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Skirmish AI v1.9 beta2 now up!


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#1 thudo

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Posted 24 July 2006 - 04:07 AM

Go grab em betatesters and PLEASE provide feedback!
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#2 Zenoth

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 07:51 AM

Report #1 for 1.9 Beta 2

Match: 3 Vs 3 (Me as CSM, allied with SM and IG Vs. 3 x Orks)
Map: Testing Grounds
A.I Difficulty: Hard
Resources Rate: Normal/Standard
Resources Sharing: Off/No
Winner: Me & Ally

Comments: Two things I noticed so far. Lack of hero attachments (in my humble opinion), and, guess it ... *drum rolls* ... gathering issue at Critical Location by our ol' friends the Imperial Guards !

From the beginning, until the end of the game, all heroes, in all factions that appeared on the battlefield probably forgot to get their coffee that morning, because they very often refused to command infantry to their promised blood or Emperor-worth-death. Seriously though, there was an obvious lack of hero attachment.

It can probably be subjective. But heroes not being attached to infantry right at the beginning, that's quite unfortunate I believe. I do it myself sometimes, but the A.I shouldn't afford to do it too often, in my opinion, even if the heroe(s) have the ability to retreat if badly hurt (although they sometimes do appreciated the pain offered by the penetrating bullets into their flesh as they come back to their enemy and cry for it).

It ain't "buggy" mind you. It's not like they were dancing around doing nothing or not knowning if they attach or not. Either they go on the battlefield alone, right after being trained and they immediately do something, or they do it and then they eventually receive the beautiful gift that is being reinforced by a group of infantry that you'll have the opportunity to command.

It happened too often, in my opinion. They did attach themselves, I saw them do it. But only a few times (the Orks did it the most) in the whole game. And I know that it's not map-related/specific. I must say, however, that in one game they seem to do it very often (to attach themselves), but in another they will almost never do so. It doesn't seem to be constant. Well according to what I've experienced in my tests (it was like that for 1.9 Beta 1, and 1.8's latest Beta as well, although I didn't report it because I couldn't find the time to do it) anyway.

It may differ from players to players, but I prefer to attach my heroe units. As often as I can. When I don't, it's usually because the closest enemy to my base is actually a tad too close for my tastes (as in this test I present to you, I did it) and that I want to protect worker units and/or scouts that are working on controlling the nearest LP/CP between my base and the closest enemies'. But usually I wait for the first true combat units I can get, I attach the heroe, and then I send them on the battlefield.

All in all, I think that the heroe attachment code could get some improvements.

As for the gathering issue ... yes, it happened again.

Here's a screenshot to start with:

http://img141.images...atheringki1.jpg

Alright, so the Imperial Guards decided to have a nice lunch time, and it was probably due, since the battlefield is very intense and demanding, those poor guys had to eat something, that's understandable. But it wasn't a reason to do it during the battle, especially not when all the rest of the army conducts the ultimate offensive that'll lead to victory !

Bah, that issue, when it happens, I always think that it wouldn't be possible to see it again. I have to say that it ain't happening as often as it did in older versions. And, to be honest, I don't even recall having seen that occur in any of the 1.8 builds.

Map-specific bug ? I'm not sure. I'd say yes for some maps. I remember having seen it happen often in Mountain Trail back during the 1.7 Builds. I don't think I have seen it again since 1.8, and then it seems to be back here and there in 1.9.

Now, here's the strange part, picture first, attempt at explaination after:

http://img141.images...ngmovingaq8.jpg

What happens here is as follows: Units gather up to that Critical Location (only IG). They eventually become more numerous there (it must have been some delicious pastas !). Then, one of the newly arrived infantry group approached the wall, the wall on the left, in the picture, left to the CL itself. Once arrived near the wall in question, that infantry group "notices" a nearby Orks-owned Listening Post (the LP probably entered the infantry's "range"). Then what happens next is that the whole gang that was gathering up there somehow had the same reaction (domino-effect), and just like the infantry group in question turned around to face the Ork LP, and all of them attacked it, and they "un-stucked" themselves in the process. Note that they never gathered up to that CL nor any other places after that. They simply joined forces with the already attacking IG and SM forces against the last standing Ork faction to the North-West.

