Space Combat - Observations and Questions (Aaron/Richard take note)

[God Emperor]

Thought I would try and tweak the combat AI a bit, so I modified some of the races to use missiles (AI_DesignCreation.txt) and changed the AI and default strategy files to Maximum Weapons Range rather than Optimal Firing Range. I then started up a game on a small map with only the modified races in it (removed the other races from the Races Directory).

After a while I noticed that some races were doing slightly better in space combat than others, so I switched the computer players to human players and had a look. Some of the computer players only had missiles on their ships and all the fleets that existed had Maximum Weapons Range selected as their strategy. I then initiated tactical combat using each of the races.
The result was very interesting. The ships equipped only with missiles began "missile dancing" against the other ships and killed them after several rounds of combat. The ships with mixed weapons kept trying to close to maximum weapons range for their short range weapons (anti-proton beams, DUC's etc) and kept running head first into the missiles launched from the other ships.

This suggests to me that the combat routine will need to be altered to include a calculation of enemy missile strength vs friendly point defence strength, which could be used to switch the Strategy mode to "Dont Get Hurt" if the ratio was too unfavourable. Alternatively, some new strategy may have to be developed (Minimise Damage?).
At this stage I cannot see modifying the txt files will help much, although I am looking to test AI ships packed with higher point defence levels.

Therefore, I am looking at creating a new ship class for the AI (Aegis class?) which would be filled exclusively with missiles and point defence. The current Attack class ship would have its point defence heavily beefed up too.
I have two questions though;
1) Does anyone know whether there are any problems with adding a new ship class to the AI_DesignCreation.txt files?,
2) What does the text "spaces per one" mean in the AI_DesignCreation.txt files? The Default_AI_DesignCreation.txt has point defence as 250 and I'm not sure what it means.
I would appreciate any comments people may have before I start modding.
Regards,

God Emperor

[Tampa_Gamer]

God Emporer-

In response to:

(1) the "classes" of ships are called by the AI via their "AI_construction_vehicle" files. Currently, there is no way to have the AI build additional "classes" of ships other than the default "attack," "defense" etc. However, having said that you CAN create different types of "attack" or "defense" ships, etc. See the Darlok and Sergetti design files in the Mod Pack 1.01. You can also further differentiate designs based on hull size (see the Darlok). The only problem is - you cannot tell the AI to build xx number of missile ships, or xx number of Aegis defense ships, etc.

(2) There are a number of good threads on this over the past month, but essentially if I have Point Defense per one = 250. You look at the hull size (e.g. destroyer with a 300kt) and divide it into the xx per one (we think the computer rounds up in most cases). In this case, the AI "should" build 2 PD's into the design if it has researched the component with that ability and has more room. It gets a bit more complicated this, but you really should refer back to those threads for further detail. If you still have questions (we all still do) let me know and I will try to help. I pretty much monitor this board off/on while at work, so I will be here until 6 EST.

Later
-TG

[This message has been edited by Tampa_Gamer (edited 30 January 2001).]

[Baron Munchausen]

Yes, the vulnerability of the "straight ahead" attack style of the AI to missile dancing has been noted both here and on the beta forums many times. So far, none of our suggestions for modifying the way missiles work or re-arranging the default techs of the game has been applied. You should realize, though, that ships which carry only capital ship missiles have vulnerabilities of their own. For example, their main armament is useless against satellites. If a huge fleet of these ships pops through a warp point and finds dozens of heavily armed satellites waiting for them they will be slaughtered since only their point-defense guns will work against the sats. The same problem occurs against a race that relies heavily on fighters. Missiles cannot target fighters either and the "Earth Alliance" mod race would probably wipe the floor with any of the default races that merely had the "missile dance" strategy. It's probably wise not to setup a race to use ONLY missiles. Too bad you cannot tell it what proportion of it's "attack" or "defense" ships should use a particular design so you could maintain a favored style.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 30 January 2001).]

[Daynarr]

These are excellent observations God Emperor. Also, that is the main reason why I have Sergetti (or the Xi'Chung I am working on) design ships that have either missiles or beam weapons, but not both in the same time. The AI simply moves to the maximum range of its shortest-range weapon and tries to maintain that distance. So basically when a race has missile ships with 1 APB on them, that APB has effect of bringing that ship in range of enemy weapons where it is heavily outgunned (unless faced with the similar design). It is the worst scenario possible for AI (or human in strategic combat). Much better results are displayed by designs that have beams weapons as their primary weapon and missiles as secondary, where this design won't be outgunned by enemy ships in close range (excluding other factors like tech levels, etc.). Of course I prefer to have specialized ships that have either missiles or beams (or torpedoes), simply because they are optimized for their purpose - no unnecessary components on them, they are made either for close combat or missile combat (Xi'Chung have a long range non-missile combat ship, though).

These things can be edited by modding, and I got my hand full so far doing it. This design flaw is one of the reasons why choose to mod the original races in the first place - the original races can be much more fun if they would be more optimized overall. Most of the game text files have lots of things that are obsolete in them and hurt AI, because of the pace the new patches are coming out - it would take too much time for MM to get through them all each time they make changes in the game. This is where the modders could help - if we optimize AI text files, the overall AI would kick a$$.

Just like the Baron said, it would be very helpful if we could tell AI what proportion to use in building a selected style. Also, it would be helpful if we could tell AI to break formation as soon as enemy gets in range of their weapons, so missile ships would break formation and start missile dance, while short-range ships would close in on enemy. It would make combat against AI much harder.

[DirectorTsaarx]

And a side benefit of improving the AI is that strategic combat would be a better option; since strategic combat uses the AI routines for your own ships as well, any improvement to AI combat improves your own strategic combat...

Just in case no-one's pointed that out yet

[rdouglass]

quote:

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Originally posted by DirectorTsaarx:
And a side benefit of improving the AI is that strategic combat would be a better option; since strategic combat uses the AI routines for your own ships as well, any improvement to AI combat improves your own strategic combat...

Just in case no-one's pointed that out yet

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IMO that would not be the case. Since you're both using the same AI files (in strategic combat), ship design, strategy (Max Range, Dont Get Hurt, etc), and formations are really the key factors.

However, I'm not that knowledgeable about modding. If the AI's use their own "Strategic Combat" files, then my argument holds no water....



[This message has been edited by rdouglass (edited 30 January 2001).]