AI?

[Scubbo 10]

better AI? or just some slightly better graphics? :-)

[enad 11]

Yep that's all we're getting with ArmA 3, just some better graphics thats all!

[Scubbo 10]

at-least they replaced the clunky animation system I guess ;-)

[metalcraze 290]

It isn't like BIS doesn't care about AI.

1.59 patch was the first time I started to enjoy commanding AI squads in whole series (including OFP where it was easier to just leave those morons behind and kill everyone yourself)

Saying that I certainly hope that improving AI will be one of the main focuses in AA3.

Improving physics is good and all - but you will stop caring about rolling barrels as soon as you'll see AI doing stupid stuff.

[maturin 12]

At this point in the series you have an AI that works. Despite what people who suck at controlling them or don't understand the limitations say, the AI does what it says on the tin, and often quite well. Now they should focus on expanding capabilities, teach the AI how to use the right round on the right enemy, or defend sandbags, etc.

[skadog 0]

I think a better interface for controlling the AI should help negate the, people suck at controlling them part. And better documentation would also help the understanding of the limitations. Aside from all of this, I really hope they can create an AI that is a little more independent, and doesn't need as much micro management.

[5LEvEN 11]

Better AI would be nice.

[metalcraze 290]

Interface for controlling AI is OK.

You have hold fire/open fire

either assign targets yourself or use "engage at will" which will make them run around on their own

And then you have 3 stances to put them in

The rest AI does itself.

It's really simple.

There are problems of course like the inability to properly make AI to grab the weapon on the ground you want or dig through his inventory without him running to the closest enemy (the latter one is fixed in ACE though)

[PRiME 1]

Not only does ARMA3 need better AI it needs WAY better AI chatter. Ditch the robotic AI for some real voice actors this time perhaps? Because the chained together artificial AI chatter is just unrealistic and often does not match whats happening in the environment.

Also the AI lacks body language so hope ARMA3 looks into making AI more natural in movement and animation, for example a AI standing around might start changing stances or start picking his nose or butt LMAO or even whistle.

[Freebie 10]

What often kills the immersion for me is the AI. They often behave in a non logical, totally unhuman-like manner that's quite frustrating to watch, and don't even mention them controlling vehicles. FPDR

To me the number one main improvement A3 needs is smarter AI.

[gnear 0]

Freebie says it all!

I'd also like to see AI move into buildings / setup from inside buildings etc - even if a building model just gets bot waypoints that the ai follows so they can nav proper through them fast/smooth and usefully :) (anyone remember waypoint files for bots in cstrike? :P surely that could be tied into the house model itself??)

[PRiME 1]

Yeah I am with Freebie. BIS needs to go out and watch some real soldiers move around in combat, you don't see a leader telling his men to take cover behind a wall when under fire, or struggling to issue a take cover order behind a building.

AI needs to be more dynamic thinking and rely less on the leader giving basic stupid orders. I just get the feeling when playing that the AI just has no idea what to do and is oblivious of combat situations half the time.

[Beagle 684]

at-least they replaced the clunky animation system I guess ;-)

Compared to OFP or Armed Asault the animations in ArmA II are fluid and lifelike.

---------- Post added at 06:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:52 AM ----------

What often kills the immersion for me is the AI. They often behave in a non logical, totally unhuman-like manner that's quite frustrating to watch, and don't even mention them controlling vehicles. FPDR

Sounds like real regular soldiers.

[gnear 0]

its the flow from one animation to the other, not during the actual animation, which is chunky. Reload on the go was good at reducing this, but things like stepping into vehicles or over fences is just slow and chunky.

[Make Love Not War 10]

Just wanted to add my 'vote' to this issue: I'd love to see BIS further improvie the AI for A3.

[dave8 0]

I think the original Ghost Recon had a very effective system of controlling AI.

Top 12 things that I'd like to see from the AI:

1. Suppression. As a leader, being able to assign TRPs through a map or in first person view and an order for AI to suppress it (and they will actually suppress that TRP methodically to conserve ammunition). AI can achieve this same effect by assigning TRPs close to the enemy.

2. A 5-10 meter radius (center of the circle is where they'd be standing in formation) where the AI has freedom of movement to seek cover and concealment. They will not go off individually and engage the enemy unless told to.

3. Ability to widen or shorten formations

4. Average AI leaders use actual teams to engage the enemy. Not individuals. They will at least go off as buddy teams. Also, AI will utilize more flanking maneuvers rather than frontal assaults. Ability to command teams to flank left or flank right should also be available.