I find it strange that when I do see a gathering problem, it happens almost exclusively with the Imperial Guards. I'm not sure what to think about that. Probably something in their own code, in the way they themselves analyse for LP/CL availability in a given map.

Alright Lords, that's what I noticed so far. I'll update if I find anything else !

#3 Finaldeath

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 05:32 PM

Changelog?

#4 thudo

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 05:35 PM

Its on the site. Yes.. I'll add the Changelog here from now on.. ;)
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#5 LarkinVB

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 05:54 PM

I did add 1.9b2 to DoWPro and it has some serious issues.

1. CC combat is still weak. Again you can see orks attacking but retreating just before they reach contact -> dead squad.
You can see the big mek in vital combat with FC, deciding to leave his boyz to teleport behind the SM line to attack three scouts. You can see sluggas attacking while nearby shootas decide to retreat a bit just to return later on, when the sluggas are already dead. Orks need to keep their troops together but they fail to do so.

2. Armies are attacking though they have barely a value of 300. I did set MinArmyStrength = 800 and
-- Returns a specific information
function ork_race:GetInfo(sType)

	-- Check info type
	if (sType == "TurretPower") then
		return 400
	elseif (sType == "SupportAllyFactor") then
		return 8 / 4
	elseif (sType == "AttackModifier") then
		return -5
	elseif (sType == "CriticalRangeIncreasePerTier") then
	   return 20
	elseif (sType == "MinArmyStrengthPerTier") then
	   return 700
	end
	return nil
end
Nevertheless they press on, even with a very small army.

3. Eldar were isolated in their base, both nearby points were decapped but the enemy retreated to attack another target. They had no army left. What did the first new guardian squad do ? Recap ? No, they follow the big enemy army and attack them just to die in a second. Rinse and repeat.

#6 Zenoth

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 07:52 PM

Good observations Larkin.

But what about the two points I mentioned in my report ? I consider hero attachments to be quite important and shouldn't be negliged for too long.

And the gathering issue ... while it rarely happens is still quite annoying.

Edited by Zenoth, 26 July 2006 - 07:53 PM.


#7 thudo

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 08:07 PM

Zenoth - can you point-form your observations like Larkin in a #1/#2 type fashion for easier reading? Hero Attachments have always been a dicey one. Please explain in point form on this. Also, your gathering issue I find is map-dependant based on where the LPs are. Its very hard to code for that methinks.
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#8 LarkinVB

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Posted 26 July 2006 - 09:33 PM

For some reason Arkhan reduced commanders health limit to <= 10% before they attach at gamestart. Not sure why.

#9 Zenoth

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 12:19 AM

Sure I will thudo.

I just thought that the two lines under the "Comments" paragraph were clear enough.

And the gathering issue isn't happening on LP's thudo (if that's what you meant by "based on where the LPs are"). It's occuring under Critical Locations. And it's never all of the CL's when there is more than one on a particular map, it's just one, never more. They gather at one of them, and that's it. If nothing else around the gathered units "un-stucks" them, they don't move at all.

I also observed it in Mountain Trail. I'll have to make another test and post the replay as well.

Edited by Zenoth, 27 July 2006 - 12:20 AM.


#10 thudo

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 12:29 AM

For some reason Arkhan reduced commanders health limit to <= 10% before they attach at gamestart. Not sure why.

We'll look into that. Thanks Larkin for noticing!

And the gathering issue isn't happening on LP's thudo (if that's what you meant by "based on where the LPs are"). It's occuring under Critical Locations. And it's never all of the CL's when there is more than one on a particular map, it's just one, never more. They gather at one of them, and that's it. If nothing else around the gathered units "un-stucks" them, they don't move at all.

Sorry.. Criticals.. Then I haven't noticed it. I run multiple games and the only issue I've seen is when the AI doesn't finish off an enemy sometimes especially when they have a leftover barracks or generator sitting in their base OR secondary base. This happens when any other ally is defeated so there is one enemy to defeat left over. The AI will sit there (whether Relic, Strat, or Critical) and do nothing. Odd..

