Grognard_JC

This mod is a very big surprise to me. I thought there would be no mod on the game. Congratulations ! I'm going to test it as soon as I can ! Thank you for your time and efforts !

Hopefully, next game will be about the Napoleonic Wars, and this time it will be multiplayer.

Excellent !

I had to show up and say someting here.

I read your post, but before starting discussiing it there are 2 important informations I need from you : 1) At what level of difficulty are you considering the issue ? (It's a question of challenge all in all, and you cannot simply ask the AI to adjust to the human brain) 2) Your propositions.

At long last I had the occasion to play the game. Legendary ofc. Wooooow ! First battle as CSA : defeat : one of the artilleries just fled away and got behind a line of yankee, and I was too exhausted to reach it in time. EXCELLENT! At the beginning of the battle, I sent my skirmisher unit far forward to intercept the two infantry units coming from the west. Guess what ? The AI took its own infantry unit (that usualy camps in the fort all the battle long) and brought it out to counter push me. So my skirmishers where on the moon while my two columns were having a hard time in the wood trying to overcome the enemy skirmishers. This was really great, as I had got bored of playing this battle again and again with the same tactic. I tried a second run and, while playing more cautiously, I achieved victory. Normaly, even on hard, I should have ended up capturing ALL enemy units. With legendary on, I had to play CAUTIOUSLY & to camp the fort at all cost, while micromanaging the cavalry unit to make (unsuccesful yet diverting) raids on the enemy artillery and general. I lost 2411 out of my 4000 men, nearing 2/3 army casualty for the first battle. At long last, challenge is here, and you definitely feel you'll have to play cautious, avoiding to push your advantage too much. And I love that. Thank you Darth.

I think this has aready been mentioned in several topics. But, I agree with Mr Larp.

I woke up this morning and I had the feeling something had happened here. Hell ! Yeah ! I definitely need to give it a try! God, I surely missed lot of stuff since december !

@Slaithium : You are asking for a "better" AI because you do not like the idea of having challenge come from cheer "bonuses" given to the AI's troops. Fine. But, for real, you cannot blame Darth for this, or maybe you do not know what he has achieved, even before he started working for Game Labs. He is a king of AI. Most games have crap AIs. AIs are scripts mate. The more scripts you put in, the more weird the AI behaves. You have to be a very patient Magician to find an AI that works. And NO, it's not "easy" to create a "better" AI. It would cost tones of money of developpement that even SEGA is not willing to pay !!! The best AIs I know on the video game markets are in CK2, EU4, Naval Action and UGCW. No wonder these are niche games. If you want to ask the devs something they can ACTUALLY make real, so that you get a real challenge from a good "AI", just ask them to put the Multiplayer mode in. This way, the game will be much more challenging, without cheats.

Thank you for this beta. I really will give it a go (but I'm really busy these days -Christmas !). Is it supposed to be plyaed on Normal or Hard ? - Edit : I found the solution. Whatever !

I cannot connect to steam for some reason. I'm eager to try the news fixes. I got the feeling this will bring more challenge.

They are currently the best indeed. What's more, they deal more damage being several squads of 4 howitzers than a big bunch of them in a single squad.

Alright. Just finished the CSA "hard" campaign. I like the AI, mostly, though it is way too cautious IMO. At Fredericksburg, it never tried to outflank me in the North though there was a great opportunity to do so. Ofc, this is close to history, but the whole battle was hardly a challenge. I lost 7k against 70k mostly watching. I don't know how the AI works but here are two suggestions : The AI should be able to to check local superiority and take the decision to charge in. There are often instances where the AI is 10vs1 against a fortified point which it could easily overrun by mass charging. The AI should make checks on fortifications. When the enemy holds like 4-5 full units in fortifications, the AI should try to outmaneuver the thing, mostly. Playing HARD campaign feels more like playing like NORMAL in the new system. Overall, I recall the 0.68 campaign was harder. It's my first CSA campaign with 100% Victories. Very addictive game. My wife hates me because of you Darth !

