[Suggestion] AI fights.

from Elemental Forums

Sorry, I initially posted it in wrong forum (did not know that there is special forum just for suggestions). I am re-posting it here to have proper discussion

One of the things that is missing in most of the strategy games and missing in ALL TBS games that I am aware off is the ability to set up matches of AI vs. AI. For whatever reason I enjoy doing it. Moreover I hope that we will be able to produce custom AI and include into game. We can even have a competition who writes the best AI. Something like that was done in Kohan (RTS). I still remember those superiour AIs wrote by community that made game so enjoyable in skirmishes and simply watching AI fights.

So, my wish list would be

1) Make AI easily modifiable (produce documentation may be)

2) Make possible to chose particular AI for particular side (AI may be side specific, but there could be a choice of different AIs for the same side)

3) Make possible to setup AI only match, where you remove FOW for the user to observe the fight on the whole map.

3.a) Would be nice if one could check FOW for particular AI player, to see what things it have seen and explored.

4) Make it possible to continue run turns without pressing turn button in AI fights, make it possible to pause and inspect everything for any of the sides, make possible to go step by step (turn by turn) as well.

5) Would be really cool, if at any moment of AI fight you could take control over kingdom and continue game as in single player.

6) Complimentary to above, in any single player game, one could relinquish control to AI and continue the game as AI fight. Then at any moment chose to stop AI fight and chose any side and continue game as that side.

7) To avoid temptation of cheating, one should be able to disable those items for particular game when you start it. Say a check box "locked game - no AI fights, no side switching" somewhere, and if you start game as "locked" then you would not be able to switch to AI fights or to other side. And only such locked games would be scored properly.

8) Ability to upload AI through the game interface (same as with maps)

The above suggestions would greatly simplify development of AIs and also give me personally (and possibly other players) lots of enjoyment.

 

What do you think? And do you know if there is ANY affordability of current version? My beta 4 was wiped so I can not check if there are AI related text files.

5,801 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

i would like this, but i kind of sped up version.  i would like to pit AI programmers AI against one another.  i loved doing this in supreme commander.  i would pit the sorain AI against the other various ones just to see who's was better.  of course sorians almost always won, it was a damn good AI. 

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

5) Would be really cool, if at any moment of AI fight you could take control over kingdom and continue game as in single player.
End of quote

I'm pretty sure that the devs can run an all-AI game for testing purposes, but I don't think they've ever released that functionality in the public builds for Elemental or GC2. Putting that together with an ability to take a faction off auto-pilot could be very interesting, especially on Ludicrously Large maps.

Galactic Civilizations III
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Yes, imagine you can be a historian watching how everything develops before your eyes with ability to interrupt the events. This is like world simulator from god's point of view. Could be really cool.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

I did it all the time in other games - GalCiv, Sins, etc. - by simply cheating myself to superiority, or being naturally better (99% of the time, against AIs of the easiest diffculty :D) and merely watching.

Heck, in Lord of the Rings: BFME, I always did this. Except I usually intervened in small ways to keep the game going, as any game can end swiftly when one AI gets the upper hand. Usually, major battles would have a handful of my soldiers, sniping away or forming a nifty shield-wall.

-N

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Nathikal, reply 4
I did it all the time in other games - GalCiv, Sins, etc. - by simply cheating myself to superiority, or being naturally better (99% of the time, against AIs of the easiest diffculty ) and merely watching. ...
End of Nathikal's quote

That's not really the same thing as the OP describes, although it might be interesting to mix watch-the-AIs with some cheats enabled for some but not all of them. Wonder if that's even possible with an internal build...

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Easily modifiable AI => long thinking AI => less thinking AI. There's no way to make AI smart, modifiable and fast. Check Civilization 4 - modifiable and fast. GalCiv - smart and fast.