Just as an update, a few more things that i have observed.

Im now strength rank 1, and my allies are still around what they were before. Still cant confederate. So something is clearly broken. I've had to result to saving, turning off your mod, confederating them, and then re-enabling your mod.

I've also noticed that the AI has a weird habit of declaring war on factions absolutely miles away. Just now, i had the Sanyo Clan (IEE Faction, east of Cathay on Nippon) declare war on a greenskin faction near kharak eight peaks. Im their only ally. Neither me, nor them, have any territory or armies nearby. I obviously have no way of testing to see if it is your mod specifically, or DeepWarAI that is doing this, as the AI seems to do slightly different things when you re-load an endturn save.

(Also now that i think about it, i've only ever seen the AI Confederate another AI faction only twice in this whole campaign so far, and all of that was earlier on, before turn 20 or so.)

Just as some extra context.

Im playing as Miao Ying, i have 64 settlements and 20 armies.
The weakest AI faction i can confederate has 3 settlements, with 13 armies.
Its turn 43. I am strength rank 19, they are rank 131.

"Join Confederation" has an AI opinion of -259:
Baseline Evaluation: -200
Relative Faction Strength: +66.5
Diplomatic Prospects: -125 (havent seen it improve any further than this)
Distance: -0.5

When i disable your mod and load that same save...


"Join Confederation" has an AI opinion of +30.4:
Baseline Evaluation: -30
Relative Faction Strength: +60.4
Diplomatic Prospects: 0

Like, i've had to use the "Trade Any settlement" mod just to maintain an economy without going to war with my allies, because even something as simple as purchasing a settlement is IMPOSSIBLE with this mod enabled, if said settlement has a barracks. Like,they literally do not want to sell it to you, no matter how much gold you want to give them.


I've also noticed that, with DeepwarAI, the AI will field so many armies that they will actually go bankrupt and a lot of their armies will take attrition due to desertion, resulting in the AI clustering 10+ armies around their capital just to replenish the attrition.

Diplomacy (Namely trading settlements and confederations) is certainly the largest problem however. I've not observed the AI for long enough to see if Desertion is a constant issue, or just something they experience for a few turns every now and then.

With Deepwar AI, this mod make confederation almost IMPOSSIBLE.

For reference...

With no AI mods - I have +27 in the diplomacy screen for the weakest faction i can confederate.
With JUST DeepWar AI - I have +30, again with the weakest faction.
With Deepwar AI + This mod - I have -297 (in the red) for the AI wanting to confederate.

That is quite frankly hilarious. Something must be broken, surely?
This is with me having almost 30 more settlements than them (They only have 2).

Deepwar + this mod already allows the AI, with a single settlement, to field 10-20 armies. I really dont think this mod should be touching the diplomacy ON TOP OF all that.

Updated recommendation to use DeepWar AI instead of Hecleas's. https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2978779730

Reworked a chunk of the mod, several changes and one notable of them is that it should rectify, when used with hecleas, AI stagnating around cities

Removed several no longer needed db entries/tables
Added entries from my internal group difficulty mod to my public facing four

great. started a new campaign with all 3 of those mods + buffed ai units slightly + buffed enemy lords + a mod that makes ai use better units in their armies + set enemy faction's potential high with Jadawyn's Unnatural Selection + garrison mod + an auto resolve mod... on very hard + hard difficulty

hopefully now no easy steamrolling with MarineCarmine's norscan berserkers & huskarls + my Wulfrik mod(which gives him Archaon's animations, his burning sword and eyes which look really cool on Masked Mustachios's Wulfrik Reskin + more mass and regeneration) hopefully AI will attack my garrisoned settlements too and hopefully end turns won't get super long lol

You can certainly increase enemy army/unit attributes, would definitely increase the challenge the AI presents in battle. It will also increase AI AR favor for battles, you'll likely end up having to fight more battles out. Buffing units won't have an effect per say on "aggression" or how "powerful" they are.

