Question on AI difficulty

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl
So while you were
probably making a "funny" I think you got your last statement correct.

At least I didn't miss on everything.

I still disagree with this analysis. The various units in WitP are not "pieces" in the sense of chess pieces. They have significant limitations on the number of different things they can do, and these are strictly dictated by the game's code. For example, a ship can be either in a TF or in a port. The difficult part, of course, is getting the AI to have some grasp of the overall situation in order to do things that aren't ineffably stupid.

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: pasternakski

At least I didn't miss on everything.

I still disagree with this analysis. The various units in WitP are not "pieces" in the sense of chess pieces. They have significant limitations on the number of different things they can do, and these are strictly dictated by the game's code. For example, a ship can be either in a TF or in a port. The difficult part, of course, is getting the AI to have some grasp of the overall situation in order to do things that aren't ineffably stupid.

And you are saying that there are NO limits on the moves of chess pieces???? Last time
I played there were pretty rigid limits on what chess pieces could make what moves.
And I've yet to see the chess rules that say "OK.., both sides plot moves for all your
pieces for this turn---and then execute them simultaneously! Not trying to put you down,
but I still think your arguement pretty much DOES "miss on everything".

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl
Not trying to put you down,
but I still think your arguement pretty much DOES "miss on everything".

You know, Mike, your mother never loved you.

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: pasternakski

You know, Mike, your mother never loved you.

Yea..., and your's swam out to meet troopships. If this is the level of your intellectual
discussion---I can do with out it.

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl
Yea..., and your's swam out to meet troopships. If this is the level of your intellectual
discussion---I can do with out it.

How did you know - were you waiting to pull her out of the water?

Look, my friend, I was just trying to inject a little levity into a discussion that had gotten too serious and gone on for too long. I have said all I have to say about the compexity of chess vis-a-vis wargame simulations and do not want to Brady it to death. Suffice to say that we disagree and that I believe customers who want to play against the AI deserve better than "Well, it's tough to improve on, so we ain't gonna."

Just remember. In four turns, a queen in chess (alone on the board) can make 16,400 different sequential moves (mom was never that talented, especially around sailors).

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: pasternakski

Look, my friend, I was just trying to inject a little levity into a discussion that had gotten too serious and gone on for too long. I have said all I have to say about the compexity of chess vis-a-vis wargame simulations and do not want to Brady it to death. Suffice to say that we disagree and that I believe customers who want to play against the AI deserve better than "Well, it's tough to improve on, so we ain't gonna."

So why didn't you just say this. I have no argument with the idea of wanting designers
to provide better AI's. Our point of dissagreement lies soley in the nature of this game.
I just don't think current capabilities will allow that much improvement in an air/sea/land/
logistics/tactical/strategic game. Too many variables. If Gary can pull it off.., Great.
But I don't think players should get their hopes or expectations raised. It will still be a
great e-mail game with real opponants. And there are still realistic "improvements" out
there to be made. I just don't see the AI as one of the areas we can realistically hope
for much improvement in at this stage, and don't want to see 2by3 hounded into trying
to do so. If you have some coding ideas that will lead to such a breakthrough I'm sure
every game designer would love to hear them..., and I'd love to play them.

[ZOOMIE1980]

ORIGINAL: Mogami

ORIGINAL: ZOOMIE1980

Once again you make a poor case. I've programmed various AI algorithms for over 20 years. You have the basis mostly correct, but the resourse claims are ludicrous. The notion that it would take an AI 3 days per turn to assign value to all the possible actions it would need to take each turn is ridiculous. The notion that a "smart" AI need consider 400 turns in advance is also nonsense, even against a "master". Also completely undefined is just what, in context of this game, is a "master". How long does it take a player to play a 1600 turn game to become a "master"? At best, a few players will play enough to get "good". Most will get to be merely reasonably competent.

I absolutely guarantee, one dedicated professional could develop a chess-like AI that could look 15-20 or so turns in advance and give 80-90% of all the people that will ever buy the game, a truely challenging game against a very intelligent API and be able to do with the AI taking more than several minutes on a PIV 3.2GHZ machine, to calculate it's best response. Certainly less than hour or so. Much less for lower intelligence settings.

But even forgoing that genre of AI, while tedious, a dedicated developer could develop enough preprogrammed strategies each with several possible strategic branches during the course of the game, based on general human opponent strategy, to keep even proficient players somewhat off gaurd, and keep the AI from being overly predictable.

What I continue to see from the development team here is an attempt to justify why the AI is well down the priority list of the game. Hopefully, after the realse, if successful enough with enough cash flow, that someone will decide to put some significant effort into an a major AI upgrade patch down the road.

Hi, I don't think I suggested that the AI would need to look 400 turns in advance. I think I said a programmer could not pre programe strategy 400 turns in advance because he will not know what transpires in those 400 turns.

