Ah, we disagree on that then - I think the more complex but robust system is better.

Consider: if you have spell-name-only counters, then you can still not force the AI to use a specific spell as a counter. Assume you specify "A", "B" and "C" as counters; it could just be that the AI decides to stick to "A" and "C" and simply not use "B". You could implement it that there's a percentage weight indicator with each spell-name specified; or make the order of specification relevant, but that doesn't really solve the underlying problem.

Consider additionally: the [tag] system itself would be part of the AI system; so getting back to "Spread Disease" [disease], [resistance], [immunity], let us assume that the AI knows two spells that would qualify as valid counters:

"Immortal" [all-damage], [immune], [self-only]

"Panacea" [disease], [resistance], [aoe]

The AI can now, based on its sovereigns preferred strategy and the current tactical situation decide whether it wants to protect just one unit perfectly; or all units partially. If it is the necromancer, he doesn't care about his minions (and they (undead) tend to be disease immune anyway) so he uses "Immortal". But the nature-loving hippies from the Rondo mountains have large masses of weak forest creatures that win by overwhelming by numbers - and here the AI prefers the [aoe] spells. Factors like own-army composition, casting time, casting cost, etc could all be captured in the evaluation process and balanced against the options available.

Let us extend the AI's thought process by adding the following tags:

"Immortal" [all-damage], [immune], [self-only], [short-duration], [medium-cast]

"Panacea" [disease], [resistance], [aoe], [permanent-duration], [slow-cast]

"Crystal Cures" [disease], [poison], [resistance], [aoe], [short-duration], [fast-cast]

Suddenly the AI can decide if the spell is a suitable counter given the time available; or the time required for it to be useful. Additionally it can see that "Crystal Cures" provides protection against an additional damage type - and it might know that the enemy uses blight magic (disease and poison). Alternatively, it may know that the opponent doesn't have access to poison magic making "Crystal Cures" less attractive.

The point is the tags allow the AI to develop a form of understanding of the function/purpose of a spell - allowing it to make more informed decisions.

Consider this case: "Purge Unclean" - reduces the targets fire-resistance by 50, but gives the unit immunity to disease. This is a valid counter for "Spread Disease"; but it might be a horrible idea to cast it if the enemy is a disease spreading pyromaniac. A spell-name-only counter list cannot capture this nuance at all; a tag system could be able to.

Honestly, I wish the tactical AI was "good enough", so that AI vs AI tactical battles could be used as quick battles, and units with abilities would be properly valued.

The problem is some of those abilities are only really fun to see in tactical battles. 

I agree.

Best regards,
Steven.

I would like to hear Frogboy's thoughts on how the AI will decide to give priority to targeting;

1. Closest units or
2. Sovereign or
3. Most Powerful Units first or
4. Weakest Units first or
5. Ranged attack units

Will all sovereigns will have the same attack priorities and use the same AI rountines? 

Will all sovereigns focus on defensive casting? Hopefully not.

Example, where the Trog Sovereign is offensive magic focused and the Mancer Sovereign if defensive focused.

When faced with a Human Player who is preparing to cast Fire Storm the Ai response is;

• Krug of the Trogs tends to counter this with his own Fire Storm Spell to damage enemy units
• Mary of the Mancers tends to cast Spell Immunity to protect her most powerful unit
• Allsop of the Altairs casts Summon Fire Elemental, immune to fire damage

What I don't want to see is a case where the AI is always casting defensive spells, while the human player is free to rain death and destruction on the enemy.

Sounds like King's Bounty: The Legend, which has quick but really awesome and fun tactical battles.  If you guys can deliver something like that then Fallen Enchantress will rock.

I will always do a manual tactical battle. I like to role play during the battles. The units get quite a bit of dialog. 

KINGS BOUNTY has the best tactical battles there is.

 

I never played, but according to the screen shots, it looks neat. Is it only a PC game (any console version)? Not sure my PC could run it.