Your problem I have never seen except right at the end of the game but its not limited to Crits. I play Mountain Trail ALOT and never saw this prior to nearing the end.
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#11 Zenoth

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 01:51 AM

Report #2 for 1.9 Beta 2

Match: 2 Vs 2 (Me as CSM, allied with SM Vs. 2 x Orks)
Map: Mountain Trail
A.I Difficulty: Hard
Resources Rate: Normal/Standard
Resources Sharing: Off/No
Winner: Me & Ally

Comments: Here I wanted to see how the heroe attachments would end up, and as I thought, it ain't constant. In this test only one of the three A.I players never attached its heroe (Ork). All others did. And that in itself isn't good in my opinion. Also, I noticed a strange "back and forth" behavior by the Orks trying to capture one of the CL.

1 - As I mentioned, in this test, two A.I players out of three attached their heroe to infantry. One of them didn't, and it was a disadvantage, since all other players around were skulking their heroe around with infantry ready to help him right away. In my previous report, none of the A.I players attached their early heroe units. It's not the type of issue that is easy to reproduce, but it happens regularly enough as it seems.

Picture 1:

http://img76.imagesh...roealonebw2.jpg

As you can see, here's the Ork heroe that ventures alone in the wilderness, eventually (but valiantly I guess) taking one of my Listening Posts by himself. And of course he never managed to do it, since I eventually killed him. Notice the game time there, 5:33 minutes in (althought all the heroes were trained ealier).

Picture 2 & 3:

http://img128.images...attachedon1.jpg
http://img128.images...ttached2nb6.jpg

By 5:33 minutes, both other A.I players had their heroe attached, and they had better success on the battlefield trying to take out enemy LP's because they were attached. Not like that Ork one. As I just said, notice we're at the exact same game time in all three pictures shown so far.

2 - During this game, I wanted to test out something I already knew how to test. Which is what I believe to be a map-specific issue, but it's very problematic. Note that it's also very easy to recreate for testing purposes.

Right when the game began, I sent one group of Cultists to the Critical Location in question. And that CL is the one directly north to my base (east side of the map).

When a human player controls that CL before the enemy, as well as leaving the troops that originally controlled the CL (in a guarding stance) there, then the A.I will wait very long before trying anything to capture it back (sometimes they simply do nothing). And when they do try something, they usually send one (extremely rarely more than one) infantry group (I've never ever seen vehicles anywhere near that CL, but that could be related to paths placed there by the map author(s) so to allow infantry only in that sector of the map, I just don't know if that'd be the case). And in this very case, it was a single group of Tankbustas.

Note, however that the enemy in that test had enough troops to take it back from my mere Cultists ...

Picture 1:

http://img134.images...lcapturebj0.jpg

All those Ork troops were waiting there, for gathering purposes I presumed. Because they eventually attacked me (they didn't stayed there for too long). But they could have resumed their LP/CL capturing-spree up to that CL so easily. They never tried. Instead they gathered as I expected (I was just waiting for them as you'll see in the replay) and they eventually tried to take me down.

Picture 2:

http://img149.images...stubbornrj4.jpg

Here notice the game time. By around 20:00 minutes in, that Tankbusta group tried in a "back and forth" fashion, to capture my CL. All they did for around 7 or 8 minutes (non-stop) was to run towards it, against my Cultists, properly attacking them on their way, but eventually turning back and retreating. Sometimes they lost one unit in the group, and they reinforced it regularly. Back and forth, non-stop, trying to get it, but never managed to. And while they tried to capture it, my forces were already laying siege to their main base (and they never turned back to help about that). I just thought it'd be worth it to show you that A.I behavior guys.

But as I mentioned earlier, that issue in Mountain Trail is inherent to it. It's surely a map-specific bug. Perhaps you Arkhan/Thudo/Larkin can take a look into it. I'm not sure if I have to call that a "bug" in the first place. But as a tester I couldn't just ignore the "back and forth" behavior. Because I know that Arkhan worked on such issues before. Well the annoying thing is that it's still happening and is very noticeable. Perhaps not happening as often as before though. But althought the frequency at which it occurs is smaller, it seems to remain something to take a look into.