Just won Antietam in my current CSA hard campaign. Just a thought. At one point, the AI could have pressed its advantage and crush me, but it did not. I really get the feeling the AI is way way too cautious now and will pull back whenever it is faced with the slightest flanking threat, prohibiting it from taking actual BIG actions that matter, like taking a Victory location. This said, the AI now redirects its troops here an there to test where you have the least resistance, so there's good and bad in the change. I'm just a bid sad the AI does not seize the advantage of overhelming superiority when it can. At Antietam center, I should have lost, had the AI dared to charge. IThe battle felt a bit like in previous to patch 0.68 game, when units would stack forever in front of an obstacle. Aaah, anyway that's just an AI (though a very good one) and not a human player. This would be crazy against a human! Oh, and I keep winning and winning. The new system seems to make me snowballing, the more you win the easier it gets to win each next fight. Well, that's maybe not that bad, I can't imagine what I would have face at Antitetam if I had not won the previous fights before... LoL ! Very hard game mode, where are you ?

Ahaha I almost lost 2nd Bull Run because of the new winning conditions !

For my units. You're right. The enemy hardly surrenders. Fine.

My first impressions on the new update : Great work as always. Morale has somehow changed a bit, as my units tend to surrender more often, almost systematically in bad conditions. Now you have to watch out. As CSA hard campaign, the small battles are now tougher. It's no longer possible to chase/destroy the AI as it is too strong. 1st Bull Run was harder than previously, though not too hard, the AI did not concentrate on Henry Hill, so I kept her busy here and there forever. My first win ever on Shiloh as the CSA. I supposed you fixed the Hornest Nest instant battle end bug. It really felt epic chasing the Yankees trying to withdraw. The CSA new "uniforms" could be a bit more polished I suppose. Custom battle mode seems to work alright, this is a very interesting feature if you are to go multiplayer. Enemy units stuck behind your lines really need to be dealt with. It's a real pain for the game. Oh and maybe, you could add a VERY-hard campaign mod next time. I'd really love to lose a campaign. What's more, you have to delete "restart" button if playing in such mode.

It's not purposely wrong built. It's about the possibilities the game gives me about the perks. If the game was perfect, it should be a very hard choice whenever you'd have to spend 1 perk point, that's all. As you said it, now AO is only about keeping up the pace with the battles getting bigger. So what about disabling AO anyway ? Army scaling screws it altogether. Last but not least, my experiment shows the army scaling is more about the number of brigades you bring than the number of men you bring. So the worst choice you'd make with army sclaing, in its current state, would be : Not to max each of your regiment to max your number of regiments to max Army Organization Take that ! Koro !

All in all, Army Organization isn't worth the spending because of army scaling. I tested it to be sure. So something needs to be done about it (and Reco as well)

This is TOTALLY NOT my point Koro. In this same very thread I complained the campaign as CSA was too easy going with full VETERANCY. I completely crushed the AI at Antientam that way ! (By the way, it only got 75 000 men this time) SO : This fourth run was a TEST to see how ARMY ORGANIZATION was balanced. It's not well balanced compared to other perks. Imho, ALL perks should weight the same in the campaign. You should get equivalent, but not same benefits from them. My test just proved HOW Army Organization is NOT worth the spending in the current game version. I'm very sad I had to clear my point to you Koro. I thought you'd be among those who'd get the point.

Hello guys. I just found time to finish my CSA campaign at Antitentam with Full Army Organization focus. The goal was to max the number of units I could get. Hard difficulty. So I was able to bring together 4 corps into battle. 1 veteran, 1 average, 2 recruits. I don't know what happened (I got wipped too fast maybe ?) but the reserve corp NEVER entered the battle. Maybe it's a bug ? The Union was SO NUMEROUS (minimum brigade strength is around 2600 while I oculd not bring more than 1000 men/brigade) and SO STRONG (2-3 stars everywhere). It was complete disaster. I got completely wiped, and I really tried y best. The AI deployed more than 130 000 men, while I deployed 48 000 (according to the battle result) of which I did not see one full corps of 13 000 men. I totally got wipped. Think of it : 130 000 against 35 000 !!! This is it, maxing Army Organization is the way to make the game MUCH harder. I you want less challenge, just play soft and max out Veteran and politic/economy. Hope the next patch will help things balance.

I haven't read of it neither.

80/100 = 4/5 which means we totally agree. My guess 1/5th was the dissolution point.

With fields o smokes moving...

Hi guys, simple question. At what point will a unit break apart ? This is a very important thing to know in fact, as you always want your units to survive battles. I'd say any unit will break apart when it reaches a number under 1/5th of its starting battle strength. Hence a 2500 brigade will disapear only when downed to 499. ut a small unit starting at 250 will only break under 49 men. Is that it ?