AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Has anyone else noticed that the AI's construction queue's tend to be empty, atleast later in the game? Usually if it is constructing something they are facilities or upgrades to existing buildings. I have seen this in EVERY game so far i've played.
Almost in every case AI has enough resource production (sometimes 10x more than upkeep costs) and it still is not building ships or anything else. I've also made sure that there are enough calls to build things in <xxx>_constuction_vehicles.txt but this seems to have no effect (each AI state has ENOUGH calls and the construction file does not contain any errors like empty extra lines).

I have been doing some testing on this subject and noticed that the problem does not exist until AI has made contact to other races.

So now i'm asking if anyone else has noticed this kind of AI behaviour?

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

I noticed exactely the same and my attemps to improve that by modifying the construction.vehicle.txt files were also a failure. But the latter may be due to my insufficient knowledge. I think this is one of the most important weaknesses of the AI in the later game and I mailed it to MM with the hope they fix it sometimes. I have the suspicion it might be in some way connected to the AI state, but again nobody seems to know how this state is determined and could be checked, so it is very hard to verify.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

There are 2 things you need to know:

1) AI ministers mostly work after you press the end turn button. That means that when you take control of the AI empire you will see only things he didn't finish building in 1 turn. The queue gets filled only after you press the end turn button (same goes for the research). You can see what AI has built Last turn by checking log at the beggining of the next turn.

2) In AI_Vehicle_creation file is specified what the AI will build. If the AI has completed queue it will stop building. Note that the number of things AI will build depends heavily on the number of planets it has - Bigger empire has bigger fleets.

Of course, AI_Vehicle_creation file can be improved significantly by moding, and we did that in our mod pack.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

To add to what Daynarr said (we have put oodles of time into this specific file) - you also have to be careful of what AI state the particular race is in at that point. While there may be enough "calls" in certain states (like exploration), other AI states may make calls to tech the player doesn't have yet (various creator and destroying ships) or the AI has met the sufficient xx per planet ratio. I know for a fact that the AI tends to be in "defensive" mod a lot more than the others, so it is important to have a wide-variety of "calls" in this AI State in case the AI flips to this state when it should be building infrastructure and still exploring (thanks to a pointer by Mephisto). I also think there is a limit to how many "calls" the AI will process in a given turn based on what I have seen.

[This message has been edited by Tampa_Gamer (edited 01 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Daynarr:
There are 2 things you need to know:

1) AI ministers mostly work after you press the end turn button. That means that when you take control of the AI empire you will see only things he didn't finish building in 1 turn. The queue gets filled only after you press the end turn button (same goes for the research). You can see what AI has built Last turn by checking log at the beggining of the next turn.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, i know this, i've checked it.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>
2) In AI_Vehicle_creation file is specified what the AI will build. If the AI has completed queue it will stop building. Note that the number of things AI will build depends heavily on the number of planets it has - Bigger empire has bigger fleets.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

In my testgames AI will never run out of something to construct, i've made sure of it... (call to build 10000 Attack ships at the end of each states queue). Also i've made sure that it cant run out of resources due to maintenance costs by setting maintenance percentage to 0%. Still its queues are empty. Though they are empty only after AI has made contact to other AI empires, and even then they are not empty 100% of the time...

Of course, AI_Vehicle_creation file can be improved significantly by moding, and we did that in our mod pack.[/b][/quote]

Yes, i've used your mod pack, great job by the way http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif, but it does not fix this problem...

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Daynarr you are certainly right about these two points but
1.) When you check the log and see that e.g. only five items have been fished construction Last turn and you have 20 empty construction queues, then 15 must have been empty the Last turn.
2.) Your modification sure did make a big improvement but even with your modification pack 1.01 I see many empty construction queues in Earth Alliance, Sergetti and Darlok when they have several 10000 resource points left in all three catogeries, that can't be stored and therefore are wasted. This occurs only later in them game, after about 100 turns.

Tampa-Gamer you might very well be right, that the AI considers only a limited number of lines in the construction list per turn. This would explain, why in the early game the empty construction queues are not so evident than in the later game, where you have much more resources to spend.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

You need to have some storage facilities. Even if you have plenty of resources left and the ship/unit to build is no problem at all the AI will still stop building anything until you give them some storage facilities.

[This message has been edited by [K126]Mephisto (edited 03 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
I can think of 2 possible reasons for this:

1.) You need to have some storage facilities. Even if you have plenty of resources left and the ship/unit to build is no problem at all the AI will still stop building anything until you give them some storage facilities.

