Need Help AI is ludicrously dumb

[Lonious]

This will be the last time I'll make a thread in this forum for some time (maybe a week or so) since I've apparently been the only one spamming it recently...

So far, sea battles have been incredibly disappointing. I am using the Constitution and am DOMINATING an HMS Victory. We start off a great distance from each other, but from there all I need to do is to make a sharp turn and rake his bow continousouly. He is unable to respond, refusing to make a sharp turn to return the favour.

I can do this continously until he sinks without having shot a single broadside at my ship.

If I allow him to broadside me, he still has a tendency to continually run in circles, repeatedly exposing either his bow or stern instead of focusing on doing broadsides. He still loses horribly.

It's so embarassing to see the great HMS Victory, flagship of Admiral Nelson, run away into the horizon, scared of the comparably tiny Constitution class frigate which its 104 guns barely dented.

I believe the AI has always been like this, even since the stock game, if I'm not mistaken. On both Arcade and Realistic, the AI, especially on large ships, is so clueless. Is there any hope at all that I could make them behave more realistically, or is this currently the best we can get?

Would like to hear from you on this.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I believe the AI has always been like this, even since the stock game, if I'm not mistaken. On both Arcade and Realistic, the AI, especially on large ships, is so clueless. Is there any hope at all that I could make them behave more realistically, or is this currently the best we can get?

I've been led to understand the Maelstrom version by @ChezJfrey has smarter AI.
But I don't know the details.
Maybe @Mirsaneli or @KillPhil could elaborate with their experiences?

 

[Lonious]

I've been led to understand the Maelstrom version by @ChezJfrey has smarter AI.
But I don't know the details.
Maybe @Mirsaneli or @KillPhil could elaborate with their experiences?

How do I get this Maelstrom version? My graphics card is rather inferior. Is it demanding?

Actually, if the Maelstrom version has better AI, perhaps I'd just get that part of it, and replace my AI. If possible anyway.

EDIT: Looks like I have to buy the Maelstrom game. Why must I buy it though? Isn't it a mod? I won't be able to spend for anything here. But perhaps I could extract the AI, if that's possible at all.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

My graphics card is rather inferior. Is it demanding?

Not excessively so, I think.
Seemed to run on my 10-year-old W7 laptop.
Didn't get further than that.

perhaps I'd just get that part of it, and replace my AI. If possible anyway.

Not possible.
Code is hidden inside the engine itself, as far as I know.
I also haven't a clue what is actually changed; or how much cleverer it really is.

Looks like I have to buy the Maelstrom game. Why must I buy it though? Isn't it a mod?

Good question.
I have no valid answer.

 

[Lonious]

Not excessively so, I think.
Seemed to run on my 10-year-old W7 laptop.
Didn't get further than that.


Not possible.
Code is hidden inside the engine itself, as far as I know.
I also haven't a clue what is actually changed; or how much cleverer it really is.


Good question.
I have no valid answer.

Thanks for your quick response.

Looks like this isn't an option for me. I wouldn't want to pay for another game that uses one released by Bethesda anyway.

In any case, is this it - no way to modify the existing AI?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I wouldn't want to pay for another game that uses one released by Bethesda anyway.

Fair enough in my book. More than fair, actually...
(Oops; I said too much already. Sorry. )

In any case, is this it - no way to modify the existing AI?

As far as I am aware, on the PROGRAM side we can give tasks to the AI (Attack/Defend/Run Away).
But the strategic intelligence of the captains, I don't think we have access to that.

I wonder what @Hammie knows about this.
He works on the source code based on the TEHO branch of the engine.

 

[Hammie]

I can confirm the AI is very dumb.

I did a quick read of the engine code, and it seems there are mostly just 2 commands: move and rotate.

It should rotate to try and align it's closest cannon arc, which can be the bow or stern.

Once we can run on the new engine it would be possible to improve it, but currently it's all pretty hardcoded.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I did a quick read of the engine code, and it seems there are mostly just 2 commands: move and rotate.

Makes me wonder if we COULD override things...
I know ships can be forced to move forwards with something like:

rCharacter.Ship.Impulse.Rotate.z = 0.2 * PowerScalar * SpeedRateScalar * DamageScalar * SailCompensation;

And turning also with:

                        if(fTacking <= 0.0)        arCharShip.Impulse.Rotate.y = -0.0018;                                // Make the ship rotate to port
                        else                    arCharShip.Impulse.Rotate.y =  0.0018;                                // Make the ship rotate to starboard

 

[Lonious]

I can confirm the AI is very dumb.

I did a quick read of the engine code, and it seems there are mostly just 2 commands: move and rotate.

