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AI/Difficulty Levels


PSY

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Apologies if this has been covered before. The demo does not appear to have any settings on AI difficulty level. I would consider this a very useful feature.

I'm sure BTS has already thought these through, but here are my thoughts on some of the techniques used for handicapping the AI or player:

<UL>

<LI>Adding or Subtracting Forces. I think this is probably one of the best ways of handling difficulty levels.

<LI>Changing AI Behavior. Another good approach, although I imagine it could be difficult to do, depending on how the AI is programmed. If it's simply a matter of reducing the depth of search trees used by the AI, then this is a good way to go.

<LI> Skewing Odds For/Against Player. Some games tweak with the combat odds to make the game harder. I'm not a big fan of this approach, but I suppose it's probably the easiest way to go and certainly is better than nothing.

Speaking of adding and subtracting forces from the AI, is there an option allowing players to pick and choose their forces for a given scenario using a point system ala Squad Leader's Design Your Own scenarios. I know it's probably difficult to get the point values balanced, but I find these lots of fun.

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Combat Mission actually will come with a way to adjust the AI, if you look at it the right way. When I designed scenarios for Close Combat, I would make two different kinds. One for head to head play, and one for human vs. AI. In the latter, the human player would get maybe one fifth to one tenth of the amount and quality of troops as the AI. This was to make up for the ineffectiveness of the AI, of course.

Since Combat Mission will come with a handy dandy editor, then you can edit scenarios yourself to adjust for playing against the AI. If you are repeatedly trounced by the AI on one scenario, then load it into the editor and reduce its forces a bit. If the AI is too easy, then you can add more forces and reinforcements.

As an added benefit, the programmers at BTS can concentrate on other things like making the AI even better and adding a feature that automatically adds ground attack aircraft to the OOB of anyone playing against Fionn.

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Thorsten

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