2.) You describe the problem as partial using of the queues. The AI will only process 1 line at a time no matter how much resources are left for building the second or later lines. A good example are colonizers:
If you make the AI build a large number of colonizers the Ai is nearly stuck in this build line as colonizers are often destroyed or reach their target. The AI will then try to reach the specified number of colonizers again so it is stuck at this build line. A solution is to build only a few colonizers in the first line (to make sure their are always some colonizers), add a second line for some warships and make a third line for some more colonizers.
This concept is true for warships, too. If you tell the Ai to build 1 ship per planet the AI is virtually stuck at this line as it is very hard to reach that many ships (to many are lost for some reason or another to get this number of ships). Hope this helps.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

You could consider forwarding this to MM, if you haven't done so already.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

I did. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
I think MM will get to this once the have squished all the other nasty little bugs.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

This is a very useful information Mephisto. It explains the problems I have encountered when trying to modify the construction.vehicle.txt files. Now I will try again!
Thank you very much.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
I can think of 2 possible reasons for this:

1.) You need to have some storage facilities. Even if you have plenty of resources left and the ship/unit to build is no problem at all the AI will still stop building anything until you give them some storage facilities.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, this can cause AI building problems, but AI usually had enough storages... (500k,250k,250k)


<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>
2.) You describe the problem as partial using of the queues. The AI will only process 1 line at a time no matter how much resources are left for building the second or later lines.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Hummh.. do you mean that AI will process only 1 entry from the construction.txt file each turn? I made a testconstuction.txt file that contained 30 emptry entries, all the stellar manipulation entries from the infrastructure state and at the end was a call to build 5 colonizers. AI had NO problems building those colonizers each and every turn. So i dont think this could be the reason. There seemed to be no limit how many lines it could process each turn.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>
A good example are colonizers:
If you make the AI build a large number of colonizers the Ai is nearly stuck in this build line as colonizers are often destroyed or reach their target. The AI will then try to reach the specified number of colonizers again so it is stuck at this build line. A solution is to build only a few colonizers in the first line (to make sure their are always some colonizers), add a second line for some warships and make a third line for some more colonizers.
This concept is true for warships, too. If you tell the Ai to build 1 ship per planet the AI is virtually stuck at this line as it is very hard to reach that many ships (to many are lost for some reason or another to .<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, i was very careful to avoid this problem in my testgames. The only entry that was impossible for the AI to build was the LAST entry at each AI state. While being in the exploration state (AI seems to always be on exploration state untill it makes first contact) AI's were building just fine. Then after they made contact, some of the AI's stopped building. Then the AI's that did not stop building started to whack those that did stop building. Even though the ones that stopped all building were losing huge amounts of ships they were not trying to replace their losses. They had enough resource production (maintenance was 0%), enough storage facilities and every AI state in the construction.txt file should have been screaming for them to build more ships.
But they didn't... this is the problem that has been bothering me.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR> every AI state in the construction.txt file should have been screaming for them to build more ships.
But they didn't... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Suicidal AI?

------------------
Assume you have a 1kg squirrel
E=mc^2
E=1kg(3x10^8m/s)^2=9x10^16J
which, if I'm not mistaken, is equivilent to roughly a 50 megaton nuclear bomb.
Fear the squirrel.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
Line 3 and all following are ignored now no matter how much more resources or space yards you have left! We already build something and that is enough for the AI.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>


So you are saying if 100 spaceyards are empty and it decides based on this to build 1 colonizer this turn then it will leave all the other spaceyards empty? It seems that we should severly limit the number of spaceyards that the AI builds then because after the first few they will always have many empty ones. No wonder I almost always see 80 to 90% empty build queues on the AI in the mid to late game. This is just wrong. If the AI could be made to use its existing resources, even though it doesn't seem to follow up enough, it would have then have enough ships to pose a threat and have some defence. I would hope that this changes soon and allows the AI to build ships with the amount of maintaince and building queues in mind instead of the number of lines it can read.

The other problem the AI has with scrapping ships and bases is probably related to this also. If it hits a line that causes it to build many ships all at once and it has the capability to do that it will probably overbuild its maintaince capabilities and then have to scrap ships to survive.

