German AI Production Priorities

[Nicholas Bell]

ORIGINAL: harley

ORIGINAL: Nicholas Bell

7. A bigger problem for the Axis AI is production strategy and utilization, something Harley is working on also. Even using the beta patch, the AI makes some production changes which simply make no sense at all - changing the same factory to something new on a daily basis, building planes, engines or parts you don't need, etc. Again, Harley is working on this, and under human control there is no problem.

The AI prod logic is entirely new from the ground up - this is the first negative feedback I've seen, so please start another thread with as much info as you can provide. I'll explain the basics of its operation there...

Heh. basics. I took a week's leave from work, and spent the whole week, and both weekends building it.

I noticed the issues while watching an AI vs AI 1943 long campaign. Wasn't focused on production, rather losses. But was surprised in September 1944 to see Me-262 parts plants converting to Me-410 parts, and Jumo Jet engine production being switched to piston types. Stopping the game, the pools indicated thousands of Me-410s available - so no need for more parts. Likewise, there were over 500 useless Me-163s. Over the course of a week I also noticed the same factories switching between parts types every couple of days.

Last night I started the same situation so that I could get some recorded results. Stopped on October 3, 1944. All FW-190D production is switching over to TA-152H production. The Dora obviously has been in production for some time given the pool counts. There are obviously no shortages of much of anything. Note the over-production of types which there are either extremely few units requiring, or no units equipped with these types, or better types.

[Nicholas Bell]

Also obvious is the mis-allocation of resources resulting in unneeded parts. More worrisome is the lack of jet engine production when there are almost a 1000 Me-262 parts available. And as mentioned above, the computer stopped producing jet engines in order to make engines for the TA-152H.

[Eratuin]

nicholas,

where do you get those stockpile numbers? In BTR 43 Campaign I´v never seen them

[Hard Sarge]

are you using the patch ?

it was added in after the release

[Eratuin]

no, where can I get it? Online Update says I´ve the newest Version

[Hard Sarge]

it is a beta patch (ahhh, I don't have a gold verison, I got what I work with)

go to community, then my games, look for GGEDtBTR and you should see private download

[Eratuin]

thx, got it now!

[Hard Sarge]

Kewl

and welcome to the forums, lots of good areas here

[Creeper]

ORIGINAL: harley

The AI prod logic is entirely new from the ground up - this is the first negative feedback I've seen, so please start another thread with as much info as you can provide. I'll explain the basics of its operation there...

<bump>

Harley, can you please say something about the AI production logic? Thank you!

[harley]

yeah, ok. Sorry...

Ok.. The goal of aircraft production is to make planes. That is the ONLY function of it.

Therefore, the AI needs to decide which planes to make. The AI uses a weighting system to decide what to build, the higher the weight, the more chance there is to build it. Factors that come into it are How many are in stock, how many are in use, how many are needed (if there's a deficit).

What it then does is look find what airframes are needed, then change anything with an excess to the new type. There must be a significant excess before it will be changed over - like at least 50% reserves, and that's only for AC in demand - things with one or two gruppen will be fairly change resistant, needing 100 days prod in the kitty (so 2 in prod means it won't change till 200 are in the pool)

Then it checks to see what is in excess. If it finds anything it will convert some to research, and some to other types, if they are in huge deficit. It will also see if there's spare airframes sitting around, and change away from them if it needs to.

With the what-to-produce done, the system then looks at the requirements. If there's a deficit in parts or engines, it will change something over. Again, it will change things only if they are not needed, or if there is a huge stockpile. It also does one trick if it finds that there are heaps of spare airframes, but the engine or part stock is low (1 - 2 days) and there are supposedly sufficient items in production, it will increase the production beyond requirements to clear the backlog.

The final thing it does is look at what engines and parts are in prod but not needed. It will find something to change to, but if it can't, then it just sits. The AI isn't losing anything, they're genuinely not needed, so why change?

Now all this works fairly well. Not perfect, but not bad.

[harley]

ORIGINAL: Nicholas Bell

Also obvious is the mis-allocation of resources resulting in unneeded parts. More worrisome is the lack of jet engine production when there are almost a 1000 Me-262 parts available. And as mentioned above, the computer stopped producing jet engines in order to make engines for the TA-152H.

Without the save file, I can only guess. But I can see the Jumo 213A needs 30ish, has 90ish planned, and 40ish actually producing, but only 3 or 4 in stock. I'd say there's some airframe(s) in prod with a huge stockpile the AI needs to clear. This looks like WAD. Not saying it couldn't be better, but it looks like WAD. If anything, I'd tweak the over-build I mentioned above to not go so far beyond 100% (it's like 220% at the moment!)

The parts - see the above post to get the answer on that. Basically, it doesn't matter.

[Nicholas Bell]

ORIGINAL: harley

ORIGINAL: Nicholas Bell
... More worrisome is the lack of jet engine production when there are almost a 1000 Me-262 parts available. And as mentioned above, the computer stopped producing jet engines in order to make engines for the TA-152H.

Without the save file, I can only guess.

Here's the savegame file:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/0ehlmt

Maybe it will help you figure out how to tweak this so there is no shortage of jet engines.

This looks like WAD. Not saying it couldn't be better, but it looks like WAD.

"WAD"? Working as designed?

[harley]

Yes, working as designed.

I'll look at the save, but as I said earlier, I think this might just be a case of tweaking the "overbuild" code...