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[thudo]

Dawn Of Skirmish *DARK CRUSADE EXPANSION ONLY* V2.0 RELEASE and Acknowledgements (November 2006)
================================================================================================

Download Link #1
Download Link #2
Download Link #3
Download Link #4

Meet the Cast:
==============

Thudo (Thudmeizer)..>> Team Lead/Coder/Gfx/Bonafied Cheerleader
ArkhanTheBlack......>> Lead Coder/Scripter
LarkinVB............>> Lead Coder/Scripter/Beta Tester
Corsix..............>> Coder
Zenoth..............>> Beta Tester
Malkor..............>> Beta Tester
Troubadour..........>> Beta Tester
ThetaOrion..........>> Beta Tester
FinalDeath..........>> Beta Tester
QuietDeath..........>> Beta Tester
JBird...............>> Beta Tester
Slash...............>> Beta Tester


Introduction
============

Prepare for a more enhanced Dawn Of War - Dark Crusade skirmish experience!

This project started after the release of Dawn Of War with the intent to bring to the global DoW community a more intense and satisfying AI opponent on the field of war. We hope you will agree that has been achieved with the understanding more is to be done in the future. Our work continues to evolve and in the coming months will make current efforts pale in comparison. However, you have to start somewhere and hot damn what a jumpstart!

Its been a slice from start to, well, continuing! We're so looking forward to enhancing the AI even further in the coming months!


A Personal Thanks
=================

At this time I would like to personally thank all the participating members of the team:

ArkhanTheBlack, LarkinVB, Excedrin, and Corsix, as well as our beta testers, Malkor, Zenoth, ThetaOrion, FinalDeath, Troubadour, Slash, JBird, QuietDeath and (all who keep our work "in-perspective" and "on-track" with our ultimate goals of achieving the most competitive DoW AI opponent we can create!).

Its through your dedication, patience, and technical expertise that allowed the work to commence and prosper. Without you fellers, there'd be a pittence of work compared to the greatness this project has become. We've come a long way and do sincerely hope to continue our expert correspondance into the future of the product.


Disclaimer
==========

This is to acknowledge that we take no personal responsibility for any hardware damage or data corruption brought forth by the use or installation of this DoW modification. As used, this modification works "as is" and has been thoroughly tested and should not cause any major problems. In the event, however, that something serious does occur, it is up to the user(s) of their computer(s) to make appropriate backups before any attempt is made to install the following DoW modification. Use at your own risk.


Whats In The Package?
====================

o Main Installation Package containing the Enhanced DoW AI scripts (contains ONLY those .ai files that our team altered)
o Dawn Of Skirmish DC V2.0 dowai.txt (what your reading)
o Doc folder containing information how to add your own faction to the AI project.


Installation
============

Piece of Cake! Run the executable and it will extract to where your <installed Dawn Of War folder> is.

Once installed, run the newly placed shortcut on your desktop "DOW Skirmish AI V2.0" or from StartMenu/Programs/"Dawn Of War Skirmish AI Mod". You will know if the modification is running when on the top-left section of the Dawn Of War Main Menu it will display: Dawn Of Skirmish V2.0.

To uninstall this modification, go back to StartMenu/Programs/"DOW Skirmish AI Mod" and choose "Remove Dawn Of Skirmish AI Mod" to remove the modification from Dawn Of War.

**NOTE**

This version of the AI mod will only work with the Dark Crusade Expansion.


What's new in Dawn of Skirmish DC AI 2.0?
=========================================

o New races Tau and Necrons included
o New AI resource donation system
o New vehicle/building repair system
o New detector code to handle the new infiltration system in DC
o Improved building placement system
o Improved assassination game mode
o More AI control panel options
o Corsix Mod Manager
o One hell of a lot of other fixes and improvements
o Updated AI Docs folder so modders can build their own AIs


Donation System (by default it is turned off, so enable it under Game Rules)
===============

- All races donate requisition if they own more than 800

- All races demand requisition if they own less than 200

- All races donate power if they own more than 600 (Necrons: more than 1100)

- All races demand power if they own less than 200 (Necrons: less than 400)


AIControlPanel
==============

There are several options you can change for each difficulty level to adjust the AI behaviour to you liking.

