Remaining issues

[Jubala]

This is another prime example of the AI's complete lack of memory and threat analyzis routines. It simply doesn't remember where, why and how it's ships are being destroyed and is therefor uncapable of dealing with the threat because as far as the AI is concerned there is no threat.

[Seawolf]

OK guys but in current patch that should be fixed... currently I have ai sending warships to a planet before sending in a CS.

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Seawolf on the prowl

[Mephisto]

Here is my updated list of remaining issues that I found during my games:

1.) ECM/Combat Sensors broken. This is caused by a "misspelling" in all design files. It momentarily reads "combat to hit add" or "combat to hit dec" but should read "combat to hit offense plus" and "combat to hit defense plus".

2.) The AI constantly tries to upgrade some cargo units but fails to do so because it contains cargo. The AI should unload the cargo first (easy for fighters) or should not upgrade the cargo but instead use the ship. At the moment the ship hangs useless above a space yard and does nothing productive.

3.) The Supply Minister should take over ships without supplies from other ministers. At the moment especially colonizer are running short of supplies and try to reach distant planets (I had a colonizer with a 250 turns route!). As the AI is only producing so many colonizers and these are out to settle in the next millennium, the AI fails to colonize free planets in the vicinity if they became available (due to attacks for example).

4.) Generally, colonizers should not travel farther than Supplies + 1 system for example.

5.) The AI is ignoring the "avoid system" even if told to not enter these systems.

6.) The AI should not channel its space traffic through disrupted warp points. The AI throws away whole fleets this way.

7.) If a warp point is blocked by enemy forces, the AI should not try to move around them and spent all their movement points this way.

8.) The AI should attack satellite Groups above warp points and empty planets. I watched the AI several time to throw colonizer after colonizer without ever colonizing the planet. A combat fleet stand in the adjacent sector but never intervened.

9.) If you upgrade a damaged ship, all damaged components are repaired instantly, only the upgraded components need to be repaired after the upgrade.

10.) There seems to be a memory leak. The engine increases in memory size every time you hit the “end turn”-button until the program become 105 MB. After a while it will drop out with “out of memory”.

11.) “Range Check Error” present, a save game file is available. There seems to be an error with the troop transport.

12.) The name file (at least the “states.txt”) is to small. The AI runs out of names and stops building new designs altogether. Just increase the design name addendum from 10 to 20 and it should work again (or just add more states :-)).

13.) When the design AI should fill up with shields, it will do so with shield generators every time but should use phased shield generators if available.

14.) There seems to be a problem with the AI focusing on an attack when more then 1 enemy is present. In a test game, the AI would not wipe out the Amonkrie in 2 systems within 500 turns (but did battle them once in a while). More enemies were present on other borders.
After surrendering all other empires to the Phong (i.e. only 1 enemy empire left) the AI went straight into an offensive in these old “Amonkrie”-systems, wiping out colony after colony ASAP (I could not have done it better), clearing the 2 systems in no time. All parameters were the same except there was just one enemy race left instead of 4.

Wishes:

1.) Add a line “use master computer if available” in the design files. At the moment you cannot prevent the AI from designing ships with bridges, life support and crew quarters.

2.) The empire AI should scrap old units (fighters, weapon platforms) to gain cargo space making room for the new designs.

3.) Atmospheric Converter: The AI should check if the planet already has the desired atmosphere and skip building the facility. It should also scrap the facility if the desired atmosphere has been produced.

4.) The AI should use all remaining points between the maintenance max. and the actually income to build units (if storage is already full). At the moment the AI stops building units if it has reached its maintenance max. even so there are resources left and units don’t cost maintenance.

5.) When assigning orders from the AI_Construction_Vehicles.txt, the AI should try to assign as many as production facilities and resources allow. I.e. if the AI should build 10 cruisers and has only 5 space yards it should order 5 cruisers and go on searching for a unit production and assign them to in effect building both, cruisers and units at the same time.

[Daynarr]

You could consider e-mailing that list to MM, Mephisto. There are some important bugs in there (the one with cargo bothers me the most).

[Mephisto]

I sent them my first list. As they are on vacation I will wait until the 4th of January to mail them again. No need to cluster their account with list after list with only one more point each time.

quote:

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Originally posted by Daynarr:
You could consider e-mailing that list to MM, Mephisto. There are some important bugs in there (the one with cargo bothers me the most).

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

[Tomgs]

Another minor one. I have seen this twice now since the patch. When I have attacked an enemy planet and there is a small transport there it for some reason tries to attack me even though it has no weapons not even a point defence. It moves right next to me and stops, waiting for me to destroy it. It must for some reason not have the don't get hurt strategy turned on. Maybe its a troop transport? It had no cargo on board that I could see so I couldn't tell what type of cargo it was supposed to hold.

[Daynarr]

Tomgs, can you remember what race used that transport?

[Tomgs]

The Last race I saw doing it was the Que Cappa. One race did it before it might have been the Sergetti but I can't remember that one for sure.

[Daynarr]

It was troop transport Tomgs.
Troop transport uses capture planet strategy. While reading DefaultStrategies.txt I checked that strategy and found an error in it. Its primary movement strategy is drop troops, and secondary is optimal firing range. Since AI troop transports don't have any weapons on them they behave just like you described. You can easily fix this just by changing their secondary movement strategy to "Don't get hurt".
Btw. the DefaultStrategies.txt file is located in DATA folder.

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

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

[Tomgs]

Thanks Daynarr I made the changes in my set-up. That should fix that problem.