[This message has been edited by Tomgs (edited 02 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Tomgs:

So you are saying if 100 spaceyards are empty and it decides based on this to build 1 colonizer this turn then it will leave all the other spaceyards empty? It seems that we should severly limit the number of spaceyards that the AI builds then because after the first few they will always have many empty ones. No wonder I almost always see 80 to 90% empty build queues on the AI in the mid to late game. This is just wrong. If the AI could be made to use its existing resources, even though it doesn't seem to follow up enough, it would have then have enough ships to pose a threat and have some defence. I would hope that this changes soon and allows the AI to build ships with the amount of maintaince and building queues in mind instead of the number of lines it can read.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I have tested this and can assure you now that the AI does build from more than one line per turn. Infact it assigns them atleast from 10 different lines. You can test this by your selves by starting a game with modified construction file. Modify the exploration state and put on each line different item with 1 Must Have At Least.
Start a new game with 10 planets at start option turned on (each planet does have 1 space yard so you have 10 space yards). Let the computer make 1 turn then check its build queue and you will notice that each space yard is building different item and all the 10 space yards are in use. So this clearly is not the limiting factor...

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by HreDaak:
I have tested this and can assure you now that the AI does build from more than one line per turn. Infact it assigns them atleast from 10 different lines. You can test this by your selves by starting a game with modified construction file. Modify the exploration state and put on each line different item with 1 Must Have At Least.
Start a new game with 10 planets at start option turned on (each planet does have 1 space yard so you have 10 space yards). Let the computer make 1 turn then check its build queue and you will notice that each space yard is building different item and all the 10 space yards are in use. So this clearly is not the limiting factor...

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>


But have you tested this a bit later in the game? The initial build queue could easily be different than the ongoing behavior of the AI. Empty all the build queues 10 turns into the game scrap all the ships that would prevent the build from happening and look again will it still build them then? I will have to try this because something is limiting the AI from building and this seems to fit the reality that I usually see.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>
But have you tested this a bit later in the game? The initial build queue could easily be different than the ongoing behavior of the AI. Empty all the build queues 10 turns into the game scrap all the ships that would prevent the build from happening and look again will it still build them then? I will have to try this because something is limiting the AI from building and this seems to fit the reality that I usually see.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yep.. just finished testing this and the AI did build items from more than one line...
Just found out something interesting in one other game. I modified the construction.txt file so that all the AI states use same construction list, the exploration list (note that this does not prevent the AI from changing state). It's now turn 50 in the test game and so far none of the AI players are experiencing troubles in their building. All the space yards are full every turn. Almost all of them have made contact to several other races and wars are raging. So far so good...

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Ok people,
your are absolutly right. I have just tested it again. I will delete my previous crap so noone is confused by it. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
Ok people,
your are absolutly right. I have just tested it again. I will delete my previous crap so noone is confused by it. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

No no, all were valid points that had to be checked...

I think i now have another theory of what causes that elusive building problem. It must have something to do with different AI states. I think that the AI somehow fails to initialize it's build list when it changes it's AI state. The reason why i think that this might be the cause of the problem is that the AI is ALWAYS on exploration state until it makes contact to other races. This is the moment usually that these building problems start. I am now on turn 100 in my testgame (was on turn 50 in my previous post) and NONE of the AI players have experienced ANY shipbuilding problems. Changes in this games settings are:

1. Set the minimum empire storage capacity to 1000000
2. Set Empire Starting Percent Maint Cost to 0

Now with these settings there should be no limit on the number of ships the AI can build (except at game settings per player limit 2000).

Now, if you use the 'normal' construction.txt that has different lists for almost every AI state the building problems usually start when the AI makes contact to other AI empires (this usually causes the change in AI state). But if you modify this so that every AI state uses the same building list no problems appear... although this could use some more testing until one can be absolutely certain of this.

If someone else wants to test this please post your conclusions in this thread...

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

My observations are that the AI is most of the time in "defense" so this should be the queue you should look for.
Can you attach a save game with the AI not building? This would make the whole process much easier.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

I would advise you guys to e-mail Aaron whatever you discover immediately.

The patch will be ready soon, and I would like to see your discoveries added to it.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Here it the savegave file Mephisto. All AI build very little, only one or to items per turn. The only exeption are the Sergetti! The Earth Alliance and Borg were also building not much until I turned the AI completely off and then one turn later on again. I use Mod Pack 1.01 plus the Borg race. I made some changes in the vehicle.construction.txt files of the Earth Alliance and the Borg, but not the other races. The Earth Alliance has now one identical list for all AI states, so I could better monitor the effects. But all the other race files are not altered. Maximum number of systems is 250. I made a few changes in some components (fighter bay, mine layer, satellite bay) but I don't think this will be important. Futhermore I use modified weapon mounts for weapon platforms and satellites. If you need them I could post them as well. Hope this works for you!
Thank you for your help.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

