AI Minesweeping

Mephisto · #1 December 22nd, 2000, 04:33 PM

Yea, it is reacting to mines now.

Unfortunatly, it will also send a minesweeper if the WP is guarded by Sats.

quote:
Originally posted by KiloOhm:
Hey, I was getting whumped by the Serengeti empire over the Last few nights and was pushed back to my Last homeworld (started with 3 :-( ). Well, they were encroaching on my territory so I used a couple of cheese tactics. I first build up some "Queen Ants", which is a small fighter with max engines and a missle rack. I've noticed that missle racks are a severely overpowered weapon. They made quick work of the frigates im my system.

Then I proceeded to build a bunch of mines an put them around my home planet, along with at the warp points. The AI ran a couple of ships into the minefield before he actually SWEPT mines out of the warp point. I got the message "12 Mines have been swept from our minefield at 4,1". That's great! The AI seems to be reacting to minefields now!

Just though I'd share my observation with you guys.

[This message has been edited by [K126]Mephisto (edited 22 December 2000).]

Talenn · #2 December 22nd, 2000, 08:12 PM

No, I dont think the Missile Racks are overpowered per se, but the AI doesnt react well to being overrun with fighters...ie, it doesnt REACT at all. All of its ships will continue to carry the same number of PD weapons regardless of whether or not you use Missiles/Fighters or not.

Try using those same fighters against a fleet of your own design that includes even 2-3 Destroyers that are packed with nothing but the requireds and level 4 or 5 PD cannons. If done properly, there wont be many fighters that even get a change to fire.

Overall, I'd like to see Fighters get a slight upkeep cost associated with them. Then I'd go in and limit PD weapons a bit. As it is now, Fighters and Missiles seem to be all or nothing weapons against a human player. Either they are worthless (the enemy has plenty of PD weapons) or they are overly dominant (they DONT have enough or high enough tech PD weapons). I personally dont care for that feel, but I'm hestitant to reduce PD weapons as long as Fighters can be churned out in unlimited numbers provided a player has the patience to queue them up, deploy them and use them.

A possible solution I'm working on is to remove the ability of fighters to move within a system. That way, you would still be limited by cargo space etc and thus they are more controled. If I do that (and it works as hoped) I think toning down PD weapons would be a good idea.

Anyways, thanks for the report on the mine sweeping. Its good to see that it actually works as intended now!

Talenn

Jubala · #3 December 22nd, 2000, 11:35 PM

I think the beat way to linit pointdefense would be to remove it's ability to always hit. Why should pointdefense weapons be so much better at hitting the enemy than normal weapons? Don't they have the same targeting systems? If so, why not? You get my drift.

Mephisto · #4 December 22nd, 2000, 11:46 PM

A middleway for fighters would be to only allow replenishing them when landed and using up some resources every turn. This way the player cannot station hundereds of fighters in orbit (poor pilots...).

Noble713 · #5 December 23rd, 2000, 12:11 AM

Point Defense DOES miss, just vary rarely. I think they have a really high built-in to-hit bonus, but they aren't infallible.

Jubala · #6 December 23rd, 2000, 01:56 AM

quote:
Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
A middleway for fighters would be to only allow replenishing them when landed and using up some resources every turn. This way the player cannot station hundereds of fighters in orbit (poor pilots...).

Yeah, I agree. Seems kind of strange to me that fighters can sit month after month on top of a warp point with no support at all to rearm, refuel, rest, eat, replenish lifesupport and so on. They are very small one man vessels and I really don't think they should be capable of being in space for months, even years, without running out of supplies. Maybe they should be limited the way they where in SE3, or at least not have that capability at once, but higher up the tech tree. Or at least a limit on how long they can be deployed in space before they have to be recovered. Haven't really messed around with them after the latest patch so I don't know how the new limits affect things.

Come to think of it, in SE3 ships used up supplies every turn even if they didn't move. I think they should now to. As it is it's too easy to just park a fleet somewhere and don't even have to bother about supplies.

KiloOhm · #7 December 23rd, 2000, 02:28 AM

Hey, I was getting whumped by the Serengeti empire over the Last few nights and was pushed back to my Last homeworld (started with 3 :-( ). Well, they were encroaching on my territory so I used a couple of cheese tactics. I first build up some "Queen Ants", which is a small fighter with max engines and a missle rack. I've noticed that missle racks are a severely overpowered weapon. They made quick work of the frigates im my system.

Then I proceeded to build a bunch of mines an put them around my home planet, along with at the warp points. The AI ran a couple of ships into the minefield before he actually SWEPT mines out of the warp point. I got the message "12 Mines have been swept from our minefield at 4,1". That's great! The AI seems to be reacting to minefields now!

Just though I'd share my observation with you guys.

------------------
Regards,
KiloOhm

Maximus · #8 December 23rd, 2000, 03:42 AM

Personally, I don't think fighters are a problem in SE4. I think their are a lot of other things that MM needs to spend their time on. If you mess with fighters to much you risk damaging one of the things that makes the game great, realism.

Let's think about this for a minute. People are saying that fighters are too powerfull...compared to what??? Capital ships? Well Last time I checked, a couple squadrons of F-18's would make pretty short work of even an Aegis Cruiser if it doesn't have any support. That's why U.S fleets are "carrier" taskforces.

The best way to fight fighters, is WITH fighters.

As far as fighters not needing support, well that can be a problem if it's abused. But the flexablity that it gives you partly balances it out. The ability to attack with my fighters without moving my carriers into range is very nice. I don't know how you would limit that without totally removing that ability.

Baron Munchausen · #9 December 23rd, 2000, 05:10 AM

quote:
Originally posted by [K126]Mephisto:
[b]Yea, it is reacting to mines now.
Unfortunatly, it will also send a minesweeper if the WP is guarded by Sats.

<Insert sound of hand smacking forehead...>
Yargh! Well, edit the AI_DesignCreation files to include lots of PDC in those minesweepers and they can be "Satellite Sweepers" as well...

If only we could tell the AI how to design a FLEET as well as a ship. "Standard Bettle Fleet := 1 supply ship (crammed with solar supply generation), 1 repair ship (with repair bays), 6 attack ships (standard beam ships), 2 bombardment ships (with missiles and/or planetary weapons), 1 MINE SWEEPER ('nuff said), and maybe 1 PDC "Aegis" ship (all the PDC you can cram into a hull)...

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 23 December 2000).]

Baron Munchausen · #10 December 23rd, 2000, 05:15 AM

Re: Supplies and station keeping

There's a general problem with supplies: Ships (and fighters) do not use ANY supplies if they don't move or fire weapons. This is a bit silly. Anyone knows that a ship sitting still must still use a great deal of fuel and other supplies in order to operate its various systems and the crew does have to breathe, eat, shave/bathe or whatever personal hygene your alien race might have, and pursue a little bit of recreation while off-duty. I've tried setting a supply usage for Life Support components but it has no effect. There should be a regular supply usage by life support each turn. If MM would make the supply usage setting for Life Support work, we'd be able to limit the station-keeping time for ships and fighters reasonably. Request #9987476745 -- maybe someone should keep track of them like the Ferengi 'Rules of Acquisition'?

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 23 December 2000).]