Game too easy?

[Panzer987]

Love the game, but it's just too easy playing against AI all the way to the "MAJOR ADVANTAGE" option. I've never won the game with the advantage all the way tilted to the enemy unless I play as Axis without the oil option (which I really never do anyway).

The problem is that as you increase the difficulty level, it doesn't appear that the AI gets much better. The only real difference you see is that the enemy winds up having huge (and totally unrealistic) manpower advantages and a major-league industrial complex that will never be rivaled. At one point on "major advantage," the USSR had something like a 250% war effort against my 95%. Even with nearly every Soviet city wiped out, they held on by dumping their ridiculous resources into more and more corps until eventually I had no more men left to fight.

[Panzer987]

Coincidentally, with the exception of the "major advantage" setting, I've won as both Axis and Allies fairly easily. Thy only real difficult option is to try and win by sacking both Ottawa and Washington DC prior to a mid-1945 end date using that option.

In the "game ends in 1945" scenario, the highest level by which I've sacked every Allied country is "even."

[Ryben]

As someone may (and will) reply you: "CEAW only really shines when playing against other human"

We had discussions about this issue some time ago, check previous post to know quite different points of view about this.

Don´t become too pasionate!

[IainMcNeil]

As this is such a complex game the AI is never going to be able to take on a human player one on one so it needs production advantages to take on experienced players. Even in simple games like chess the AI can always be beaten and we're a long way from having an AI that can learn any set of game rules.

[firepowerjohan]

The thing is, in every wargame I play at "normal difficulty" I always beat the AI often first time I play or after a few times I beat it consistently. Unfortunately, it is not unique for CEAW. The bigger the map and the bigger the maneuvers the easier it is to find tricks to beat the AI to the punch that is just the way it is in the early 21st century

One important note also is that many games have inflation in their "normal" diffculty where AI gets significant bonuses already and so it may correspond to the "minor advantage" setting in CEAW. Sort of like the american "Small" soda was medium, the "Medium" was large and the "Large" made you over weight

When you play RTS for example, a lot of players need 3-4 AI enemies vs you so a 3:1 or 4:1 or more ratio in order for them to be able to beat you. 1:1 you always blow up the enemy without any problem. I do not know if the comparison was the best but

These games are RTS so it is different but it still shows a significant problem that even bigger mass market games have AI problems vs a human. It is possible to compensate a game for being "better" in AI vs human play. For the RTS game it can be designed so that reaction times is a bigger impact on result since AI are lightning quick (as can in Blitz chess). In turn based it is also possible to change the rules of the games so they are very lenient and rely a lot on random factors so that the AI can make mistakes (for example out of supply units do not get much penalty) and not pay so much for them. Also, if scale is differently and diplomacy is in to have a few important rolls change the battle entirely (like the Warsaw roll in Third Reich where a bad result wiped out all attackers) or a diplomacy where suddenly USSR attack Germany in 1940 abruptly changing the situation. These changes and/or hidden cheats where AI do not follow the same rules as a human (for example hidden research or battle bonuses) can create the illusion that the AI is smarter than what it. The end result is the same regardless if we call it "normal" or "hard" difficulty. Some of the games using these compensations fall apart once you play them, in multiplayer since all they were meant to be was a guided tour through history. CEAW is a proof that the gameplay is solid since in multiplayer it is even better. A side effect or good effect of sound design.

CEAW was made as good as we could possibly make it during the projected time we had for finishing the game, both in single- and multiplayer.

[Fastheinz]

Just make sure the game is fun...

[firepowerjohan]

Just make sure the game is fun...

Well said, that's our goal

[Panzer987]

Just make sure the game is fun...

Well said, that's our goal

Well, the game is definately fun. That's the reason I've played it enough to make it easy for me to win on just about any setting. In that regard, mission accomplished!

[Panzer987]

As for multi-player, that method of game play just takes too much time for me. The AI makes me frustrated waiting for all of their moves in the middle of the war, so waiitng on a person for the same moves is too much for me to handle.

It's not that it's bad, or even a problem, it's just not for me. Given the ease of playing against AI, I'd rather deal with that set of issues and save the time.

[borsook79]

As for multi-player, that method of game play just takes too much time for me. The AI makes me frustrated waiting for all of their moves in the middle of the war, so waiitng on a person for the same moves is too much for me to handle.

It's not that it's bad, or even a problem, it's just not for me. Given the ease of playing against AI, I'd rather deal with that set of issues and save the time.

I don't think human player needs that much more time for turn. Rather that we have other things to be done and cannot play as often as AI. That said it would be of course great to get an improved AI (as the current one can be improved) but the one that we have now is not that terrible, and as you said yourself is challenging with big enough advantage, whether we like the way that challenge is achieved or not.