O-ho! That are MANY systems. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
I "solved" the problem for the EA in the game by building just one more mineral storage facility. They immediately begun to build fighters again.
For the Darlok it was sufficient to cancel their treaty with a neutral race to have them build their ships again.
I will have a look into this (especially the Last thing) but your game is so big that it takes forever to make one turn. Furthermore the Darlok use more ship classes then a "normal" race and your game is so big that even this can result in errors (I had a fatal RCE in the ship design menu with your game for example). So I can't pinpoint it exactly but I will have a look into it.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by HreDaak:
Now, if you use the 'normal' construction.txt that has different lists for almost every AI state the building problems usually start when the AI makes contact to other AI empires (this usually causes the change in AI state). But if you modify this so that every AI state uses the same building list no problems appear... although this could use some more testing until one can be absolutely certain of this.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

HreDaak,

This sounds like a major problem with the AI opponent.

I haven't done anything myself with the AI files. So I really don't trust myself to modify mine correctly to fix this problem.

I would greatly appreciate some advice from you on how I can fix this in my game. what recomendations can you make on what AI state build list to use for every AI state and how do I modify this.

Thanks

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Q, I have d/l your savegame too and took a peek at what is going there. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif
So far I have taken control of Sergetti to see how are they doing, and I must admit that I am kindda proud of them http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif. However, it took them forever to finish their movement (about 30 minutes at least), so I didn't get any further than that. I can make an assumption on why they don't show problems with building queues like the rest of the races. Assuming that Mephisto is right and AI mostly uses Defensive state, the important change is the Last line in the Sergetti_AI_Construction_Vehicles.txt file that makes them build large number of attack ships (the Last line in the Sergetti defensive state queue, of course). You could try putting these lines at the end of all AI states for all AI empires and see if that helps. I just can't find enough time to test this myself.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Sorry for the many systems Mephisto, but when I started this game I never had in mind it may become something for others to examine!
It is very curious that you get RCE, because as you can see I played it for 200 turns (and continue to play it) without any error Messages. And I do definitely not have a super computer (Pentium II, 233MHz, 32MB RAM)!
But I am very happy that at least some points you could examine and fix. The most astonishing in this game for me is the Sergetti empire. They continue to grow and construct many ships, units and facilities and became number one with twice the score of number two. What do the Sergetti have, the others lack?? And did you realize, that the lack of construction is not confined to units and ships but also to facilities? Even if there is lot of empty space on the colonies left, no facilities (or very few) are built. These AI behaviour started about turn 150, but I don't have a savegame file from that time.
Thank you again for your work and help.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

I think that atleast part of the building problems that the AI is experiencing are caused by this 'bug':

It involves Defense Bases and Colonizers. Here is an easy way to reproduce this 'bug'. Modify the construction queue:


AI State := Exploration
Num Queue Entries := 3
Entry 1 Type := Colonizer
Entry 1 Planet Per Item := 200
Entry 1 Must Have At Least := 1
Entry 2 Type := Defense Base
Entry 2 Planet Per Item := 150
Entry 2 Must Have At Least := 2
Entry 3 Type := Attack Ship
Entry 3 Planet Per Item := 50
Entry 3 Must Have At Least := 10

Now after you've done this load space empires again and start a new game. Take hotseat game, any two races of which one is AI controlled and the other player controlled. Run 20-25 turns, check what the AI player is doing. It's build queues should be empty and it should have 0 attack ships.

This indeed is a strange thing as i could not reproduce this bug with any other items.
As far as i know it only works with colonizers and defense bases. And even then you must put them in right order and so that the Colonizer Planet Per Item is higher than Defense Base Planet Per Item and the Colonizer Must Have At Least is lower than Defense Base Must Have At Least.

Oh.. and one other thing i noticed about colony ships is the fact that AI builds them ONLY if it has colonizable planets available. If it does not see any available planets then it skips all colony ship entries in construction queues.

