1. I think the AI is spending too much time in the Civics tech and not enough time in the Warfare/Magic/Adventure techs.
a ) The AI has very nice, well-advanced cities for me to takeover. Unfortunately, they're usually protected by armies with attack/defense values of no more than 15/15. Perhaps, they're doing the research and then just not designing the units...Anyway, the AI needs better equipped armies.
b ) There is also some nice attack/defense/movement improvements in the Magic tech if they have access to crystals...not to mention the extra spells/essence techs. I don't see the AI using magic effectively at all. This might also be because it's too easy for me take out the enemy sovereign/heroes on the first turn of tactical battle.
c ) My first three techs to research every game come out of the Adventure series so that I get a notable location level = 3. The treasure chests provide 50-400 gildar which is more than enough to seed my economy. I don't see the AI putting a priority on goodie huts as a source of income/resources.
2. What's the deal with the seemingly endless supply of catapults and pioneers produced by the AI?
a ) I never sustain any damage from the catapults. I always fight them on auto-resolve combat. Is the auto-resolve combat for catapults broken or our catapults broken in general or is the AI strategy in using them broken (i.e. they need to be guarded with melee troops)?
b ) There are always way too many pioneers hanging around doing nothing. They're easy to kill. The other thing the AI does with them is send them through my territory even when we're at war unprotected. Bye, bye, blessed pioneer.
3. Has the AI figured out how to use imbue champion?
a ) Perhaps we need to make it easier for the AI to figure out which heroes to imbue and which ones to make melee captains. This could be done if the heroes themselves came with with high intelligence/wisdom vs. some that came with high strength/dexterity/constitution. By the way, you know how we give the hero 3 essence when we imbue them? I think that amount should still be -3 essence for the sovereign, but then modified by the hero's wisdom like you do with weapons/attack rating. For example, if a hero's wisdom is 8, he would get 3 x .8 = 2.4 essence. If a hero's wisdom = 15, she would get 3 x 1.5 = 4.5 essence.
4. I don't like AI cheating, but....
I don't like AI cheating in terms of breaking rules (i.e. they don't have to abide by the food rule, they generate extra gildar income even if they don't have the right resources/buildings, etc.), but I'm ok with the AI getting a head start at the first of the game.
a ) on Ridiculous level, perhaps they should start out with an extra scout or hero or random guardian. It's too easy for me to take out AI cities at the first of the game.
b ) on Ridiculous level, perhaps the sovereign should get more attribute points or talent points or something which reminds me...when I create my sovereign, I lower all the attribute stats (because we can just get those when we level up in game) and instead, pick almost every talent. That's broken! I shouldn't be able to do that. By the way, the most broken talent is the ability to lower enemy morale in a battle. Every battle I feel like manually executing is an automatic win because the enemy can't move from panicking.
5. Is the AI properly using diplomacy to ally with each other and come against me? If so, I've never seen that.
6. In Patch 1.0.9, I've had 3 enemy sovereigns throw themselves at my cities without any accompanying army which is basically a suicide mission. This was even when they had still had a bunch of cities that could have produced units. I had not seen that kamikaze behavior previously.
