Minsk AI

[Glenn Saunders]

Glenn: Unclear about this, Have the new AI features been incorporated into all other games in series?

The basic answer is YES BUT ....

You see we looked at a lot of AI behavior in Minsk and we went over and over it until the basic AI things like not bumping units in T mode into enemy units at the front line - and yet not changing into Deployed formations too far from the front line.

But we also did a ton of AI scripting to take advantage of these changes.

The result of this is we are most happy with the changes in Minsk and any game created after Minsk. Previous games which have been been updated have the same basic AI improvements.

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Here is what the Notes say about the AI.

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D. AI Enhancements

There are often tweaks and adjustments made to the AI in Panzer Campaigns, but this time with Minsk, we made a lot of adjustments to attempt to correct as many AI issues as possible. I don’t want to over stress this, because we didn’t completely re-design the game AI, rather we observed an AI behavior and attempted to correct it.

For this task John Tiller enlisted the assistance of John Rushing. People may have heard of his AI programming in the Total War title "The First Blitzkrieg", and anyone who has played that game is aware that the AI can really give the human player a good game.

Anyway, as we tested the scenarios against the AI, as an issue came up we ask Dr. Rushing to see what he could do. Later in the project, I asked John if he could prepare a list of some of the changes he made, so we could share them with you and this next section are those notes.


Panzer Campaigns AI Changes

by John Rushing

Partisans: New logic was added to handle partisan units. These units will try to block road and rail lines and will also try to stay in areas where they can hide, like forests.

Retreats: Several changes were made with respect to retreating units. Disrupted units in contact with enemy units are now more likely to retreat. Checks are now made for units that are in imminent danger of being surrounded, and those units will retreat. Artillery units that are caught on, or near the front, will no longer attempt to fire before retreating. Instead, they will try to use their full movement to get as far away from the front as possible. Path finding for retreating units was modified to allow for moves parallel to the front if the eventual path leads away from it. Path finding was also changed to look further ahead, so units are less likely to get trapped in areas that they can not move out of.

Advancing: Ideally, units should use travel mode when advancing towards the front and then switch out of travel mode just before reaching the front. Several cases where units were either switching too soon, or too late, were addressed.

AI Orders: In some cases, units with attack orders were not getting them because of a previous default hold order to their parent organization. This was causing units to stay where they were, or even retreat, instead of attacking. This problem was fixed.

Occupy Objectives: In some cases, enemy owned objectives with no units in them were not being occupied. This problem was fixed.

Defender Auto Combine: Defending units can now recombine if the component units end up moving into the same hex.

Scripting: Changes were made to the AI scripting to allow for specification of direct path orders. These orders tell units to go towards their objective without taking wide detours. This is especially useful in scenarios with constricted terrain. Also, AI Orders can now be issued for individual units and not just entire formations.