Noone will even answer this but anyways...

[JollyGoodBork]

Okay, this game is broken. It's broken. Alliances mean nothing. At all. Improving your relationship with a nation is almost only about trading and getting ripped off. Like, you might be great friends, but sometimes I need to pay double price. And that won't even make them like me more.
The AI is retarded.

The 1936 scenario is always the same. Germany declares war on lithuania and finland.
There are no alliances. Britain won't ally anyone, not even france. Like, wtf. Great B in this game is like, "France wants a non aggression pact? Pay us 46 million!". And then suddenly their relationship with me is cordial.

You have ALL PREVIOUS TREATIES WITH ME. YOU ARE TECHNICALLY ALREADY MY ALLY. WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?

The AI never defends their allies. Because, why would they?

Modern day is inaccurate, both in warfare and diplomacy. Estonia is allied to Russia, right?

In cold war there is no NATO and no Warsawa. As the SU you cannot even install communists governments in other countries. Why?!

Nazi Germany defeats SU, China defeats Japan (within a year or so) and then UK and US invades Germany. EVERY TIME.

This game costs 28 euro btw.

[Kristijonas]

The game is not meant as a historical reconstruction or precise imitation. I enjoy it when everything happens ahistorically.

However, I agree with you that AI is dumb and its actions do not appear to have a good reason. Wars started by AI make no sense. For example Belarus declaring war on France/Spain..? And as you mentioned, many wars almost always end the same (china wins over Japan) which gets tiresome. I would like this game to be closer to Europa Universalis where countries make decision to go to war based on many factors (claim to lands, military strenght, economy strenght, common borders, allies, resources). Here it is much dumber I'm afraid. The game is still great and worth the money though in my opinion. Just could use some easy fixes for these dumb AI problems.

[JollyGoodBork]

The game is not meant as a historical reconstruction or precise imitation. I enjoy it when everything happens ahistorically.

However, I agree with you that AI is dumb and its actions do not appear to have a good reason. Wars started by AI make no sense. For example Belarus declaring war on France/Spain..? And as you mentioned, many wars almost always end the same (china wins over Japan) which gets tiresome. I would like this game to be closer to Europa Universalis where countries make decision to go to war based on many factors (claim to lands, military strenght, economy strenght, common borders, allies, resources). Here it is much dumber I'm afraid. The game is still great and worth the money though in my opinion. Just could use some easy fixes for these dumb AI problems.

This is definately a game with great potential, however, the AI feels very dumb given the size and cost of the game.
You listed all the things that I think they should take into consideration (apart from the strategic importance of certain countries ).
I also think the surrender mechanic should be redone, so that japan and SU at least don't give up to their in real life inferior enemies.

The difference between this game and europa universalis is also not only that their AI is very smart, but that by randomizing their rivals and quests by the beginning of the game, every game is special.

If you've played their hearts of iron you know that their games play out somewhat realisticly, even IF Germany wins, it'll be because the AI's have been thinking slightly different than their real life counterparts.
In this game, some things are missing. I don't even think winter/ lack of supply can be deadly. Those are things that made the SU win.

So I think that all this game nees is a smart AI, diplomacey and alliances that matter and finally a lot of balancing and testong so that Japan, China and France can do a difference.

Sorry if I was a bit harsh before, I didn't mean to insult this game.

[Nerei]

I think these images summarises the problem with the 2nd Sino-Japanese war as presented in this game pretty well.





Notice how little is actually directly under the direct control of the Nationalist Kuomintang. Many of the areas added as shown on the 2nd map would really just be considered colonies or allies in game mechanics not actual territorial gains.

The problem is that the nationalist Kuomintang is basically one big blob that Japan has to fight while in reality China was far from a unified nation. A large part of the nation was a group of warring warlords that would not put up a unified effort against the Japanese invasion due to a lot of reasons like mutual mistrust and opportunism. Then there is the communists to throw into the mix.

China should partially unify (some alliances etc. not unification) once Japan attacks but until that point there should be a lot of internal strife and potentially quite a few small wars.

That is really the essence of the problem. Japan faces a fully unified China which is quite ahistorical.


With regards to 1936-1941 Europe I have no idea how accurate the setup actually is. That part of the war has never really had my interest but if it has the same level of problems that might be half the problem.


I agree that the AI could do with improvements and together with more diplomacy and UI improvements is probably highest on my wish-list. Unfortunately making a consistently good AI that can handle as complex scenarios as this game throws at it is no small feat.

With BG's limited resources I hope they mainly prioritise that kind of improvements and leave balancing like the setup of the 2nd Sino-Japanese war to the modders (I know ideally that should also be done by the dev but I do not expect them to even remotely have the resources to do both).

With regard to trade from what I can tell it is mainly down their opinion of you not what deals you already have with them. If you are allied with them but they still do not really like you they will not offer that good deals.

[JollyGoodBork]

I think these images summarises the problem with the 2nd Sino-Japanese war as presented in this game pretty well.





