How do you lure leaders out of their keeps?

[Maiklas3000]

When you approach a fortress, sometimes the leader dashes out at you, sometimes not. How can you entice an enemy leader to leave his recruiting spot? What factors go into his decision to stay or go? Gold available? Value of target unit? Ease of killing target unit? Lack of any other units to go for the target? How random is his decision?

[pauxlo]

It depends

In some cases the scenario file has an order for the leader to always stay in its keep, no matter what.

[Joram]

Basically, the more vulnerable your unit to being killed, the more likely they will be to jump out. Unless scripted otherwise, I believe that they will always go out if they have a chance of killing a unit with no chance of dying themselves. So of the factors you listed, I believe that the single biggest factor is ease of killing target unit.

I find footpads to be good leader bait (since with negative resistances, there is usually always a chance they will die). It doesn't always work (like when the leader is scripted to stay put, or when it is a bad time of day for it), but it does fairly often.

EDIT: I am assuming that you are speaking of single player mode. In multiplayer mode, who knows what goes into the leader's decision to stay or go.

[joshudson]

For allied AI leaders I prefer Master at Arms -- that unit has a knack for getting itself out of a dangerous situation.

[Anonymissimus]

High probability of getting a kill but 100% chance of zero counter damage. I use a thief in HttT::Valley of death to lure the northern lich out of his keep to catch him after I've finished his army.

[Maiklas3000]

In the situation below, why didn't the (AI-controlled) leader fall for the bat bait?



(This is from Decent into Darkness, Beginning of the Revenge. Replay is available in the scenario review thread.)

Was it because it was day?

Was it because there was a large assassination force within striking distance?

It's not because of the WML or because it was a bat, because on previous times I played the scenario, the leaders did bite bat bait. I'm just not sure of what the difference is here.

[Anonymissimus]

When did you play it for the last time ? On 27 Nov 2008 esr fixed a typo regarding (only) side=2 ai's aggression in this scenario. Aggression makes apparently a difference, I lured the liches out of their keeps quickly here http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewtopic.php ... st#p445945
although they had 0 chance for getting a kill.
I think all of the things you mentioned can make a difference. Place a more valuable bait (A dark adept maybe, since then there's zero chance for retaliation damage.), stay as far away with the force as possible, do it at night etc...

[Dunno]

why don't you move your bat closer to the castle? Maybe he doesn't want to go into forest because he has higher defence in the castle. By the way this looks hilarious! Imagine those ghosts saying "Come on, kill that bat. We won't hurt you! You know you want to kill that bat!"

[Xandria]

The funny thing is, the orc had no real way of knowing the ghosts were there, given the fact that the river is deep water...
(another funny thing: whether you can see over a narrow stream depend on how deep it is)...

[HomerJ]

(another funny thing: whether you can see over a narrow stream depend on how deep it is)...

HAPMA
'nough said.

Greetz
HomerJ

[Araja]

I thought that was "possibly" miles across.

[Maiklas3000]

The funny thing is, the orc had no real way of knowing the ghosts were there, given the fact that the river is deep water...
(another funny thing: whether you can see over a narrow stream depend on how deep it is)...

I checked the status table, and fog/shroud is "no/no" for everyone. So, is it really true that the Orc doesn't know the Ghosts are there (in the screenshot above)? I did notice that if the Ghosts stay across the deep river, the AI sends all its units north away from the leader, but if I so much as send a Bat across, the AI will divert several units to intercept. But I thought maybe it was just that it had no concept of how to defend without being able to attack.

[Max]

I checked the status table, and fog/shroud is "no/no" for everyone. So, is it really true that the Orc doesn't know the Ghosts are there (in the screenshot above)?

he'll see what you see - maybe he's just smart enough to notice the trap. does it attack the bat when there are no other units around?

[Maiklas3000]

he'll see what you see - maybe he's just smart enough to notice the trap. does it attack the bat when there are no other units around?

Hmm, just tried. No! If there are no other units around, the Orc leader still does not attack. However, if the Bat instead takes the village or another hex next to the fortress, then the Orc leader attacks, usually. It does not seem to make a difference whether there are other units around or which side of the river bank any other units are. So, Dunno was probably correct that the leader was trying to stay in better terrain.

[monochromatic]

Hm. I think since the computer calculates the terrain defense, it probably figured if he had moved to attack the bat, he would be on 50% def terrain and the bat 60, giving the bat a better chance to hit. But if you moved the bat to a village where it has 40% def, attacking from a 60% def castle hex would give the Orc a better chance to hit. And if you move the bat next to the castle, it would be 60-60, where then the Orc's higher attack values would entice it to attack. I think the Orc would have even stepped off the castle hexes to attack a unit with 30% def for example, since he would have a better chance to hit.