I recommend the following mods to achieve desired results:
Hecleas's AI Overhaul
My Aggressive AI Personalities mod
NNOBBs - Never obsolete AI lords and heroes

This of course would not increase "AI Stats" aside from increasing the rate at which AI lords/heros accrue XP. If you would still want AI stat increases, can simply use the in-game slider to make those adjustments

oh thanks for the info. i guess i'll stay away from these difficulty mods for now then..

do you think if i just buff up ai armies, their units and their lords... it would have the same effect in terms of how aggressive and powerful ai factions are?

@drunk - I removed that is increased in SFO and a mod author posted a 'pool size' mod that does just that. It is more so that if you want that feature - it is optional now through another author. Though if desired I can certainly add it back with no problems.

@888 An unfortunate side effect of the AI having more armies is indeed longer turn times. We can't make the AI 'smarter' in some areas, so have to make up for that lack of intelligence with brute force and numbers. I don't see that changing anytime soon, maybe one day we'll have a truly challenging AI that doesn't require cheats up the wazoo and multiple armies just to take on one player army due to CHEESE

with this mod end turns take really long i'm guessing... cause with the low upkeep ai has more armies and is recruiting more heroes etc

on that note I also did not see the "+Increased pool size for lord and hero recruiting, as well as increasing the frequency of new ones entering the pool" unless you are doing it a different way. The way I know of is in - campaign variables - min_total_recruitment_pool_entries recruitment_pool_entries_per_category

Updated and added growth. Yeah without a growth boost the AI will def lag behind. The economy boons to the AI are in part necessary, upkeep being one of the most important ones. Upkeep determines how many armies the AI recruits (if it has the money to do so). There is a side effect of this that you can play real estate with the AI and rank in the dough. I have a fix for it - overrides to specific DB tables but it will conflict mods that alter the same, I'll probably just upload that as an optional submod

Is there a reason why you are not giving the AI bonus growth as well? I used to buff the AI the way your doing and I guess im going to start again because I dont trust the SFO buffs anymore when im #1 strength rank in like 10 turns. I thought the SFO buffs might have been enough with their per faction balance but campaigns are just not unfolding how I want them to. Not so sure about the blatant -75% or -50% to everything but im just going to try it with minimal tweaking on my part for now. Also a thought, I always set the immortality skill unlock to like level 9 or something otherwise all AI agents and lords will just die. Really love tha tyou take away the stalk stance btw, I didn't know how to do that myself.

Thank you very much Zach

Reverted the change! Lmk if the issue persists, should be immediately apparent that it was reverted

Hello! Indeed I did, it was more so catered to the higher tiers where the AI is swimming in dosh. I'll revert the change for this one

Hello friend, the first thing is that I love your mods and I use them all the time but since your last update something strange has happened that didn't happen a week or two ago. I've been using a mod for years to remove the "a lot of traders penalty" and it has stopped working. Have you changed any diplomatic or economic value in the last update? thank you fot your work.

Updated for 5.1

Lowered AI winds regen by half (From 1 to 0.5)
Tidied up/removed some non-pertinent tables

Lowered bonus starting army cap for humans from 5 -> 1 (Only affects Tomb Kings, Nakai, and Beastmen).

Updated some tables
Tweaks to rebel armies
Corrected research bonus tables for AI
Removed tables that conflict with Hecleas's AI Overhaul
Cleaning and Polishing
Updated "required" mods list
This and that, yadda yadda

Absolutely, entirely safe to switch between any of them at any time

"Mid-Save Safe Remove? Unlikely"

Is it safe to switch between your difficulty mods mid-save? For example, switching from Light -> Hard.

Thank you!