Why don't you help out and post strategy they can pre program for the AI to play Allies or Japanese for scenario 15 (the complete war Dec 41 to June 46)
It would help if you could define all possible courses the war could take because having the AI following a pre planned stategy that has no relation to the current on map situation is worse then having a merely stupid AI.

Also I was not saying there were or would ever be masters of WITP. I said novice chess players that think they can confuse master chess players by making "unexpected" moves lose the game faster then if they stick to simple but solid moves. It does not matter if the master can predict them as long as they do not present him with a weakness that he can then exploit to his advantage. A master will see and recognize a weakness and "unexpected" moves are where they generally occur.

I don't mind being rebutted but I do mind be rebutted using points I did not make. I'm sorry if I was unclear.
I play high dollar ,high rated chess machines. At their fastest settings they are all at least 400 points (USCF rating) below what they play at their slowest settings. Just don't play where you try to out calculate them. Play solid closed long term positional chess and watch them suffer breakdowns. (Rookies open the position and then try tactics against a computer) Also most chess programs have an opening libary where the past 300 years of grandmaster chess is stored. The program just checks for positons that match one from it's libary. (so it is not really understanding or thinking just plagerizing history) It is illegal for a human player to consult such a libary during a game. In matches where the libary is removed the program has a dramamatic drop in results. Chess programs have scored their highest in "Blitz" games where they can use their libaries and calculating powers in tactical games to advantage. They remain almost hopeless when deprived of the libary and are forced to play slow closed strategic games. (They are suckers for material sacrifice and will never be able to understand the positional nature of such sacrifices because the grandmaster can not explain it only knows from experiance what it means and how to exploit it. )

First off, I largely disregard the chess analogy as appropriate, at least in the notion that every unit on the map is a chess peice and every hex a square. You people seem totally incapable of thinking outside the box when it comes to creating a decent AI for a turn based wargame, basically because you simply do not want to be bothered at this late date.

From what I've seen on this forum during this discussion is CLEAR indication that the majority of potential purchasers will NOT be playing this game via e-mail, or hot-seat, but playing solo. That should be input enough for you people to devote a significant amount of time after release for a major AI patch upgrade.

And such an improvement is not anywhere NEAR the difficulty you are making it out to be. Like I've said, I've worked on AI's for the Air Force and Army off and on for over 20 years. The job can be done, and it can be done to perform reasonable on today's computers and there are a LOT of AI advancements out there, if you care to take time to research them.

Most, the VAST majority of the purchasers of this game, will be solitare players. They deserver better than a 1985 vintage AI.

[ZOOMIE1980]

ORIGINAL: pasternakski

Well, let's think about the complexity of chess for a moment. There are only 32 pieces, it is true, and only 64 squares on which they can stand.

What makes chess a tremendously complex game for the computer to play is the range of possibilities over the course of several moves. Human players discard tens of millions of those threads of play without even thinking about it. The computer, on the other hand, has to consider every single one of them.

WitP is a very different proposition, it seems to me. Each "piece" has a limited role and capability. The computer is not really looking at a game map and is not calculating on the basis of what it "sees" and "knows." It is merely applying coded formulae in lockstep fashion to generate a result that can be translated, through the game's graphics, into something the human player can see and interpret. This makes the AI very much a closed system. What I suspect can be done to improve AI play is to loosen the formulae that are applied and add alternative sequences that can be triggered either by the existence of certain preconditions or, in some instances, even randomly.

Of course, I don't have the slightest idea of what I'm talking about.

If the chess analogy holds at all, it holds only in the broadest sense. At least at the first level of improvement I could envision for an AI. Based on what I know, the analogy adds up to WitP having about half dozen squares, about a dozen or so "peices", and only about 20 or so moves for the entire 1600+ turns of the game.

At least, that's how I'd start. And the drill down in future phases. And the notion of working in the background in a separate thread while human is making their move is the exact type of resource management I'm alluding to.

[Raverdave]

I am inclinded to disagree that the vast majority of players will use the AI, this is based on what I have seen with UV. ZOOMIE1980, I am sure that Matrix would welcome you to work pro bono on AI, all you have to do is offer.

[pad152]

Just due to time restrictions, most people will play WITP in single player mode.

I'll bet most people aren't willing to wait a half an hour for the computer to plan it's move. Read the editor doc that was posted it will give you some insight into the computer AI.

The truth is, there is no such thing as an AI, there are expert systems but no intelligence behind them. The biggest problem with expert systems is the people doing the programming aren't the real experts when it comes to the subject matter. A good expert system can do some very clever things, like fly a plane for example, but it's not intelligence.

Computers get faster and faster, but aren't getting any smarter. We are still stuck in the stone age when is comes to software.

[soeren]

ORIGINAL: Damien Thorn

Does anybody remember the game "Archon" back in the Atari 800 (and maybe Apple II) days? It was a chess-like gmae with tactical combat. The AI was very good, both in where to move and the execution ofthe combat phase as well. All that in a 48k game.

One of my favoured games back then. Make's me feel old just to think about how long ago that's been.[:)]