[This message has been edited by HreDaak (edited 05 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Last Posts way caused the AI to limit it's expansion to it's starting system. Here is another way to produce the same effect but now AI is not limited to it's starting system... (AI uses only Attack ships/Carriers to explore new systems)

AI State := Exploration
Num Queue Entries := 4
Entry 1 Type := Colonizer
Entry 1 Planet Per Item := 200
Entry 1 Must Have At Least := 2
Entry 2 Type := Attack Ship
Entry 2 Planet Per Item := 0
Entry 2 Must Have At Least := 1
Entry 3 Type := Defense Base
Entry 3 Planet Per Item := 100
Entry 3 Must Have At Least := 3
Entry 4 Type := Attack Ship
Entry 4 Planet Per Item := 0
Entry 4 Must Have At Least := 10

This should have same effect, except in addition AI should have 1 attack ship.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Daynarr you have every reason to be proud of your Sergetti empire. They are just doing great!
I tried your suggestion and I even copied the whole Sergetti_AI_Construction_Vehicles.txt file in other races with empty construction lines. No effect until now. I get more and more the feeling that the problem lies not only in the AI_Construction_Vehicles.txt file but somewhere else. But I have no idea where this might be.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Ok guys, just modify your vehicle construction files and watch the AI kick some major butt http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif.

1. Do not let the AI build defense bases!!! I think that there is some sort of conflict between defense bases and colonizers, this conflict (when it appears) can cause the AI to get stuck on its build queue.
2. Avoid filling planets with stuff. This concerns especially weapon platforms as they take HUGE amounts of planets cargo space. I suggest not to build more than 1 weapon platform per planet. If you let the AI build all/almost all of it planets full of stuff it causes AI to get stuck on its build queue when it is building things that use up planetary cargo space.

After these changes i am pretty sure that the AI will never experience building problems, unless ofcourse its running out of resources...

Some time ago i was talking about changing construction.txt file so that all the AI states would use the same build list. I was using the default (malfadors) construction file. In this construction file there are defense base calls only in infrastructure AI state. When the AI changed its state to infrastructure state it sooner or later caused that conflict between colonizers and defense bases. This in turn caused the AI to stop its building...

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by HreDaak:
Ok guys, just modify your vehicle construction files and watch the AI kick some major butt http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif.

1. Do not let the AI build defense bases!!! I think that there is some sort of conflict between defense bases and colonizers, this conflict (when it appears) can cause the AI to get stuck on its build queue.
2. Avoid filling planets with stuff. This concerns especially weapon platforms as they take HUGE amounts of planets cargo space. I suggest not to build more than 1 weapon platform per planet. If you let the AI build all/almost all of it planets full of stuff it causes AI to get stuck on its build queue when it is building things that use up planetary cargo space.

After these changes i am pretty sure that the AI will never experience building problems, unless ofcourse its running out of resources...

Some time ago i was talking about changing construction.txt file so that all the AI states would use the same build list. I was using the default (malfadors) construction file. In this construction file there are defense base calls only in infrastructure AI state. When the AI changed its state to infrastructure state it sooner or later caused that conflict between colonizers and defense bases. This in turn caused the AI to stop its building...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I've known for a long time that the AI doesn't check if a planet has cargo space for what it is building. This results in loads of satellites being built and then LOST with nothing to show for the allocated resources. I have asked MM to let satellites (at least) be automatically deployed when built if there's no cargo space. But the defense base thing is odd. I can't imagine what might be going on there. BTW, the AI _does_ build colonizers even if it doesn't know of any colonizable planets. The "must have" entry in the queue works for colonizers. I've seen every "Neutral" I ever invaded keeping a colonizer at its homeworld even though there are no planets left that it can colonize. Too bad. This is also a useless drain of resources.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 05 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

[quote]Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
I've known for a long time that the AI doesn't check if a planet has cargo space for what it is building. This results in loads of satellites being built and then LOST with nothing to show for the allocated resources. I have asked MM to let satellites (at least) be automatically deployed when built if there's no cargo space.
[quote]

I think that the AI checks if there is enough free space in the planet to build ONE unit of the things it is trying to build. If there is less space on the planet than one of these units would take it will not try to build these on that planet. But if there is enough space for ONE unit then it will try to build as many of these units on the planet as it can in one turn, the excess units that cant fit on the planet are simply not build on that planet (log Messages: not enough storage or something). Problem in the late game are Medium and especially Large weapon platforms that are so big that many of the planets cant hold even one of these monsters. So now if there is a call to build say 2 per every planet the AI has there will soon be very acute space problems on AI planets. Some larger colonies especially the ones with breathable atmosphere are able to hold several Large weapon platforms but the amount of these planets is very limited compared to the total amount of planets the AI has. So this can cause very severe building problems for the AI in late game as only those planets with breathable atmosphere and maybe some other large/huge planets are the only ones able to hold them. This also limits the amount of planets that can even try to build them and this in turn can cause the AI build queue to advance very slowly (or stop completely if AI runs out of space) if there is a call to build huge amounts of these Medium/Large weapon platforms...