1.) Dancing
~~~~~~~~~~~
Dancing is the ability to run away with ranged units if they are attacked in melee.
There are three possible settings:
a) Off => Dancing is not used at all
b) Standard => The AI is restricted to only dance with one unit at a time
c) Godlike => The AI will dance with several units at a time if necessary

2.) Attack Delay
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This forces the AI to wait with an attack until a specif time has passed.
You can adjust this time in two minute steps from 0 to 20 minutes.

3.) Tech Speed
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
With an increased teching speed, the AI will spend its resources more on teching than on building troops.
With a decreased teching speed, the AI will spend its resources more on building troops than on teching.

4.) Teching Handicap
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A handicap will slow down the teching of an AI. It will also hoard more ressources
instead of spending it immediately for units or buildings.
You can give allies an handicap or opponents. If you give allies a handicap, all
AI's allied with a human player are affected. If you give opponents a handicap, all
AI's not allied with a human player are affected. You can use this behaviour for
example to weaken AI opponents if you don't feel good enough to face them at full
strength. Or you want the exact opposite, a real challenge, and weaken your own
allies, so you have to do more yourselve.

5.) Allow alternative strategies
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
All AI's have 4 different strategies:

- A solid allround strategy
- A special ranged strategy
- A special melee strategy
- A vehicle fast tech strategy

If alternative strategies are activated, the AIs will choose one of those strategies at the start by
random, though the chances of each strategy are influenced by opponent and map size. If deactivated,
the AI will always choose the solid allround strategy.

6.) Early Harassing
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This allows commanders and combat troops to make an attack at an extremly early state to
avoid opposing scout capturing strategic points. If successfull, this can severly cripple
the opponents ressource income and decide the game at a very early state. On the other side,
harassing can also lead to a quick sacrifice of troops, which gives the opponent an advantage.
Harassing is only possible in the first 4 minutes.

7.) Multiple Troop Production Buildings
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The AI normally builds more troop production buildings if it has excess ressources. This allows
often an outproducing of the opponenr who can't replace its losses fast enough.
Bear in mind that the AI might still build more troop production because of other reasons. IG for
example need to build them to increase their squad and support caps. In this case those buildings
are normally only built a bit later. This can also hurt the balance between the races since some
of them are affected more and others less of it.

8.) Allow Relic units
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If deactivated, the AI won't build any Relic units like the Baneblade from the Imperial Guard or the Chaos
Bloodthirster.


Thanks to everyone on the team for you incredibly hard work getting this compatible with all the major balance changes in WinterAssault and thanks to you, the community, for your patience!

We'll be watching for your general comments and experiences. Enjoy everyone and get some serious battlefield ownage going on!

[mnbvcxz3210]

Hooraaaay!

is the meta-map ai also improved?

[mnbvcxz3210]

just run through an AI vs AI on hellfire canyon...it was tau vs ig.
the fire warriors on the high ground were mowed down by a turret down the hill but they were not aware of it... and sometimes fws ran directly within range pass a lp2 to persue a guardsmen squad, leaving several dead bodies behind.. they cost 70 each..heart broken..

i'm sorry i find this problem in the AIProblems.doc.. any way to delete this post?

Edited by mnbvcxz3210, 01 December 2006 - 03:21 AM.

[mnbvcxz3210]

Create a file in your <installed DC folder> called: autoexec.lua

Now put this in that file at the start of it:

run = Cpu_ControlLocalPlayer()

bind( "shift+F1", "vslow()" )
bind( "shift+F2", "slow()" )
bind( "shift+F3", "standard()" )
bind( "shift+F4", "fast()" )
bind( "shift+F5", "vfast()" )


function vslow()
setsimrate( 1.5 );
end

function slow()
setsimrate( 6.5 );
end

function standard()
setsimrate( 15 );
end

function fast()
setsimrate( 25 );
end

function vfast()
setsimrate( 40 );
end

and then run with -dev.

[ArkhanTheBlack]

I didn't see any AI donations going on, as far as I can tell.

You have to activate it one time in the win conditions panel at the start of a game.

