Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon families
 

hey, fast question. I want my AI to design ships using 3 weapon families. I can get two families by using the majority and secondary ability, but is it actually possible to get a third weapon in the design, somehow ? In fact i want my ship to use 2 normal weapons, one short and one longrange. A third weapon family is needed because using the general "Point-defense" ability would not work, since i want the AI to use a specific point-defense weapon, and not the one with the most damage output (or however it chooses). I dont have enough AI-Tags for each point-defense weapon as well.

Any suggestions ?!

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon families
 

Using AI tags and dummy abilities (like Palace and such) is the only way to achieve it.

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

As with any valuelss ability, the AI chooses which PDC to use by tech reqs and component level, not by damage or any relevant criteria. Add some dummy tech reqs to the one you want the AI to use (multiple entries for the techs it already requires are perfect), and boost its roman numeral values by 1. This will cause the AI to use it over others.

If you want more detailed info, we are in the process of writing a formal guide to this very topic over on ModWorks:

*link*

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

oh, sure. just don't give any credit to the guys who found out and told you =P.

I am pretty sure this is wrong. Comp W is more advanced since it requires a total of 3 tech levels. While Comp X needs two tech areas, the total number of level is only 2.

I am 99% sure the AI would pick Comp W in case of of a valueless ability.

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

Erm... sorry. Would you like credit? I wasn't trying to steal your limelight, just adding information in one centralized location. I have no idea who posted what, so it is hard to just pull names out of a hat...

This has been my experience of how the AI evaluates components... I shall go test it again.

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

Ok. I don't know what I saw before that lead me to think that number of tech req areas was relevant, but it is not. Updated that linked post. Thanks for the feedback Rollo.

By the way, if you ever feel bored and want to write up little mini tutorials on any specific modding aspect, feel free to submit them to ModWorks. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Edit:
Tested a tie with valued abilities and edited post with results.

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

I pretty sure it was Timstone who found a connection between the number of tech levels/reqs and AI decisions. Bab5 tread is too long to search, so I hope my memory serves me well.

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

The problem with adding in AI tags to make the AI add a third weapon is that the AI will add that third weapon at the expense of all other weapons. Or so it has been with the test I ran. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

no, i was just pulling your leg http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

That must have some other cause. It definately works, it has been used for the space monsters since before SE4 Gold came out.

Perhaps there is not enough room in the design left to add weapons. I would need to see the design file and component list to make an educated guess.

Re: Forcing the AI to do ships with 3 weapon famil
 

Wouldn't making the AI Tag a must have ability and then defining how many under misc abilities work without shorting the primary or secondary weapon?