[quote]
But the defense base thing is odd. I can't imagine what might be going on there. BTW, the AI _does_ build colonizers even if it doesn't know of any colonizable planets. The "must have" entry in the queue works for colonizers. I've seen every "Neutral" I ever invaded keeping a colonizer at its homeworld even though there are no planets left that it can colonize. Too bad. This is also a useless drain of resources.[quote]

Have you tried one of the examples i have posted in my previous Posts? These will reproduce that conflict bug. I suppose this could be a typo or some other small quirk in the hard coded part of the game that partly somehow mixes up defense bases and colonizers, but only Malfador can say if it is so...

Hummh.. i meant that the AI will not assign any more colonizers in its build queues if it does not see any more colonizable planets. This does not prevent the AI from having few leftover colonyships from turns that it still had one planet left to colonize. You can easily test this by making a construction file that has only 1 entry in the exploration AI state.

AI State := Exploration
Num Queue Entries := 1
Entry 1 Type := Colonizer
Entry 1 Planet Per Item := 0
Entry 1 Must Have At Least := 1000

AI will build new colonizers as long as it has free colonizable planets in its home system. Once there are no more free planets left in its home system it does not assign more colonyships to be built. Note that this can cause the AI to have 1 or more leftover colonyships depending on how many turns it took for the Last colonizer to do its job.
I think this is the reason why neutrals can have few colonyships left even though they have no more planets to colonize.

[This message has been edited by HreDaak (edited 06 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

You should forward these findings and savegames to MM before the patch comes out.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Daynarr:
You should forward these findings and savegames to MM before the patch comes out.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I will, but could someone else also try one of those construction lists and report if he experiences same kind of behaviour as i have.
I would like to be absolutely certain of this until i bug MM.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

HreDaak,
Thanks for the information. I went into my AI files tonight and removed the Defense Base call from the lists and set all the weapon platform calls to 1 per planet.

I also put in God Emperor's increased AI PD Mod.

I play with a heavily Modded set of files and have been for weeks. It has been stable thus far although the AI never built enough stuff. I'm hoping these changes may cure a lot of that.
Thanks again to you and Emperor

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Tenryu:
HreDaak,
Thanks for the information. I went into my AI files tonight and removed the Defense Base call from the lists and set all the weapon platform calls to 1 per planet.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The changes you made to the vehicle construction.txt file will take effect only if you load space empire IV again and start a new game. Saved games are not affected by these changes.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Ah, a very interesting topic!

HreDaak, I can confirm both of your observations regarding the defence base and the units.
The reason for production crippling due to units is AFAI can see it the cargo space. The AI just runs out of space but is still trying to produce units in effect building nothing.

But the best is, I think I found the error with the defence bases. It is plain simple. The AI analyses each turn which planet to protect (and will move its defence fleets in accordance). The AI is obviously doing the same for a defence base. So, what does this mean?
Simple. Every time you start a colonizer and this colonizer reaches a world, it will build a defenceless colony which the AI will try to protect with a defence fleet - or a defence base. As we need a space yard for building the base the AI tries something impossible - it tries to build a defence base at planet with no yard! So in effect the AI will try to build a base at this site to fulfil the requirements of the construction file but will never succeed crippling the total production this way.
I have confirmed this by building only space yard enabled colonies. The AI had no problems, builded a base at one of the new colonies and proceeded to build more stuff of the later lines.

I will send this to MM.

[This message has been edited by [K126]Mephisto (edited 06 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
Ah, a very interesting topic!

HreDaak, I can confirm both of your observations regarding the defence base and the units.
The reason for production crippling due to units is AFAI can see it the cargo space. The AI just runs out of space but is still trying to produce units in effect building nothing.

But the best is, I think I found the error with the defence bases. It is plain simple. The AI analyses each turn which planet to protect (and will move its defence fleets in accordance). The AI is obviously doing the same for a defence base. So, what does this mean?
Simple. Every time you start a colonizer and this colonizer reaches a world, it will build a defenceless colony which the AI will try to protect with a defence fleet - or a defence base. As we need a space yard for building the base the AI tries something impossible - it tries to build a defence base at planet with no yard! So in effect the AI will try to build a base at this site to fulfil the requirements of the construction file but will never succeed crippling the total production this way.
I have confirmed this by building only space yard enabled colonies. The AI had no problems, builded a base at one of the new colonies and proceeded to build more stuff of the later lines.

I will send this to MM.