[ArkhanTheBlack]

We've an entry in the programs panel under THQ/Dawn of War Dark Crusade which has links to readme.txt, AI control panel, etc.

[thudo]

Please submit any comments/suggestions/bug reports in "point form" - its easier for us devs to ensure we can prioritize a "fix list" if it comes to it. The Network Synch'ing issue will have to be investigated although its not completely proven as others have no problem playing online.

[thudo]

1. Yes thats known. We don't do Attack-Move all the time. AI sends squads to an area and sometimes doesn't attack enemies on the way. Working as designed.
2. Well its not a perfect situation here - this is constantly being improved upon. Yes squads should retreat when they get overwhelmed but its difficult to script all scenarios.
3. We cannot script focus-fire for AI controlled units however I beg to differ.. the AI is QUITE apt in taking out enemy builders. It always attacks units first over buildings. If a stray enemy builder is around it goes after it unless the attacking unit needs to retreat for whatever reason.

[LarkinVB]

Just finished a game with my friends against 4 Insane AIs. Noticed some problems/bugs:

Did you have AI donation on or off ? There are reports with sync errors in network games and we try to find a pattern.

Edited by LarkinVB, 01 December 2006 - 03:46 PM.

[thudo]

Go to the \dowai folder located where your \DarkCrusade is installed and you'll see it in the \data folder. Can't miss it.

[thudo]

Go to GameManager while in DoW and deactivate the Dawn of Skirmish Mod by activating the regular game..

or

Edit the file Local.ini in your \<installed DarkCrusade> folder and change the line that says "currentmod=dowai" to "currentmod=dxp2".

First option is easier though.

[LarkinVB]

Just finished a game with my friends against 4 Insane AIs. Noticed some problems/bugs:

1. Some AI units seem to be desperately trying to get somewhere and ignore our units attacking them.

2. Throwing away units when it is pretty obvious the AI will take heavy losses. Could be part of harassment? I dunno...

3. Jump harrasing units (e.g Falcons) doesn't seek and hunt down easy targets like builders. Instead shoots at structures and runs away when it takes some damage.

Uploaded the game replay for the mod team to better understand these issues:

http://www.easyshareonline.com/464347

Keep up the good work guys!

Watched the replay. You won because of a bug in Relics pathfinding code (causing problems 1. and 2.). It crashes. Arkhan wrote a substitution code but the AI can't find safe gather/attack routes on maps with curved layout. Therefore you were able to camp in the middle and the AI just tried to move past you to distant gather points while 'thinking' the route is safe. It was not. Blame Relic, we informed them about the bug but they didn't fix it.

[Dralafi_XIII]

Just a couple of quick questions and points all for the Necrons.

I pit 1v1, all Kasyr Lutien, always 1 Necron AI vs. 1 random AI. I just delete my hq at the beginning to begin
spectating (which btw if there is an easier way I'd like to hear it). I watched 6 different games with the results being for the most part the same:

-Are the Necrons supposed to horde their power? In all of the games, especially towards the beginning they horded close to 2000 (anywhere from 1400-2000).

-Necrons spent most of the beginning of the game taking strat points. My only real problem with this is that it seemed to be their only focus. They didn't build a Necron Lord until they had captured a quarter of the map and they didn't even build a Summoning Core until they captured half the map.

-As a result of previous, by the time their Monolith was getting its first upgrade, it was almost always under attack from enemy forces which, in all 6 games i did, destroyed it every time!

-The Forbidden Archive was built after the Summoning Core. I can agree with this order, but since the summoning core was always built so late, the FA was always built super late in return. imho, the abilities given to the necron lord give the necrons a great edge which is sadly received in all the cases i did too little too late.

-Also, as a minor grievance, I read somewhere in the beta threads that a script was made for the necron lord to do an emergency teleport if he was revived in the middle of enemy forces. I admit I wasn't watching him all the time, but in the few times i watched him be resurrected he did no such thing; he basically just got up off the ground and ran off, in one of the cases he didn't make it very far (Tau firepower IS the win).

All of these things could just be map specific or even just me, but if no one else notices these things I'll just shut up.

Otherwise, gj everybody! Keep up the good work!

Edit: I'll c if I can upload a demo somewhere.

Edited by Dralafi_XIII, 01 December 2006 - 04:44 PM.