost | No | No | 100 | 200 | 300 |
// Income flat bonus | No | No | +10 | +20 | +30 |
/ Income bonus for cities | No | No | +33% | +67% | +100% |
/ Income bonus for cities | No | No | No | +25% | +50% |
Combat Boost vs Independents | No | No | No | +3 / +2 | +3 / +2 |
Machine / Undead Cheat Heal (In fog of war only) | 0 | 0 | 2 / | 4 / | 8 / |
Maximum excess of number of cities compared to the human player | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 4 |
*: the handicap that the AI Squire gets revolves around a limit to the strategic points it may contest at one time. It can never attack more than one point simultaneously.
**: see Starting Army for more details on how Starting Armies are calculated. Lord, King and Emperor AI get a flat bonus whatever the Starting Army level (Weak, Normal, Strong, Battle) so it is relatively bigger on Weak Starting Army.
Learn more about how the AI deals with Concealment.
Modding AI
In Title.rpk / AoW Global Settings:
- AI Cheat Bonus: determines the boost to defense and resistance of King and Emperor AI
- Domain Structure Min Distance (AI): minimum distance between domain structures (cities or Fortresses, actually cities only for AI) to allow their building
- Strategic AI Settings: contain a number of settings, among which:
- Max Cities More Than Human
- Max Cities More Than Human (King)
- Max Cities More Than Human (Emperor)
In the .rpk containing units (e.g. AoW_Dwarf.rpk), in the Entities tab, Units category (and not Figures category), tables such as this can be found regarding AI behaviours.
Parameter name | Parameter value | Help text from devs | Comment |
---|---|---|---|
* AI Settings | (TAIUnitSettings) | ||
** CombatValue Modifier | Usually 0 | Modifier added to the Combat Value (use for exotic combat abilities that can't be properly processed) | |
** Role | Combat, Constructor, Found City, or Ignore | The role the AI uses the unit for | |
** BuildFrequency | Never, Rare, Normal, or Often | Influences how often the AI will build units | [STRATEGIC AI] |
In AoW_UnitProperties.rpk, in the Settings tab, for each ability, in the "Effect" entry, tables such as this can be found regarding AI behaviours.
Parameter name | Parameter value | Help text from devs | Comment |
---|---|---|---|
* AI Allow Dispel | True/False | True if the AI should try and dispel this effect | |
* AI Is Positive | True/False | True if the effect is positive for the target unit, false otherwise. Used by AI during evaluation | |
* AI Mode | Ignore, Any Unit, Most Dangerous, In Most Danger, Resurgence, Sprint, War Cry, Any Non Paralized Unit | Mode the AI should use when deciding how to target the effect | Any Unit is used by Touch of Faith, ... |
* AI Morale Filter | 0 or other integer values | If above 0, then the target must have at least this morale, if the less than 0, it must have morale lower than this. | |
* AI Range Filter | All Units, Only Ranged Units, or Only Melee Units | Filter used by the AI to check if the effect should be used on ranged units, melee units or both | |
* AI Count Filter | Disabled, Need Multiple Enemies, Need Multiple Friendlies | Filter used by the AI to disable the effect based on how many units are in the battle | |
* AI Unit Health Mult | Float between 0 and 1 | Multiplier to apply to a unit's health, to get the AI score |