High Quality AI

[lparkh]

Having been able to trounce the AI in SC1 and with a bit of trial and error in SC2 I am really impressed with the AI in WAW. the scripts really do a good job. The russians stopped me and managed to maintain a coherent front. I can see the AI moving units to plug holes. Then I received a massive invasion in sicily. That despite my have 4 capital ships lined up in anticipation. Well I was able to hold there (the AI is still not too bright about putting HQs with units (it put poor bradley by himself). I figured the allies were used up till 44.. then I got ANOTHER massive invasion in france. Caen captured! I am deep trouble now and expect the AI to win.

Very impressive! Kudos to all involved.

[lparkh]

Having been able to trounce the AI in SC1 and with a bit of trial and error in SC2 I am really impressed with the AI in WAW. the scripts really do a good job. The russians stopped me and managed to maintain a coherent front. I can see the AI moving units to plug holes. Then I received a massive invasion in sicily. That despite my have 4 capital ships lined up in anticipation. Well I was able to hold there (the AI is still not too bright about putting HQs with units (it put poor bradley by himself). I figured the allies were used up till 44.. then I got ANOTHER massive invasion in france. Caen captured! I am deep trouble now and expect the AI to win.

Very impressive! Kudos to all involved.

[Timskorn]

Nice to hear, I haven't played as Axis yet vs. AI.

Currently playing as Allies, Expert +0. It's October, 1942 and the Germans have already advanced to Stalingrad and Gorky. I've finally been able to slow them down. It's clear the Axis AI gets considerable early-game units via script, and I believe Hubert mentioned this as well. It's allowed them to be competent on all fronts (AF to defend against bombing raids in France, units for North Africa and a huge force for Barbarossa (At least 5 armor + numerous ground and air units).

I still see mistakes with the AI, such as armor double-striking an entrenched AT unit even after taking considerable losses during the first strike, and the AI still can't seem to handle North Africa very well (Ie, softening up El Alamein with air before attacking with ground). He sends a unit or two at a time at the fortification, and with the British armor, artillery and air supporting, I could blast every unit that came up. They retreated fine, except for leaving Rommel all alone in the city west of Tobruk.

Having the increased early units for the Axis AI has certainly helped a lot though, and the AI definitely finds weak spots better, attacking vulnerable units with air and ground. This in itself goes a long way in allowing the AI to actually finish off units, as before there was too many times they'd hurt a unit but not destroy it when they could have.

So far so good though and it's a lot of fun, looking forward to seeing how the rest of this game plays out and how playing the Allied AI is.

[ December 01, 2007, 05:15 PM: Message edited by: Timskorn ]

[Timskorn]

Nice to hear, I haven't played as Axis yet vs. AI.

Currently playing as Allies, Expert +0. It's October, 1942 and the Germans have already advanced to Stalingrad and Gorky. I've finally been able to slow them down. It's clear the Axis AI gets considerable early-game units via script, and I believe Hubert mentioned this as well. It's allowed them to be competent on all fronts (AF to defend against bombing raids in France, units for North Africa and a huge force for Barbarossa (At least 5 armor + numerous ground and air units).

I still see mistakes with the AI, such as armor double-striking an entrenched AT unit even after taking considerable losses during the first strike, and the AI still can't seem to handle North Africa very well (Ie, softening up El Alamein with air before attacking with ground). He sends a unit or two at a time at the fortification, and with the British armor, artillery and air supporting, I could blast every unit that came up. They retreated fine, except for leaving Rommel all alone in the city west of Tobruk.

Having the increased early units for the Axis AI has certainly helped a lot though, and the AI definitely finds weak spots better, attacking vulnerable units with air and ground. This in itself goes a long way in allowing the AI to actually finish off units, as before there was too many times they'd hurt a unit but not destroy it when they could have.

So far so good though and it's a lot of fun, looking forward to seeing how the rest of this game plays out and how playing the Allied AI is.

[ December 01, 2007, 05:15 PM: Message edited by: Timskorn ]

[Retributar]

Timskorn!:

Glad to see that "Professional Explanation" of your's as to how the 'AI' is currently operating in 'SC2'!.

I hope that your valuable insight will be considered to make the necessary adjustment's!.

[Retributar]

Timskorn!:

Glad to see that "Professional Explanation" of your's as to how the 'AI' is currently operating in 'SC2'!.