ON ething for sure, the combat needs to run fast. According to the comments, Kings bounty combat were running fast, which somewhat surprises me for a game that seems to focus on tactical battle.

Else ...

Why not make it a puzzle game like HOMM: Clash of heroes

I would prefer a bit more fleshed out battles actually. The issue I have with KB (and similar games) is that you might as well auto resolve, the battle outcome is pretty much given on turn 1 and you always perform the same moves. That kind of Tactical combat is more puzzle game than strategy imo.

You're talking about AI that is capable of "functioning" on  the metagame level. IMO this can only be scripted in our AIs with today's' technology.

If you can think of a way to do this in general AI code, and without hard coding the strategy then:

1. You will become famous and rich.

2. SHODAN is watching you...

I think you guys are too concerned with the process and not the result. Giving the AI a major and minor spell class and making it choose between them is so simple. The end result is confusing a human that is only ready to defend against one element. You should be able to make this kind of AI choose a suboptimal spell and attack the weakest unit without much trouble. The hard part is what to do once the human or other AI has learned that trick. The AI would only need to do it once, as humans will invariably assume an AI will do it every time. So in the second battle the AI would go straight for his major spell class. The third battle would be 50% chance. as would the 4th. A total randomness would then be used after this. Humans are so predictable.

Admit it, this would have taken all of you down. I can sense you clicking quickload even now. Guys, Frogboy is an AI genius. He can do what I have described. The question is whether or not it is something he wants to put time into.

The best part is that as the game progresses new shards will be acquired, causing new mages to be trained that have a different set of major and minor focus. That means you will never know which spell to expect at any given battle, unless you are mapping out enemy shards and keeping a journal of every wizard you fight. This is admittedly a far cry from what Frogboy is planning I would think, which is why I wanted to know what he thought of it. I am also curious as to why two people think this is so improbable.

The main point is to push for zero information about mages on both sides. The less we know in the first battle, the better. The AI in GalCiv2 was really good at fighting a battle and then coming up with a really good countering ship. This is the same but with many more weapon types. 

Just wanna chime in that, King's Bounty has the best tactical combat (TC)experience in recent years.   Copy 70% of KB into FE's tactical combat system, 20% of your own innovation then it will be great!

Maybe then put some effort on adding Siege and wall related rules, making the TC map tiles matches the strategic map, escape/retreat/subdue rules, basic flanking, basic ZOC, and basic LOS rules.

In KB, they don't have smart AI at all but AI spell casting is still very nice.  The reason being that every single spell is designed to be useful, even if the AI is not truly smart, whatever spell it cast onto players will not be wasted.   The worst case is just that it does not deal as much damage but it is not a big dealbreaker for the game.

I've heard rumors that FE battles give you cancer...

This is my dream for the future. A high-quality total war-esque realtime combat, with hundreds of thousands of units that are mostly operated by the AI after initial battle plans have been laid out. The user controls heroes or possibly legendary units with a few hundred men, operating within the war. All set in a high fantasy environment. The scale is immense - you can view it all from above, see the dragons soar and torch the landscape, see the siegetowers roll up and be torn down. Or you can play one of the heroes standing on the ramparts, arrows flying past you, a hundred thousand orcs and a hundred thousand goblins below rushing forward. Mighty wizards fly across the battlefield to fight the dragons, and unleash nuclear-level devastation when left alone. Assassins dispatched to the enemy command chain - but can you make it back alive? Giant warriors that stand in the thick of it all, breaking the tide. But keep moving, or you won't be able to wield your weapons for all the dead bodies around you. You can break any shield, stomp any snotling. But beware the cavalry, they'll outdistance you, do charges with lances. And if you go too deep, they'll encircle you with spearmen attacking in unison.

Just need the computers to do it. Strategy, in my mind, is the genre that has the most potential for future gaming precisely because of how it can scale. In another ten or fifteen years, FPS games willl probably look completely realistic. They'll surely invent new gimmicks to immerse the player - direct mind to computer linking would be a big step forward. But when it comes to pure computer power, strategy games will see the largest improvements in the future.