So for this test I focused on looking for heroe attachment "issue" (might still be subjective). And any problems around LP's and/or CL's if I saw any. And I saw one, as reported here. That's about it for now for this test guys. Hope it eventually helps.

#12 thudo

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 02:04 AM

WoW! Fantastic detective work there Zenoth! Bravo! Very comprehensive. Very much like your use of screenshots!

Yes the CL thing is a little dicey. Having the AI send infantry to capture them backed up by another force especially vehicles may/may not be possible until DC. See your point though and good analysis - we need that kind of observations. Thank you!
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#13 ArkhanTheBlack

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 08:07 PM

Attaching problems:
There were indeed some problems with the min strength of the squads to attach. Further, the Orc commander had the wrong attach code. Probably a copy/paste problem.

Capturing back and forth moving:
In general very rare. But I increased the required squad strength for guarded crits, which should help to avoid this problem.

Capturing of critical locations:
The AI doesn't capture crits in the harassing phase to get more harassing power. This was a design decision because Slash reported that they capture too much instead of harassing. This is a good compromise.

Reduced commander health limit:
In WA commanders seem the only ones which are able to really hurt a LP. I did this after I saw a replay of Zenoth where chaos lost about three squads in a row to a LP because the commander was attached and no unit able to effectively hurt the LP.

CC combat is still weak...:
I tried to reach some more "Do it or not" behaviour, but these are fundamental problems which can't be fixed so easy.

Armies are attacking though they have barely a value of 300:
Should only happen in harassing phase where the AI has some more tolerance during attacks.


New version should be ready tomorrow. Further issues are delayed to DC since 1.9 is intended mainly as a fix for 1.5 balancing and performance.

#14 LarkinVB

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 08:22 PM

Armies are attacking though they have barely a value of 300:
Should only happen in harassing phase where the AI has some more tolerance during attacks.


How long is the harassing phase ? It was way 6 minutes into the game. I also gave the eldar example were a single squad (the only squad eldar had) followed the enemy instead of recapping its points.

Is it possible to give some more control for setting these attack values ? I want the orks to gather a big army but they waste their guys too much running around.

Don't know when it crept in but I get the feeling there are too many move commands. Once commited orks should stay at CC. Looking at the battles it seems that CC troops and jumpers commit for a short time just to retreat - just to reengage - just to retreat. As if the code isn't sure about the best action and they are trapped between two different tactics.

#15 ArkhanTheBlack

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Posted 27 July 2006 - 10:34 PM

How long is the harassing phase ? It was way 6 minutes into the game.

4 Minutes!

I also gave the eldar example were a single squad (the only squad eldar had) followed the enemy instead of recapping its points.

I guess it was the capturing plan. Threat on path detection isn't really the strength of the AI.

Is it possible to give some more control for setting these attack values ? I want the orks to gather a big army but they waste their guys too much running around.

I'll send you the new version tomorrow which should have less chaotics in the harassing phase. I think I also add the attack / retreat points to the race parameters. This should give you a bit more freedom in this area.

#16 LarkinVB

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Posted 28 July 2006 - 05:40 AM

Thanks.

I guess it was the capturing plan. Threat on path detection isn't really the strength of the AI.


There were two uncapped points just near their hq which it could capture easily.

B

P P







E

B:Base
P:uncapped Points
E: Enemy

Edited by LarkinVB, 28 July 2006 - 05:41 AM.


#17 Zenoth

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Posted 28 July 2006 - 09:22 AM

Larkin, are you referring to one of my reports ? If so I presume it's the first one ? Just curious ... I'll have to check back if I can notice any un-capped LP's in both tested games.

Edited by Zenoth, 28 July 2006 - 09:23 AM.


#18 LarkinVB

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Posted 28 July 2006 - 10:59 AM

I was referring to my game.

#19 thudo

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Posted 28 July 2006 - 12:53 PM

Actually, the "AI not capturing certain points" is quite map-related. Most maps its fine but on some its like a curse is placed on those unclaimed LPs. Wierd. 6p_Mortis is like this especially for Player0 (If an AI is placed there). Bizarre. Not sure Arkhan can correct this "anomaly" since its rare.
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