I hope that your valuable insight will be considered to make the necessary adjustment's!.

[Timskorn]

The AI also LOVES to try and steal cities and resources. This is more of an annoyance than anything, and can cause units to easily get cut off.

For example, the Germans were driving east and a Panzer went AROUND Rostov and then south to grab the Maikop oil field. He ended up at least 10 tiles away from his other units. Needless to say I ended up destroying him at supply level 0.

Another example, I had an Army on the city just northeast of Stalingrad for many turns while they assault Stalingrad. I move him away one tile, and suddenly a strength 6 German army appears to try and take the city.

It certainly makes a Russian player defend cities he normally wouldn't, but in the end I think it evens out because the Russian player can completly cut off and obliterate expensive units. Plus it's not terribly historical and is probably the most glaring AI "gamey" element I've seen.

[Timskorn]

The AI also LOVES to try and steal cities and resources. This is more of an annoyance than anything, and can cause units to easily get cut off.

For example, the Germans were driving east and a Panzer went AROUND Rostov and then south to grab the Maikop oil field. He ended up at least 10 tiles away from his other units. Needless to say I ended up destroying him at supply level 0.

Another example, I had an Army on the city just northeast of Stalingrad for many turns while they assault Stalingrad. I move him away one tile, and suddenly a strength 6 German army appears to try and take the city.

It certainly makes a Russian player defend cities he normally wouldn't, but in the end I think it evens out because the Russian player can completly cut off and obliterate expensive units. Plus it's not terribly historical and is probably the most glaring AI "gamey" element I've seen.

[lparkh]

I agree the AI shows no finess (e.g., african behavior) but on the other hand it seems to at least apply brute force where it is needed. Which is good for an AI

As human I seem to have gotten a fair number of units by script too

What is really cool is watching a script fire for allies taking a minor country. I saw a little coordinated orchestra of naval, air, and land take the capital.

Also the invasion scripts are pretty cool, but since you've not played axis yet won't ruin it for you

[lparkh]

I agree the AI shows no finess (e.g., african behavior) but on the other hand it seems to at least apply brute force where it is needed. Which is good for an AI

As human I seem to have gotten a fair number of units by script too

What is really cool is watching a script fire for allies taking a minor country. I saw a little coordinated orchestra of naval, air, and land take the capital.

Also the invasion scripts are pretty cool, but since you've not played axis yet won't ruin it for you

[Retributar]

"YODA SAYS!!!"... 'Perfect!' the "AI" may not be!, 'Better!' it will soon become!.

[Retributar]

"YODA SAYS!!!"... 'Perfect!' the "AI" may not be!, 'Better!' it will soon become!.

[Hubert Cater]

Glad to hear everyone seems to be enjoying the new and improved AI.

Just for reference on the AI unit bonuses and especially for the early years what it does receive is more or less Corps for Garrison positions and not necessarily extra units to help with the general Offensives... well not until France surrenders where it receives a task force for North Africa and a set of reserve units for Barbarossa but even here they are not available until after the DoW on the Soviet Union.

The reason these Corps units are scripted in to help the AI is that it helps the AI focus its stronger units towards the attack rather than let's say have the AI use an Army or Tank Group to Garrison Warsaw etc.

For example, in 1939 it receives a bonus Corps which it can use for Garrison duty in either Warsaw, Copenhagen, Brussels etc.

Then in 1940 it receives a Corps for Oslo (which coincides with the SURRENDER_2 event forcing the surrender of Norway) as well as Corps for Caen, Bordeaux and Essen BUT only following the surrender of France. In this latter case all this does is free up the stronger units from Garrison duty in France, in case it has not purchased enough Garrison Corps in time to do so, for the eventual build up for war with Russia.

In 1941 Germany does receive Rommel's task force for North Africa and this was mostly done to ensure a strong invasion force for Russia (less diverted units) and to keep the game interesting in North Africa for the Allies, i.e. give them a reason to keep forces down there and to continue the fight in the Med.

For Barbarrossa and as mentioned above the Axis AI does receive a set of reserve forces but for the most part they will only come into play at best the turn after the initial invasion but most likely 2 turns later as they need to be moved up to the front lines. Here they only receive 2 extra tanks but some extra air and smaller units like Anti-Tank and Artillery etc.

After that the AI will also receive bonus Corps for Garrison duty in Russia but again only after the appropriate objectives are taken and only to once again free up stronger units to continue the Offensive.