5. Ability to order AI to stack on doors and clear a room, up and down stairs, and move down a hallway correctly as a fireteam/buddy team.

6. AI shoot worse and less frequently when effectively suppressed

7. When in danger mode, the AI will stay crouched whenever halted.

8. More random yet appropriate chatter / animations for the immersion factor.

9. Better driving and path finding

10. When in formation, AI scan their assigned sectors and take cover relative to their sectors. When engaged by the enemy, their sectors will be overruled unless designated by the leader.

11. When ordering movements, it should be easier to state a direction for where the AI should be facing. (For example, if you hold down the left mouse button when clicking where to move, a fire arc will be displayed. You will then move it wherever you'd want them to face and then let go to place it).

12. AI actually clear out buildings as a team to take cover in them when engaged. This would make MOUT a lot more interesting.

Edited May 20, 2011 by dave8

[Make Love Not War 10]

This is a pretty good list. Thanks, Dave.

1. Suppression. As a leader, being able to assign TRPs through a map or in first person view and an order for AI to suppress it (and they will actually suppress that TRP methodically to conserve ammunition). AI can achieve this same effect by assigning TRPs close to the enemy.

6. AI shoot worse and less frequently when effectively suppressed

Totally agreed. Although it could just be my feverish imagination, but I think there might already be some suppression effects in the game. Still, it should really be a major game mechanic not an afterthought.

Hand-in-hand with suppression, I'd also like to see a realistic morale system. Most firefights are not won because one side has been wiped out to the man, but rather because a side loses its willingness to continue the fight and withdraws or surrenders (if those options are available).

Suppression would play a major role in such a morale system. I envision game mechanics, for instance, whereby a force that can bring superior (and accurate) firepower to bear upon enemy units would prevail not necessarily because they are able to inflict casualties upon the enemy, but rather because the enemy AI realizes that to continue the fight will only lead to their slaughter.

Naturally, these ideas need a lot more discussion and general hashing out, but I'll leave it at that for now (this response is already TL;DR). In any case, I think one can get the gist of where I'd like to see BIS go with these sorts of game mechanics.

2. A 5-10 meter radius (center of the circle is where they'd be standing in formation) where the AI has freedom of movement to seek cover and concealment. They will not go off individually and engage the enemy unless told to.

Actually, as of the 1.59 patch, the AI does this to a large degree (if I'm corectly understanding what you're suggesting), The problem is that the implementation ATM isn't very good, because in looking for cover within this given radius, the AI ignores tactical spacing and will often stack up on the same pieces of cover. So, what we're getting is a lot of cringe-worthy clusterfucking rather than formations that make tactical sense.

3. Ability to widen or shorten formations

I'm a bit scared of adding things to an already cluttered UI (the squad command UI is in need of some streamlining, IMO), but, yes, I have to agree on this one. It can be pretty important at times.

4. Average AI leaders use actual teams to engage the enemy. Not individuals. They will at least go off as buddy teams. Also, AI will utilize more flanking maneuvers rather than frontal assaults. Ability to command teams to flank left or flank right should also be available.

Yes! As far as I can tell, there really is no overall AI "commander" or even AI unit leaders that make decisions on squad or global levels. At the very least, the AI need to start operating on the intra-squad level as a cohesive unit or team. Manuevers, such as flanking, should be executed in a systemic and logical fashion, not single soldiers running around in an ad-hoc manner willy-nilly.

Of course, for there to be an overall AI commander, first we'd need an AI that can examine the battlefield and assess the terrain from a tactical viewpoint. That's probably a bit of a programming project, but not something that couldn't be done, IMO.

5. Ability to order AI to stack on doors and clear a room, up and down stairs, and move down a hallway correctly as a fireteam/buddy team.

12. AI actually clear out buildings as a team to take cover in them when engaged. This would make MOUT a lot more interesting.

Yeah, the AI is still completely clueless inside buildings and CQB in general. It'd another huge undertaking to fix this, but some work really needs to be done in this area.

7. When in danger mode, the AI will stay crouched whenever halted.

Not a hard thing to code. One could probably even script it without too much hassle. I always put my squads into "stay crouched" or "keep low" when going into "danger" mode, but, yes, having the AI automatically do this would be nice.

