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Age Of Wonders 3 Wiki

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 Gold value About +310 Gold value
Happiness Base Happiness Boost No No 100 Happiness 200 Happiness 300 Happiness
Gold/Mana/Knowledge Income flat bonus No No +10 +20 +30
Gold/Production Income bonus for cities No No +33% +67% +100%
Mana/Knowledge Income bonus for cities No No No +25% +50%
Combat Boost vs Independents No No No +3 Defense / +2 Resistance +3 Defense / +2 Resistance
Machine Machine / Undead Undead Cheat Heal (In fog of war only) 0 0 2 Hit Points / Turn 4 Hit Points / Turn 8 Hit Points / Turn
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[]

Global settings[]

In Title.rpk / Settings / Settings / AoW Global Settings:

Parameter name Parameter value Help text from devs Comment
* 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
** Max Cities More Than Human
** Max Cities More Than Human (King)
** Max Cities More Than Human (Emperor
* Tactical AI Settings
** Kill Target Score Bonus 25 Bonus the AI adds to target evaluation score if it can kill a target unit or obstacle
** Die to Unit Score Penalty -30 Penalty the AI adds to target evaluation score if the actor will die attacking a target unit
** Out of Range Score Penalty -40 Penalty the AI adds to target evaluation score for each hex a unit is out of range
** Wall Climb Safe Distance 5 Min distance an ennemy has to be from a wall climbing posituion to not be considered a threat
** Wall Too Far Base Penalty 15 Score penalty given to walls that are too far to reach in one turn (should be positive)
** Wall Too Far Penalty 2 Score penalty given to walls that are too far to reach in one turn for each unit of distance they are too far (should be positive)
** Marked Wall Bonus 15 Score bonus to give to marked walls when using melee attacks
** Wall Damage Score Mult 50 Amount to damage obstacle wall damage proportion by to get a score
** Breached Wall Guard Bonus 10 Score bonus given to breached walls when evaluating which hexes needed to be guarded in siege defense
** Position Guarded Penalty -15 Score bonus added to a guarded position once a unit has been assigned to it
** Minimum Spell Effectiveness 1 Minimum cost effectiveness (score/mana cost) a spell must have before being cast
* Prioritization Settings (TTacticalAITargetPrioritizationSettings)
** Is Leader Bonus 1.5 Value to add to the multiplier if the target is a leader unit
** Is Hero Bonus 0.75 Value to add to the multiplier if the target is a hero unit
** Independent Hero Penalty -0.4 Value added if the target is a hero/leader and the player is independent
** Has Ranged Attack Bonus 0.2 Value to add to the multiplier if the target has a ranged attack
** Has Area Attack Bonus 0.3 Value to add to the multiplier if the target has an AoE attack
** Has Mind Control Bonus 0.3 Value to add to the multiplier if the target has a mind control attack
** High Threat Bonus 0.6 Value added to the highest threat unit
** Low Threat Bonus -0.6 Value subtracted to the lowest threat unit
** Flat Adjacency Bonus 0.2 Value added if the target is adjacent to any friendly unit
** Per Unit Adjacency Bonus 0.1 Value added for each friendly unit adjacent to the target
** Leader Adjacency Bonus 1 Value added if the target is adjacent to the leader
** Hero Adjacency Bonus 0.5 Value added if the target is adjacent to a hero
** Mind Controlled Override 0.2 If a unit is mind controlled, it will always use this value
** Mind Controlling Bonus 1 Value added to units that are mind controlling
** Caution Level Default 1.1 Default caution level to use for normal units
** Caution Level Leader 2.5 Caution multiplier to use for leaders
** Caution Level Hero 1.75 Caution multiplier to use for heroes
** Caution Level Mind Controlled 0.2 Caution multiplier to use for mind controlled units
** Ranged Attacker Melee Preference 0.4 Amount added to melee preference for units with ranged attacks
** Exploding Ranged Preference 0.7 Amount added to ranged preference for units which explode when killed
* Num Enemies Cast Spell Override: Hero 4 If there are this many enemies on the field will cast spells even if settings tell them not to
* Num Enemies Cast Spell Override: Leader 6 If there are this many enemies on the field, Leaders will cast spells even if settings tell them not to Does not seem to work: a Leader with only 1 spell, Stiffen Limbs edited to "Need multiple enemies", will not cast it even if 6 enemies are on the battlefield.
* Spell Choosing Random Spread 0.2 Size of the random spread applied to AI tactical spell casting to make it less predictable
* Guard After Use Score Bonus 6 Score bonus added to attacks made using abilities that cause a unit guard after using them
* War Cry Damage 3 Extra damage per melee blow when assessing if the system should use war cry
* Free Ability Ranged Attack Bonus 15 Score bonus for ranged attacks that are free actions


Units[]

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]


Abilities[]

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 Units who have at least one ranged attack (e.g. heroes and Leaders with their base weapon) are considered Ranged. It means if "Only Melee Units" is selected, heroes and Leaders are excluded from valid targets (except if they do not have any ranged attack items).
* AI Unit 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 "Multiple" apparently starts at 3
* AI Unit Health Mult Float between 0 and 1 Multiplier to apply to a unit's health, to get the AI score

Spells[]

In the .rpk containing spells (e.g. AoW_SpellTest.rpk), in Settings, several elements are listed for each spells.
In the Effect part, if the Effect is a Magic - TacticalUnit Effect: Property (e.g. for Skin of Oil), it has the same parameters as an "Effect" from an ability (see table above), including the "AI Unit Count Filter" parameter which can take the following values:

  • Disabled
  • Need Multiple Enemies (> 2)
  • Need Multiple Friendlies

Spells can have several effects listed in their Targeter so it might be possible to add such conditions to existing spells. However, some Targeters can use only a constrained list of Effects. For instance the Targeter of Great Reawakening cannot use Effect: Property elements.

In the Spell element, the parameter "Allow No Target Casting" could be set to FALSE to condition the casting of the spell to the presence of valid targets (and for instance prevent the casting of Greater Reawakening if only friendly machines are involved in the fight).

AI tactical decisions[]

AI tactical decisions are based on a AI score for each possible actions. These values are determined in a number of .rpk, depending on what the source of the action is (an ability, a spell?).

For spells, values come from:

  • For damage spells:
    • It is based on the damage, as for other damage-causing abilities. Bonuses like attacks on Leaders, heroes, or killing units should apply.
    • The minimum threshold to be cast is set in the Global Settings (Minimum Spell Effectiveness, set to 1 by default): [damage caused]/[mana cost of the spell] > 1
  • For individual debuff spells (e.g. Slayer's Doubt), an AI Unit Health Mult(iplier) is applied in the Effect to determine the AI score. For instance with a multiplier of 0.5, if the target unit has 100 HP, the score should be 50.
  • For battlefield spells like Blessing of Health, a AI Score Mult(iplier) is applied in the Combat property. Sometimes, the effect is hidden in the Active Abilities (in AoW_UnitProperties.rpk) or in other locations (for instance the effect of Revive Instinct is in AoW_UnitProperties.rpk / Settings / Active Abilities - Touch Mind Contrl / Feral Mount Effect on line 28).
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