Notice how little is actually directly under the direct control of the Nationalist Kuomintang. Many of the areas added as shown on the 2nd map would really just be considered colonies or allies in game mechanics not actual territorial gains.

The problem is that the nationalist Kuomintang is basically one big blob that Japan has to fight while in reality China was far from a unified nation. A large part of the nation was a group of warring warlords that would not put up a unified effort against the Japanese invasion due to a lot of reasons like mutual mistrust and opportunism. Then there is the communists to throw into the mix.

China should partially unify (some alliances etc. not unification) once Japan attacks but until that point there should be a lot of internal strife and potentially quite a few small wars.

That is really the essence of the problem. Japan faces a fully unified China which is quite ahistorical.


With regards to 1936-1941 Europe I have no idea how accurate the setup actually is. That part of the war has never really had my interest but if it has the same level of problems that might be half the problem.


I agree that the AI could do with improvements and together with more diplomacy and UI improvements is probably highest on my wish-list. Unfortunately making a consistently good AI that can handle as complex scenarios as this game throws at it is no small feat.

With BG's limited resources I hope they mainly prioritise that kind of improvements and leave balancing like the setup of the 2nd Sino-Japanese war to the modders (I know ideally that should also be done by the dev but I do not expect them to even remotely have the resources to do both).

With regard to trade from what I can tell it is mainly down their opinion of you not what deals you already have with them. If you are allied with them but they still do not really like you they will not offer that good deals.

Given their resources and all, I think that we'll have to give up the warlords, sadly. But I don't think they're the largest problem when it comes to China being too unified and strong.
I think it's the fact that they've excluded the chinese civil war. Those warlords were maybe loyal to China, but the communists certainly were not. The way the actual map of China looked like at the 1936 start date is like this:

Please include the civil war in the next patch! The only thing that wouldn't work would be loyalty, but that system needs to be changed anyways. When the czech people aren't loyal to Czechoslovakia something is goofy.

[zapatista]

China overrunning Japan all the time was a bit annoying, so I decided to play as Japan to see what the problem might be. I think that lack of military goods that result in poor supply might be the case. To test this, I started a new campaign for Yugoslavia, cheated myself tons of military goods and started dumping them to Japan. Result: Japan conquers most of China within a year before running out of reserve troops (I suppose), and China is forced to sign a peace treaty with Mengjiang, which was reduced to the capital and its surroundings by that time. I'd have seen what happened next if not for pesky Germans invading and conquering me within like a week.

So for future updates, I'd suggest beefing up Japan's military goods production capabilities and increasing their reserves.

[YoMomma]

So for future updates, I'd suggest beefing up Japan's military goods production capabilities and increasing their reserves.

Yes also noticed this few years back, pretty weird knowing the power of the Japanese in WW2, but im no expert. It hurts Japan greatly tho.

[YoMomma]

The problem with China is prolly because limit of nations, colony or not. So i dont think devs can create more nations, else they would have done it. Prolly limitation of the game engine which cant be changed at this time of development (altho we need alpha smily besides beta haha, im playing alpha game now which is way more finished then this one).

[Rhaycen]

If you start the game without troops China will almost always beat Japan the huge size of the nation just lets it produce more raw troops (loads of elite guards), if you start the game with troops then Japan will win about 50/50 ...

Sorta like how if you start without troops, and start as France it is almost like cheating. Because you should be able to take out Italy & Germany at 90-100% CB and conquer most of Europe in the process without breaking a sweat.

[JollyGoodBork]

If you start the game without troops China will almost always beat Japan the huge size of the nation just lets it produce more raw troops (loads of elite guards), if you start the game with troops then Japan will win about 50/50 ...

Sorta like how if you start without troops, and start as France it is almost like cheating. Because you should be able to take out Italy & Germany at 90-100% CB and conquer most of Europe in the process without breaking a sweat.

Then why do it?

Also, how did you cheat up a lot of mil goods? I though you could only cheat money?

Also, do remember that the Japanese AI maybe just sold the military goods away and bought something else instead. So it may not be the military goods after all.

I heard that the SSR AI could also defeat Germany if they had military goods, but the tests I've done haven't shown any difference.

The reason why france falls is because they don't put any garrisond in their gun emplacements, making it possible for Germany to just capture them - aka they're useless. How about at least in the 39 starting date and the batttle over france campaign you put garrisond in there at start? Also, the French army isn't at the north and south east borders, that's where they should be located

[merlinx_at]

The game is not meant as a historical reconstruction or precise imitation. I enjoy it when everything happens ahistorically.

However, I agree with you that AI is dumb and its actions do not appear to have a good reason. Wars started by AI make no sense. .... I would like this game to be closer to Europa Universalis where countries make decision to go to war based on many factors (claim to lands, military strenght, economy strenght, common borders, allies, resources). Here it is much dumber I'm afraid. The game is still great and worth the money though in my opinion. Just could use some easy fixes for these dumb AI problems.

+1