Better AI

Florek112 · 03-16-2011, 10:41 AM,

At first, I'd like to say hi everybody, because it's my first post and thread here. ;) I was playing strategy games for years, but got one of Panzer Campaigns just now (Kursk 43' and Stalingrad 42'). My question is: Is it normal, that AI is (in my opinion) so stupid? I've played one of the shortest scenarios to get used to game interface, and next started the whole battle of Kursk with the Axis side. I've easily crushed the AI forces, especially on south sector, because their tactic is dumb. They don't react on outflanking, and can be easily encircled, and destroyed. They throw their forces on frontline without any sense. They don't retreat, even if it would be the best option. They engage my forces in their fire turn, even when it's obvious that my counterfire would cause much more casualties. They always fire and move in a night turns exhausting their forces. Casualties ratio is now about 4:1 in men and much higher in guns and vehicles. It's 23d turn of 121, and I'm pretty sure I'll get a major victory (having about 30 000 VP now). Are there any mods to improve the AI? Or do you have any other ideas? Thanks for any response, and sorry for my english, it isn't my native language, doing my best. ;) Greetings.

Dog Soldier · 03-16-2011, 11:11 AM,

(03-16-2011, 10:41 AM)Florek112 Wrote: Are there any mods to improve the AI? Or do you have any other ideas?

For any game beyond 10 game turns play a human opponent in PBEM. You can find plenty here at the blitz that will give you the challenge you seek.

The AI is just not able to handle the larger scenarios. Think of how complex and subtle the PzC game system is. Far too difficult to program an AI to deal with the changes that occur in the larger campaign games.

Dog Soldier

Volcano Man · (This post was last modified: 03-16-2011, 01:57 PM by Volcano Man.)

If you want a challenge of playing against another human without actually playing against someone else, try playing Hotseat mode, but play both sides. It is a fun solitaire experience IMO. Of course you will have to play the game twice as long however. :eek1:

edited: typos

Dog Soldier · 03-16-2011, 01:11 PM,

VM is right. If you turn off the FOW then it can be the similar as the old cardboard war games. The cat will not jump on the PC and mess up your stacks. That is a bonus.

Dog Soldier

**Mr Grumpy** · 03-16-2011, 05:57 PM,

(03-16-2011, 01:11 PM)Dog Soldier Wrote: The cat will not jump on the PC and mess up your stacks. That is a bonus.

Yup my cat did that a lot! :eek1:

Hello and welcome to the ladder. :)

When i got my first title (S43) i found the AI very easy to beat, but the AI is a great learning tool for new players, what a shock i had in store when i played against a human! Big Grin

Mike Bowen · 03-16-2011, 06:42 PM,

One thing you can do when playing hot seat which is interesting is use AI commands to move your formations it levels the playing field in that both sides have the same tactical AI and you just make the big plan. It is much quicker and can be interesting you do need however to intervene for river crossings etc.

Florek112 · 03-16-2011, 11:20 PM,

Thanks for all your replies. I know that playing against human is much more challenging and fun, but I wanted to introduce myself to game mechanics, and get some experience, before getting my ass kicked by someone real. I didn't expect AI to make complicated strategical maneuvers, but I found it strange, when computer was making so many illogical moves at tactical level. Now i see, that i have to find someone to play and maybe teach me, giving some hits. Problem is with my free time, sometimes i could play few turns in a day, sometimes i don't have time during the whole week. Playing with myself is an interesting idea. But i think it would be hard to suprise opponent. ;) But i played classical board war games this way, when I was young (oh, come on, I'm still young:P), so maybe I'll try it. I don't have a cat (un)fortunately, so there was no risk factor. Thanks again everybody. Greetings.

Glenn Saunders · (This post was last modified: 03-17-2011, 02:11 AM by Glenn Saunders.)

The Bottomline on the AI is this.

Over time, in teh newer games, the AI has gotten better. Changes to the EXE has made improvement. More emphasis in later games has gone into scripting the AI to do as the designer would like. Kursk '43 was PzC #5 and I don't even know if we had scripted AI orders at that time. If we did I don't think the HOLD AI order was an option. So in a similar game - like like MINSK, I think the German AI will defend bette than the Russian AI in Kursk. YOu will still win, but the Ai will be better I think.

There are a number of issues here - so it isn't just a broad brush - "the AI is dumb". Clearly it is not as good as a human nor will it ever be. Even if we made it twice as smart, it would still not offer a challenge to some of the HTH experts here.

Furthermore, we don't want the AI to be too predictable either so it has to do things differently in situations and sometimes this makes the AI look dumb. And the longer or more complex the battle is, the more chance the AI has to screw something up.

Also - a human gets smarter over time - certainly faster than any program improvements we have made and the series is old enough now - 10 years I think. So there are a lot of players who are damned experienced now that making a scn that is challenging vs the AI for someone who is new is one thing - but against a veteran PzC player like some of the guys here - with ten years and thousand of hours under their belt, is something altogether different.

The AI in the demo is too bad - in fact the Started scn in that game was at first so hard some players I had testing it couldn't win. So we soften it quite a bit to make it winable by mere mortals. The tougher scn was advocated by Dogsoldier and he has it posted for play on this site somewhere.

Anyway - if you want to learn the system vs the AI, try the later games, and teh scns for AI play - you will still win, but hopefully the challenge will be better.

Or - download the demo - play the started scn, play the Campaign and review the PLAYERS GUIDE Created by Bob Barker and then try the harder Scn the DogSoldier posted.

The AI is the AI. It is like playing with your worst Human opponent and yet the ablity to win has more to do with your skill level. Many Scn in Tunisia 43 were easily won by one tester while another person might only manage a draw.

Glenn

Nitram Draw · 03-17-2011, 02:27 AM,

One thing that would help the AI would be to somehow limit it's desire to move every unit every turn, even at night. If you look at the AI units at dawn a lot of them are at Max fatigue even if they are away from the front lines.

Glenn Saunders · 03-17-2011, 03:40 AM,

(03-17-2011, 02:27 AM)Nitram Draw Wrote: One thing that would help the AI would be to somehow limit it's desire to move every unit every turn, even at night. If you look at the AI units at dawn a lot of them are at Max fatigue even if they are away from the front lines.

If you care to send if your BEFORE and AFTER btl files - to me to to HPS or JTS Support, we can certainly look at it. But we need a concrete example to show the AI programmer the action that is being corrected. We need to file before and after to determine which files moved at night and what logic can be applied.

Glenn