It should rotate to try and align it's closest cannon arc, which can be the bow or stern.

Once we can run on the new engine it would be possible to improve it, but currently it's all pretty hardcoded.

As I understand it, no changes were made to the ship behaviour in New Horizons from the stock game, right?

If you're interested, have a look at this. This is the Constitution vs. Victory battle everyone dreams about.

Spoiler

Here I intentionally positioned the ships this way so I couldn't exploit his bow like earlier.

It is mostly an equal-ish exchange at first, with Victory managing to demast me in the first broadside. So already Constitution's fate should have been sealed, right?

At one point, it looks like he would even rake me from behind. Yikes!

I manage to outmanuever him despite lacking the main mast.

The exchange is about to re-occur.

This is the point where things start to irritate me. Instead of the fight continuing dramatically, Victory makes the unbelievably stupid decision to steer leftward:

I fast-forward out of frustration, and continually bombard him with impunity from his behind:

He re-enters the match after having strangely sailed to a far distance, with lower HP than mine at this point.

He seems to want to resume the fight, this time he already is lower than me...

Oh boy. Did Lord Nelson take a nap?

This is after putting the Constitution HP to 9.3K and giving it 32 pounders and the Victory's down to 15K HP, with 24 pounders as per how I imagine would match the real ships' tonnage/armament in the closest way. Both of us have no abilities enabled - as I have found that for some reason, matches are VERY easy to win because maybe the AI doesn't make use of them? Both of us have 8 in sailing, cannons, accuracy, and defense though.

Like seriously, even I could do better, if I was ever captain of the real Victory.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

As I understand it, no changes were made to the ship behaviour in New Horizons from the stock game, right?

Define "ship behaviour".
Certainly the internal AI hasn't been changed.

Speeds/weights/intertia/turnrates have been modified.
Plus some "fake cleverness" so AI ships don't sail straight into the wind on Realistic and lose all speed.
And the switching of those earlier mentioned tasks depending on the situation.

 

[Lonious]

Define "ship behaviour".
Certainly the internal AI hasn't been changed.

Speeds/weights/intertia/turnrates have been modified.
Plus some "fake cleverness" so AI ships don't sail straight into the wind on Realistic and lose all speed.
And the switching of those earlier mentioned tasks depending on the situation.

The way the ships just circle around you when fighting instead of focusing on the broadside. That is literally all they do. I could actually just sit there and do nothing, in a stationary position, and probably even win because they keep exposing their bow/sterns during the circle runs.

Come to think of it though, is there any way I could actually replace the new AI with the old one as an experiment? I generally play on Arcade, which is kind of identical to the stock game, so it should probably work.

As far as I know, the speeds/weights/inertia/turnrates don't have anything to do with the AI. They're in the ships.init file, not SEA_AI afaik.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Come to think of it though, is there any way I could actually replace the new AI with the old one as an experiment? I generally play on Arcade, which is kind of identical to the stock game, so it should probably work.

Didn't we discuss exactly that before?
All you can do is get rid of this line in PROGRAM\BATTLE_INTERFACE\LogInterface.c:

Improve_SeaAi(groupe);

That's not going to change the behaviour in mid-battle though; and certainly not captains' "intelligence".
Nothing is going to do that.

As far as I know, the speeds/weights/inertia/turnrates don't have anything to do with the AI. They're in the ships.init file, not SEA_AI afaik.

Exactly; got nothing to do with AI that does.

 

[Lonious]

Didn't we discuss exactly that before?
All you can do is get rid of this line in PROGRAM\BATTLE_INTERFACE\LogInterface.c:

Improve_SeaAi(groupe);

That's not going to change the behaviour in mid-battle though; and certainly not captains' "intelligence".
Nothing is going to do that.

Will check this out.

 

[KillPhil]

Maelstrom has an improved AI for ERAS. It should be relatively easy to implement it into Maelstrom: NH . For someone with coding knowledge, which none of us who are currently working on Maelstrom: NH have.

I don't know about any details how or where it is improved at all..

 

[Lonious]

Didn't we discuss exactly that before?
All you can do is get rid of this line in PROGRAM\BATTLE_INTERFACE\LogInterface.c:

Improve_SeaAi(groupe);

That's not going to change the behaviour in mid-battle though; and certainly not captains' "intelligence".
Nothing is going to do that.


Exactly; got nothing to do with AI that does.

You are right - I'm still winning now.

Looks like I'm out of options.

I think I'll have to uninstall the whole game first. The number of times I feel disappointed after trying and trying is just too much. Too bad though, I just really liked the ships.

 

[Rip0sta]

Looks like I'm out of options.

Our option is to wait for better times There are also other mods, for sea dogs