Archers and decoys in MP - questions to experienced players

[Corwin]

Hi guys,

I've been away from Dom3 for a long time, so my memory of it is a bit rusty. Please help me to refresh in when it comes to using archers and decoys. I have several questions on this subject. Please only answer them if you are reasonably sure if you are right - there seem to be a lot of confusion about it, based upon my brief inquiry in dominions IRC and getting conflicting answers there. The questions are roughly ordered from the simplest to the more complicated ones.

(Note that all these situations are related to MP games when your opponent is using decoy targets against your archers)


1. When set to "fire at *target type*" (say cavalry), will your units fire at the closest available cavalry unit? What if there are no cavalry in range - will they instantly lock onto the closest one (decoy) even if it is outside their range, or will they advance forward for several turns until they will be within shooting range of *some* cavalry unit (which by that time may or may not be the original decoy unit), and only *after that* would they lock on that target? Or will they choose a random group of cavalry from among those on battlefield? Or, of there are few cavalry groups are already available withing shooting range, will your archers choose the largest/less protected one (maximizing damage, as with spells targeting), or will they always choose closest one? Or is it random as well?


2. Once group of archers chooses the target - will they always keep firing into it until either them or the target are dead/routed? (the "locking" effect)


3. If "target locking" indeed always happens - when does it take place - the moment the battle begins, or the moment *your* first turn in battle begins? (obviously when you are an attacker the later happens after the former, since defender acts/moves first). So the depending on when exactly "target locking" occurs the closest unit (to the attacker) could be different one before and after defender would move.


4. In MP, people use archer decoys of all the time. Sometimes they use decoy on "guard commander" order. This can be very nasty, since if I understand game mechanics correctly, *all* you archers (set at either (where decoy belongs to that type) ) *will* get "locked" on this decoy target. (is it indeed so?) And when the target retreats toward its commander, who stays in the back, all your archers would rush forward, usually right in the middle of the enemy melee troops, where they get promptly massacred.

Is this indeed the case? And if so, how powerful/popular is this tactic (archer decoy on "guard commander" order) in MP games?


5. Assuming number 4 is true, how do you script and position your archers when you have to fight against opponent who uses such "decoy on guard" tactic?


6. IIRC, in the past, when I've dealt with elaborate anti-archers scripting such as those above, I usually set my archers on "fire" without specifying targets. When this happens, how will your archers choose target? Will they fire at random target in range? If so, will they "lock" on it? Does the size/protection of the enemy group matters? Or is it completely random? If it is random - will your archers always chose target in range, or can they choose target outside its range, and rush toward it? Finally what do they do if you gave them this order and there is no target in range - will they advance forward until they will get in range? If so, what would prevent them from locking on target decoy once again - situation I am naturally trying to avoid.

7. If the "fire" order chooses completely random target, then such scripting makes your entire archer force *much* less efficient and very unpredictable. Are there any better counters to the archer decoys in MP, especially - archer decoys that retreat toward the back because of "guard commander" orders?


Sorry for a long post. Any tips, comments and advice is highly appreciated. Thank you!

[Baalz]

The AI targeting is a little bit fuzzy, which is probably why you get some confusion on this. Against very straightforward deployments (PD, indies) you'll get consistent behavior, but once you get a whole lot of different stuff milling around things get a lot less predictable. The archer AI is different (and generally inferior) to the mage targeting AI (which chooses its target based on potential damage inflicted).

Also, note there is a bit of squishiness sometimes with archers firing at all. Under some conditions (I'm not entirely clear what those are) they will advance rather than firing even when they have ammo and a valid target is in range. One obvious time this happens is if enemies are close enough for them to run up and immediately engage in melee. I've seen it happen though when there is no obvious reason.

Originally Posted by Corwin

1. When set to "fire at *target type*" (say cavalry), will your units fire at the closest available cavalry unit? What if there are no cavalry in range - will they instantly lock onto the closest one (decoy) even if it is outside their range, or will they advance forward for several turns until they will be within shooting range of *some* cavalry unit (which by that time may or may not be the original decoy unit), and only *after that* would they lock on that target? Or will they choose a random group of cavalry from among those on battlefield? Or, of there are few cavalry groups are already available withing shooting range, will your archers choose the largest/less protected one (maximizing damage, as with spells targeting), or will they always choose closest one? Or is it random as well?

They will choose the closest group and fire at it until it routes or they can't. At that point they will drop back to "fire closest".

Originally Posted by Corwin

2. Once group of archers chooses the target - will they always keep firing into it until either them or the target are dead/routed? (the "locking" effect)

Heh, with my previous disclaimer I'm not comfortable with the word "always", but generally yes.