[This message has been edited by [K126]Mephisto (edited 06 February 2001).]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Excellent! Send it to MM ASAP http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif. The solution you've come up with the defense bases sounds reasonable to me. For now everyone should just remove defense bases from their vehicle construction.txt files and make sure that there is enough space on AI planets. This will let the AI build HUGE amounts ships and other stuff.

I have another test game running now in huge galaxy with 254 systems. There are 10 AI players with low computer bonus in this game and some of them are simply enormous. The first AI player atm is Cue Cappa commonwealth. It has score of 3.1M, 216 planets in 47 systems, 324 ships and over 3000 units. Second is the Xi'Chung hive with 2.1M score, 105 planets in 23 systems, 251 ships and over 1300 units. The third one is amonkrie with over 1.6M score.. and the other AI players are doing also pretty well except the cryslonite empire which is about to be wiped out by the Ukra'Tal. So far none of them has had any building problems. This is with the removal of defense bases and making sure that the AI does not run out of space on its planets. Oh and btw its turn 150 in this test game...

One thing i have also noticed is the fact that the AI does not take full advantage of its bonuses when you give it low/medium/high computer bonus. The bonus that does not get fully used is the production bonus. AI gets 2x, 3x, 4x the resources each turn it produces with the computer bonus turned on. But it's ship maintenance max is specified in each races settings.txt file and this is usually set to 80% of max resource income. By setting this limit lets say to 160%, 240% and 320% respectively you can get the AI build absolutely insane amounts of ships (without it having any maintenance problems)provided that you have also fixed those 2 other production problems...

[This message has been edited by HreDaak (edited 06 February 2001).]

[This message has been edited by HreDaak (edited 06 February 2001).]

[This message has been edited by HreDaak (edited 06 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by HreDaak:
[b] Excellent! Send it to MM ASAP http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif. The solution you've come up with the defense bases sounds reasonable to me. For now everyone should just remove defense bases from their vehicle construction.txt files and make sure that there is enough space on AI planets. This will let the AI build HUGE amounts ships and other stuff.

I have another test game running now in huge galaxy with 254 systems. There are 10 AI players with low computer bonus in this game and some of them are simply enormous. The first AI player atm is Cue Cappa commonwealth. It has score of 3.1M, 216 planets in 47 systems, 324 ships and over 3000 units. Second is the Xi'Chung hive with 2.1M score, 105 planets in 23 systems, 251 ships and over 1300 units. The third one is amonkrie with over 1.6M score.. and the other AI players are doing also pretty well except the cryslonite empire which is about to be wiped out by the Ukra'Tal. So far none of them has had any building problems. This is with the removal of defense bases and making sure that the AI does not run out of space on its planets. Oh and btw its turn 150 in this test game...

One thing i have also noticed is the fact that the AI does not take full advantage of its bonuses when you give it low/medium/high computer bonus. The bonus that does not get fully used is the production bonus. AI gets 2x, 3x, 4x the resources each turn it produces with the computer bonus turned on. But it's ship maintenance max is specified in each races settings.txt file and this is usually set to 80% of max resource income. By setting this limit lets say to 160%, 240% and 320% respectively you can get the AI build absolutely insane amounts of ships (without it having any maintenance problems)provided that you have also fixed those 2 other production problems...
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

In other words, there's a BUG with AI bonuses. The AI should be calculating its maintenance cost according to what it really has available to spend. If it doesn't "see" the bonus, it's as if it's not really there!

Glad to hear that this has been figured out, though. MM should credit many of you guys as Beta testers! http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif It sounds like after this next patch the AI is gonna kick ***! We may have to start using the "low" difficulty setting! http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif



[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 06 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Great work guys!
This coming patch is going to be great!

Keep up the great work.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Right from the mouth of MM (regarding cargo and defense bases):

Thanks for the excellent observations. We had noticed these as well and
are working on putting in a fix for them.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Great news Mephisto http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif.

Just to bring a small update on how the test game is progressing. Its turn 206 and here are some stats: 1st Cue Cappa with 5.1M score, 286 planets in 70 systems, nearly 4000 units and 476 ships. 2nd Xi'Chung hive with 2.2M score, 111 planets in 29 systems, nearly 1500 units and 225 ships. Seems to me that Cue Cappa has captured a fairly large fleet from Xi'Chung as it now has nearly 50 Xi'Chung ships http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif. Uuups, just noticed that the Amonkrie has climbed to the second place with 2.9M score http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif. Hih.. this indeed is fun to watch http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif. The bastard Ukra'Tal made peace with the cryslonite and they now have military alliance.. so the cryslonite meanies are still alive.. barely though as they only have 7 planets left http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif.