There are additional bonuses here and there like Destroyers in the Baltic to help the AI deal with the Soviet sub and an extra HQ here and there, like the one it receives in 1942 and so on.

As mentioned before the goal with the WaW AI was to improve it on many levels and not necessarily just throw a ton of extra units in your face to give the illusion of a superior AI. The base AI from Blitzkrieg was pretty good and did perform well when it had enough units to do so and this was the general idea behind the Corps unit bonuses scripted in for WaW, i.e. free up the stronger units to give the human player an appropriate challenge but at the same time I also focused on many improvements to the general AI including the tactical portion as mentioned by Timskorn and others where the AI does a much better job attacking, defending, retreating and finishing off weak and exposed units etc.

The other main improvement was simply towards how the AI makes its purchases and spends its MPPs and this will of course be very noticeable on the Expert levels where it receives additional MPP from plunder as well as from the end of turn collection. In this case it will definitely come at you with more units regardless of the scripts as the AI does not hoarde MPPs as it once did in Blitzkrieg.

I'll be the first to admit there is some slight of hand with the AI unit bonuses but the goal was to make it reasonable throughout and only with the intent to improve gameplay in a coordinated and logical manner.

In the next upgrade to the SC2 engine I will be including Global Variables as well as a #LEVEL flag for UNIT scripts etc. so this will allow better control of AI purchases, i.e. less likely to need bonus Corps for Garrison duty, as well as allow me to control just how many extra units such as in the case of the Barbarrosa reserve script the AI should receive per level. As a result it will make the overall setup that much more intuitive and reasonably controlled.

[Hubert Cater]

Glad to hear everyone seems to be enjoying the new and improved AI.

Just for reference on the AI unit bonuses and especially for the early years what it does receive is more or less Corps for Garrison positions and not necessarily extra units to help with the general Offensives... well not until France surrenders where it receives a task force for North Africa and a set of reserve units for Barbarossa but even here they are not available until after the DoW on the Soviet Union.

The reason these Corps units are scripted in to help the AI is that it helps the AI focus its stronger units towards the attack rather than let's say have the AI use an Army or Tank Group to Garrison Warsaw etc.

For example, in 1939 it receives a bonus Corps which it can use for Garrison duty in either Warsaw, Copenhagen, Brussels etc.

Then in 1940 it receives a Corps for Oslo (which coincides with the SURRENDER_2 event forcing the surrender of Norway) as well as Corps for Caen, Bordeaux and Essen BUT only following the surrender of France. In this latter case all this does is free up the stronger units from Garrison duty in France, in case it has not purchased enough Garrison Corps in time to do so, for the eventual build up for war with Russia.

In 1941 Germany does receive Rommel's task force for North Africa and this was mostly done to ensure a strong invasion force for Russia (less diverted units) and to keep the game interesting in North Africa for the Allies, i.e. give them a reason to keep forces down there and to continue the fight in the Med.

For Barbarrossa and as mentioned above the Axis AI does receive a set of reserve forces but for the most part they will only come into play at best the turn after the initial invasion but most likely 2 turns later as they need to be moved up to the front lines. Here they only receive 2 extra tanks but some extra air and smaller units like Anti-Tank and Artillery etc.

After that the AI will also receive bonus Corps for Garrison duty in Russia but again only after the appropriate objectives are taken and only to once again free up stronger units to continue the Offensive.

There are additional bonuses here and there like Destroyers in the Baltic to help the AI deal with the Soviet sub and an extra HQ here and there, like the one it receives in 1942 and so on.

As mentioned before the goal with the WaW AI was to improve it on many levels and not necessarily just throw a ton of extra units in your face to give the illusion of a superior AI. The base AI from Blitzkrieg was pretty good and did perform well when it had enough units to do so and this was the general idea behind the Corps unit bonuses scripted in for WaW, i.e. free up the stronger units to give the human player an appropriate challenge but at the same time I also focused on many improvements to the general AI including the tactical portion as mentioned by Timskorn and others where the AI does a much better job attacking, defending, retreating and finishing off weak and exposed units etc.

The other main improvement was simply towards how the AI makes its purchases and spends its MPPs and this will of course be very noticeable on the Expert levels where it receives additional MPP from plunder as well as from the end of turn collection. In this case it will definitely come at you with more units regardless of the scripts as the AI does not hoarde MPPs as it once did in Blitzkrieg.