Originally Posted by Corwin

3. If "target locking" indeed always happens - when does it take place - the moment the battle begins, or the moment *your* first turn in battle begins? (obviously when you are an attacker the later happens after the former, since defender acts/moves first). So the depending on when exactly "target locking" occurs the closest unit (to the attacker) could be different one before and after defender would move.

The archers lock when they first fire, so if you're defending it's your placement after the first turn which matters.

Originally Posted by Corwin

4. In MP, people use archer decoys of all the time. Sometimes they use decoy on "guard commander" order. This can be very nasty, since if I understand game mechanics correctly, *all* you archers (set at either (where decoy belongs to that type) ) *will* get "locked" on this decoy target. (is it indeed so?) And when the target retreats toward its commander, who stays in the back, all your archers would rush forward, usually right in the middle of the enemy melee troops, where they get promptly massacred.

Is this indeed the case? And if so, how powerful/popular is this tactic (archer decoy on "guard commander" order) in MP games?

Yes and no. That's the theory and it works sometimes, but as I mentioned its not nearly as clean as you might expect when dealing with larger mixed groups. Its got some utility, but it mostly shines in letting you do things like slaughter PD with much smaller raiding parties.

Originally Posted by Corwin

5. Assuming number 4 is true, how do you script and position your archers when you have to fight against opponent who uses such "decoy on guard" tactic?

Well, entirely depends on the situation. A couple ideas:

1) Select targets that make poor screens. Fire archers, fire fliers, fire cavalry, fire large monsters...depending on what he's fielding you can often target something without shields, and if he uses a small group of them as a screen it'll often take enough damage to route in round one switching your archers to a different target.

2) Use a counter screen of your own with a small squad of flyers/cavalry set all the way forward to attack closest as kamikazis to wipe out the screeners turn one as they've got to be set all the way forward on your turn one.

3) Similar to 2 only with mages. Drop a destruction on the screeners, or a flaming arrows and you can likely decimate them. Or use short range spells like orb lighting banking on the fact that they'll be close to your front lines. Don't overlook trying to snipe the enemy commander with an appropriate spell if he's got more hps.

4) Place your army all the way forward and immediately attack, attempting to push the front line forward enough that your archers can target the back row. Depending on your archers and the enemy screen you may just need a couple volleys of arrows to kill the screen (or the commander they're guarding).

5) Don't count too much on your archers in all situations. Some nations are just poor choices to focus on archery and part of that is how effectively they can screen. If facing MA Pythium, for instance, you're pretty boned if most of what you brought shoots a bow.

Originally Posted by Corwin

6. IIRC, in the past, when I've dealt with elaborate anti-archers scripting such as those above, I usually set my archers on "fire" without specifying targets. When this happens, how will your archers choose target? Will they fire at random target in range? If so, will they "lock" on it? Does the size/protection of the enemy group matters? Or is it completely random? If it is random - will your archers always chose target in range, or can they choose target outside its range, and rush toward it? Finally what do they do if you gave them this order and there is no target in range - will they advance forward until they will get in range? If so, what would prevent them from locking on target decoy once again - situation I am naturally trying to avoid.

It'll be fire closest and they'll be no consideration for damage inflicted. Yes they'll lock, even if the closest target is currently out of range.

Originally Posted by Corwin

7. If the "fire" order chooses completely random target, then such scripting makes your entire archer force *much* less efficient and very unpredictable. Are there any better counters to the archer decoys in MP, especially - archer decoys that retreat toward the back because of "guard commander" orders?

Archers are generally questionably effective against smallish enemy groups who are able to very effectively use archer screening (and other anti-archer) tactics. Against larger enemy armies archers are much more effective as the chaos tends to gum up the archer screens and you can often choose targets that are hard to screen. Also, you often have critical mass of archers so smallish amounts of archer screens can often be pincushioned in a couple turns.

[thejeff]

Originally Posted by Baalz

Also, note there is a bit of squishiness sometimes with archers firing at all. Under some conditions (I'm not entirely clear what those are) they will advance rather than firing even when they have ammo and a valid target is in range. One obvious time this happens is if enemies are close enough for them to run up and immediately engage in melee. I've seen it happen though when there is no obvious reason.

I've also seen archers close and fire when their target group is engaged in melee. This happens most often with indy defenders. I believe I've also had it happen semi-reliably by leaving archers on default orders. I haven't tested that recently though, so my memory may be bad.
It can be useful, since they'll close to behind your front line and friendly fire drops off drastically at such short range.

Originally Posted by Baalz

They will choose the closest group and fire at it until it routes or they can't. At that point they will drop back to "fire closest".