[This message has been edited by HreDaak (edited 06 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Thanks Mephisto.

This patch is going to be huge!
Aaron has been telling me about alot more issues he is working on that will resolve problems with exploiting the AI and play balance.

I can't wait to see how much better the AI will play.



[This message has been edited by Emperor Zodd (edited 06 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Ok, for anyone reading this thread, but afraid to modify their \AI files. Here is the file everyone is talking about with the temporary fix until the patch comes out. I have removed the Infrastructure call to "Defense Base" and substituted in its place a call to "Defense Ship". I tested this Last night, and all appears to be working OK. Place this file in your \AI directory.

[This message has been edited by Tampa_Gamer (edited 07 February 2001).]

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Tampa_Gamer:
I have removed the Infrastructure call to "Defense Base" and substituted in its place a call to "Defense Ship".<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Excellent idea Tampa! I will replace my file with this one. I just yanked the Def Base call and renumbered. I spent a few minutes thinking about putting something else in its place but, since I haven't really done much to the AI files, I wasn't sure what effect any replacement might have. The Def ship, however, sounds ok.

BTW, I also set almost all the Weapons Platform calls to 10,1. I left any 10,0 calls. Not really sure what the major difference is between these statements. If I understand it correctly, the 10,1 will build one per planet and make sure you have at least one of them( on each planet?) and the 10,0 will build one per planet.

Question: Does this mean if I have 10 planets and I have it set for 10,0 the AI may try to build 10 Weapon Platforms but might try and stick them all on the same world, whereas, the 10,1 would limit it to no more then 1 platform per world?

If it doesn't it probably should.

If the latter is true then, in line with some of the discussions here, we may also need to make sure there are no 10,0 Weapon Platform calls in the files.

Any idea?

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Tenryu:
Question: Does this mean if I have 10 planets and I have it set for 10,0 the AI may try to build 10 Weapon Platforms but might try and stick them all on the same world, whereas, the 10,1 would limit it to no more then 1 platform per world?

If it doesn't it probably should.

If the latter is true then, in line with some of the discussions here, we may also need to make sure there are no 10,0 Weapon Platform calls in the files.

Any idea?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

It is my understanding that you cannot currently pick how many of x to place per planet (I would love to be able to designate the AI to put not more than x per planet). Unfortunately, the x per planet simply makes sure if I have ten planets (using you above example)the AI will make sure I have 10 WPs in aggregate throughtout my empire. There is no difference between 10,0 and 10,1 using your above example since you will always (hopefully) have at least one planet http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif B/T/W I sent you an e-mail at your new address. Thanks for the quick response.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

JUST WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED!

22. Fixed - Improved the AI's determination of when to skip an item in its
purchase list if there is no cargo space available to hold it.
23. Fixed - The AI would try to build defense bases at planets without
spaceyards.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

Excellent.. excellent http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif. Uh.. only one thing concerns me now. How the hell am i supposed to beat the AI after the next patch?!? http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon9.gif

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by HreDaak:
One thing i have also noticed is the fact that the AI does not take full advantage of its bonuses when you give it low/medium/high computer bonus. The bonus that does not get fully used is the production bonus. AI gets 2x, 3x, 4x the resources each turn it produces with the computer bonus turned on. But it's ship maintenance max is specified in each races settings.txt file and this is usually set to 80% of max resource income. By setting this limit lets say to 160%, 240% and 320% respectively you can get the AI build absolutely insane amounts of ships (without it having any maintenance problems)provided that you have also fixed those 2 other production problems...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I don't think you are right there. The AI doesn't get any resource bonus with the computer bonus turned on. I have checked this against AI with High bonus setting and he had the same amount of resources at the start of the game (checked it on second turn) as I had.

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

I believe the computer stats show the "appropriate" amount, but they get to SPEND 2x, 3x, or 5x that amount. I.e., if you take control of the computer player for a turn, you'll see the "right" number of resources, but the actual spending is much higher... or at least that's what others have claimed (I haven't done a lot of checking on this yet)...

Re: AI construction queue problems (ship construction)
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Daynarr:
I don't think you are right there. The AI doesn't get any resource bonus with the computer bonus turned on. I have checked this against AI with High bonus setting and he had the same amount of resources at the start of the game (checked it on second turn) as I had.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, it appears as if the AI has the normal amount of resources but that is not the case. I have checked it much later in the game and even if the AI has forexample mineral income of 50k and it has 75k maintenance cost (plus construction queue usage) in minerals its mineral storages are always full.