8. More random yet appropriate chatter / animations for the immersion factor.

Sure. But, give the players an option to disable all or parts of the AI chat. Especailly in MP, AI chatter is unnecessary as real players already chatter enough as is.:D BIS (or whomever it may concern) take a look at the DSAI mod, as it does extra chatter (for American units) pretty well, IMHO.

9. Better driving and path finding

Yup, the driving still needs work. AI drivers constantly over-running intersections is especially annoying and shouldn't be too hard of a fix. That said, IMO, the infantry pathfinding in general is pretty well done everything considering.

10. When in formation, AI scan their assigned sectors and take cover relative to their sectors. When engaged by the enemy, their sectors will be overruled unless designated by the leader.

Yeah, shouldn't every formation have a rear security element, for instance?

11. When ordering movements, it should be easier to state a direction for where the AI should be facing. (For example, if you hold down the left mouse button when clicking where to move, a sector of fire arc will be displayed. You will then move it wherever you'd want them to face and then let go to place it).

Well, we do have the 'watch direction' command somewhere in the squad menu. But, without scripting I don't think there is an easy way to set formation direction, which would be nice to have. Not quite sure which of these two you're talking about here.

In any case, I wouldn't want this kind of feature implemented in a way that leads to fumbling around with setting the AI direction when all you really need is for your SAW gunner to get to that FRICKIN' corner NOW so that he can fire down that street. Maybe, have 'spacebar' and then 'mouseclick' as a "move to" order as is now, but include the option to 'ctrl-mouseclick' which would allow the player to adjust the AI formation direction by dragging the mouse (similar to the construction menu)?

Having said all this, I'd like to point out that the current Arma AI is pretty amazing when compared to anything else out there. One has to take into consideration that this game's AI has to operate in a massive sandbox environment and in a multitude of various combat scenarios. Not an easy thing to code. So, many kudos to BIS for the AI we do have.

TL;DR: Yeah, what Dave said.

[KillerP90 10]

I want:

Breach and Clear Postions

Making them stay in the buliding and GOD DAMMIT DO AT THE POINT IM POINTING AT.

[Leopardi 0]

OFP AI seemed more intelligent, like they worked just like intented. It's like they added all these features without having a plan on how to make it all work smoothly.

[sinisteral 10]

I know you've all done your nice lists and such but here's my take.

Enemy AI in Arma 2 works for two reasons :

1.There is no user input, no unpredictability of command

2. AI talking to AI works faster, better than Human talking to AI

Commanding needs some serious work. High command AI and command doesn't work effectively (not good enough for me personally), the user should be able to group AI units instead of having a sleuth of individual symbols for each AI member. It needs to be quick, smart and dynamic to each and every situation and fight.

Brothers in Arms AI system works in a set piece environment, not a sandbox, however the idea of controlling SQUADS emphasizes teamwork and above all proper usage of a fireteam, squad or platoon.

I couldn't care less for graphics or physics, make the fight a good fight before you make it a pretty one.

[froggyluv 2136]

I'm not entirely sure how to word this proper so here it is:

When playing MP and a friend has lead of the squad, I often break away to use a flanking position on enemy and automatically a few AI follow me instead of him. Thats good and well except that I have no command over these guys and have to relay to the lead what micro orders to give my guys when he is often bogged down in a suppresive fight.

Is it possible to give more then one player command over AI in the same unit?

[Militant1006 11]

It isn't like BIS doesn't care about AI.

1.59 patch was the first time I started to enjoy commanding AI squads in whole series (including OFP where it was easier to just leave those morons behind and kill everyone yourself)

.

I am the exact same, usually I would rather just manage myself, but now I find myself in charge of large squads, making fireteams for flanking teams, suppressing teams etc.

Next step I suppose is making AI work completely properly (or at least to the best of their abilities) in CQB, moving around the rooms, engaging quickly (would like to see this in all combat, not just CQB), and non-player AI using buildings as general cover without being told to or using a script or addon.

Also seeing a better MG weight simulation (don't expect this though) that works for AI aswell where Medium MG's and maybe even LMG's use a lot of stamina when firing from the shoulder, so most of the time lowering the weapon or firing when prone would be chosen for players and AI, but would make this cool though is seperate animations that support it.

[Make Love Not War 10]

Next step I suppose is making AI work completely properly (or at least to the best of their abilities) in CQB, <snip>

If I had to choose only one area of improvement in terms of AI in A3, then this would have to be it.