Updated for 5.x
Agents will no longer perform actions on campaign map, will instead embed (mostly, some outliers)
Removed AI attack decision making tables, please be sure to subscribe to Hecleas's Ultra Aggressive AI mod

Corrected AI "Blobbing" where they would idle at settlements/capitals and do nothing else

Effects should be immediate (1-2) turns. At most should take no longer than 5 turns to show results

No update necessary! For a more 'curated' experience, please use my 'tailored' difficulty mod linked below. It has more adjustments to it than these, I will update these with those adjustments I just haven't gotten around to it yet.

Does it need an update?¿
Your mod looks pretty good and im willing to try it.

I've just unhid and updated the description for my 'tailored' difficulty mod.
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3046687417
I'd say its on the level of hard - very hard depending upon what you set the campaign difficulty to.
The tailored mod has more alterations/adjustments in it than what my four standard difficulty mods have.

Sizeable update:

Reintroduced Domain and Decision policy tables (Encourages AI to make best choices it can based on its situation(s))

Adjusted income allocation tables to encourage AI to spend its dosh, as it is usually swimming in it

REMOVED RESTRICTIONS disabling AI agent campaign actions - (Messed with AI special agent actions like doom engineers and etc). If you wish for agents to be disabled, please subscribe to an agent mod that does just that

Updated lightning strike disabling tables

Uh that is definitely not my mod(s) doing that. I do not alter human player agent caps + this mod is scriptless and in no way can have that effect to cause heros to be recruited for the player

In just one turn，I suddenly had five more heroes and agents, but I didn't produce them, and they just popped up around my capital. It's just like the way Ai produce them.

Reduced bonus agent cap for AI. This will not undo the agents currently active on the map for the AI (not retroactive). Now the starting cap is the same from easy to hard.

I'm not quite sure I follow the second part about agents popping up around your city(s)? Are these your heros/agents or the AI's? Nothing I have changes hero caps/recruitment for human players

There are too many heroes and Agents from the Ai, and they constantly produce new ones in every turn. The most absurd thing is that there will also be a large number of heroes and Agents popping up around my city!I didn't produce them！

Alright, thanks for your answer, I'm gonna test that, and if I see issues, I'll report to you ;)

That is a good question, I would lean towards no. I've pulled most of the "AI" behavior tables from my mods, and leave that up to more knowledged modders like Hecleas

So should be safe, I'm not quite sure what "tables" are not working with empires expanded

Hello Zach!
I'm gonna try a campaign with your mod, but when I see Hecleas's mod description it says that AI mods are broken by Immortal Empires Expanded, do you know if your mod is concerned?

4.x Update, minor content changes. Removed overlapping tables with Hecleas's mods, now there are no conflicts

Due to the current state of Warhammer 3 and that every 'patch' they drop breaks more stuff - currently no desire to continue modding as of this moment

This *DOES NOT* mean I will not support my published mods. I am unsure which ones have been impacted and need attention, if any issues are noticed please do not hesitate to let me know so I can look into and rectify them

TLDR
I'm in maintenance mode for a while

GOOD, THANKS.

TONIGHT

UPDATE WHEN???

Posted, was a minor revision. Just 'undid' the last update which was just a tweaking to diplomacy money values between player and AI

Changelog when???

ok,I know what you mean,''keep things fresh'' and more randomness,i agree with that.
Thanks for your reply!

In this, minor and major factions have the same 'potential' set thus they are on even playing fields. So its not odd to see a minor faction beat and wipe out a major one (keeps things fresh). I'll make an adjustment to increase potential for major factions and and a small reduction to minor ones

Thanks, this is a fun mod and i use this mod over 20 hours with my friend.
but i think legendary factions are too weak. even weaker than minor faction.
maybe can increase legendary faction potential or decrease minor faction potential.

Returned hero recruitment back to normal, was giving undesired effects

Added Hecleas's Ultra Aggressive AI mod + FiftyTifty's AI diplo contact and war dec mods

They are *NOT* required, but I strongly recommend them as they work in tandem with each other and this mod

Created a submod to re-enable lightning strike and stalk stance with my difficulty mods for those who want it - https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2964263894