This applies to all troops, right? Your orders only apply to the initial target choice. After that they just drop back to default, which behaves like "fire closest" if they have a range weapon and "attack closest" if they don't.
This was particularly frustrating when I tried to use Crystal Pegasi when I had a F9W9 bless. They'd fly up, slaughter the first group and then start shooting.

Originally Posted by Baalz

Archers are generally questionably effective against smallish enemy groups who are able to very effectively use archer screening (and other anti-archer) tactics. Against larger enemy armies archers are much more effective as the chaos tends to gum up the archer screens and you can often choose targets that are hard to screen. Also, you often have critical mass of archers so smallish amounts of archer screens can often be pincushioned in a couple turns.

And in large battles everyone tends to bunch up in the middle of the field anyway. Archer screens don't help much if they're in the middle of the troops you'd wanted to target anyway.

[Corwin]

Thanks a lot guys, it's very helpful.

Few clarifications - are all of you 100% sure that "fire at none" work exactly the same as "fire closest"?

I could have almost swear that when in the past (2 years ago, when I've used to played Dom3 MP a lot) when I had scripted my archers to "fire none", they would mostly ignore the archer decoys (who were positioned closest to them), and instead were firing at seemingly random targets all over the place. At least that's how it looked like to me, if I remember correctly.

Am I mistaken and are those false memories?

Another question - how exactly "fire at large monsters" order works? Will at always attmept to fire and lock at the largest enemy unit on the field? What if there is size 5 enemy unit within the firing range of your archers, and there is size 6 unit beoynd the range in the back - will your archers fire at size 5 enemy, or will they advance and fire at size 6?

And does it matter what exactly is the size of the "large" enemy unit? (for example, will it fire at the size 3 cavelry of the rest of the enemy troops are size 2)

Last question - let's say your javelins were set to fire at archers, and they have done so, but now they are out of missiles, so they will go to melee. Will the revert to "attack closest" order, or will the continue to perform "attack archers", only now in melee? Same question for your commanders.

[Gandalf Parker]

Wow, excellent breakdown of the subject. A couple of minor questions.

On the subject of "keep firing into it until either them or the target are dead/routed":
Shouldnt ammunition and rate of fire come into play? Some have 2, 12, 15, 24 but Im not sure if any can quite go the full number of battle rounds

The targeting formula apparently makes a difference between straight line-up or angled? So lining up archers for "fire at archers" at the top of the screen works better if the enemy is also at the top of the screen (like the AI likes to do it). I know its formulaic but I like to think of it as line-of-sight

[Squirrelloid]

The targetting formula chooses closest applicable unit. The game's distance metric is near the manhattan metric. Thus, stuff down a gridline from you is 'real' distance away, while stuff off a direct gridline is farther than it seems it should be. So its not that the targetting formula makes a distinction, its that the distance metric is weird.

[Corwin]

And one more question - Baalz has said that "fire at *target type*" order reverts to the *fire at closest* order once their initial target is dead or routed. If this is the case, then when two large armies full of archers meet and when they are well scripted, there is no way for the archers to fire at each other, as ther owner would often like them to do, correct? All you need to do to prevent your archers from taking massive enemy archers fire is to position 3-5 single archers spread over your front line. All enemy archers set to "fire at archers" will lock on those decoys, will likely kill them after a 2 turns, but by that time you'll have your heavy melee units (who were advancing forward) closer to the enemy units then your archers. and since all enemy archers (set to "fire at archers") who were locked on decoys, are now firing at your heavly protected melee units because their ordes have reverted to "fire closest", all your archers are now completely safe from enemy missile fire. Same goes for your enemy of course, if he uses the similar decoy tactics.

Is it correct?

[Wrana]

Another thing. Sometimes AI may ignore small decoy squads. I've heard it said that the magic word is 3 or less soldiers in squad, but am not sure.
Also, I've personally seen some archers from the same squad starting to shoot at another enemy... As Baalz said, there are few quite sure things in how targeting AI works.

[chrispedersen]

debug diving

initbattle: search for this, it will tell you the size of the battle map precisely.

CalcOverkill: looks like it determines whether gems will be used.
targtype: numeric value corresponding to the type of target.
mode: seems to be the kind of behaviour that the unit will use in engaging the target. 0 seems to be melee.

Targetting seems a bit strange. When friendly casualties can occur it seems as if the ai will target sometimes so that variance will not allow casualties. Ie., if the range is 24 to an enemy, the variance is 3. If their is a friendly at 22, it sometimes it appears the computer will target 26.

unr seems to be Unit nr.
eu: enemy unit.
ord seems to dictate what the unit will do.