I'll be the first to admit there is some slight of hand with the AI unit bonuses but the goal was to make it reasonable throughout and only with the intent to improve gameplay in a coordinated and logical manner.

In the next upgrade to the SC2 engine I will be including Global Variables as well as a #LEVEL flag for UNIT scripts etc. so this will allow better control of AI purchases, i.e. less likely to need bonus Corps for Garrison duty, as well as allow me to control just how many extra units such as in the case of the Barbarrosa reserve script the AI should receive per level. As a result it will make the overall setup that much more intuitive and reasonably controlled.

[Timskorn]

Thanks a lot for the in-depth look at your AI Hubert. It makes sense to give the AI garrison units and it isn't an overt "cheat", but rather seems a more efficient way to streamline the way the AI uses its forces.

AI is difficult to do, and many games (particularly RTS) just pile on more cheats to make the AI more difficult. You have to, at some point, give the AI advantages but the frustration comes in when it's completely obvious they are getting huge bonuses. You've seem to have done an excellent setup so far in giving a challenging AI without beating us over the head with cheats.

And this is without me giving the AI any Exp. modifiers! Very impressed and hope to see some reviewers actually take notice, although now they'll probably complain for getting obliterated.

[Timskorn]

Thanks a lot for the in-depth look at your AI Hubert. It makes sense to give the AI garrison units and it isn't an overt "cheat", but rather seems a more efficient way to streamline the way the AI uses its forces.

AI is difficult to do, and many games (particularly RTS) just pile on more cheats to make the AI more difficult. You have to, at some point, give the AI advantages but the frustration comes in when it's completely obvious they are getting huge bonuses. You've seem to have done an excellent setup so far in giving a challenging AI without beating us over the head with cheats.

And this is without me giving the AI any Exp. modifiers! Very impressed and hope to see some reviewers actually take notice, although now they'll probably complain for getting obliterated.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

I know what you mean about the AI's "resource" greediness-there's a script in there for them to launch a one-corp invasion of Romania, if the cheating little bugger "detects" that Bucharest is unoccupied.

I was only able to win against them by focusing all early research on IT and PT, which was the only way to have enough units by 1943 to fend off invasions in the west AND keep the initiative on the Russian front.

[John DiFool the 2nd]

I know what you mean about the AI's "resource" greediness-there's a script in there for them to launch a one-corp invasion of Romania, if the cheating little bugger "detects" that Bucharest is unoccupied.

I was only able to win against them by focusing all early research on IT and PT, which was the only way to have enough units by 1943 to fend off invasions in the west AND keep the initiative on the Russian front.

[Hubert Cater]

Timskorn,

Thanks again and I too hope reviewers take notice .

In fact there is at least one review I am aware of and that is from the Armchair General and the reviewer does mention the new and improved AI:

http://www.armchairgeneral.com/articles.php?p=3716&page=1&cat=59

John,

What you experienced is probably different from what Timskorn has noticed as the AI does have some general logic to go after resources as well as cities etc., and in fact in SC1 would go after coastal cities that were left abandoned. This latter set of instructions was removed but as far as I remember with the SC2 WaW scripts there is just that one sneaky script where the AI would go after Romania if an Axis player would leave it unoccupied. Even here it does not do it 100% of the time and for the most part this was only put in to mimick some of the more devious human strategies and tactics but from an AI opponent, i.e. give the AI a more human like approach and feel in order to keep players honest and/or on their toes.

[Hubert Cater]

Timskorn,

Thanks again and I too hope reviewers take notice .

In fact there is at least one review I am aware of and that is from the Armchair General and the reviewer does mention the new and improved AI:

http://www.armchairgeneral.com/articles.php?p=3716&page=1&cat=59

John,

What you experienced is probably different from what Timskorn has noticed as the AI does have some general logic to go after resources as well as cities etc., and in fact in SC1 would go after coastal cities that were left abandoned. This latter set of instructions was removed but as far as I remember with the SC2 WaW scripts there is just that one sneaky script where the AI would go after Romania if an Axis player would leave it unoccupied. Even here it does not do it 100% of the time and for the most part this was only put in to mimick some of the more devious human strategies and tactics but from an AI opponent, i.e. give the AI a more human like approach and feel in order to keep players honest and/or on their toes.