AI Improvement

[maddogx 13]

Instead BIS wastes time on animations...

Weird, I don't remember the press release where BIS said: "The AI will not be improved, because they're like totally perfect in Arma2. Instead we are having the AI programmers make new animations, because that just makes so much fucking sense."

Must have missed it.

[neokika 62]

3 A context sensitive command to tell the AI to take cover behind something (like a wall) would be an absolute godsend.

You can already do this in Arma 2.

Metalcraze,

What you are saying is simply not true, AI can in fact, enter a building and kill a player...

[instagoat 133]

You can already do this in Arma 2.

Metalcraze,

What you are saying is simply not true, AI can in fact, enter a building and kill a player...

They can, but they don´t. I have been hiding in buildings all the time, and even with AI mods, up to date I have not once been killed by an AI that actually got into the building I was hiding inside of.

What I´d love to see is to get rid of the grid the AI uses to navigate, and instead the introduction of some sort of fluid, non static system. (If you watch the AI, you will notice that they always move at definite angles when navigating around, and only stop at nodes in the grid. That is why sometimes multiple AI soldiers stand inside of each other currently in Arma 2, and in Arma and CWA.) That would also get rid of the problems with grid size we have currently, for example in TOH, where the large maps cause the grid to be so rough that the AI cannot navigate even in small-ish settlements, and is completely unable to navigate in and out of alleyways or gates.

If that could be fixed in any way, that´d be rad.

[neokika 62]

I fully agree that the current AI pathfinding seems a bit odd most times, but there was statement from a BI dev saying that AI pathfinding is strictly related to the animations system, so, since they are re-doing the animation system I'm hoping the AI pathfinding will become a lot better.

What I meant with AI being able to use building still stands, because they can use them fine.

Another example of what I mean is, AI pilot is able to enter a chopper, turn it on and fly it, now if you place a empty chopper on the map, and a AI pilot besides it, you can't just expect the game to magically let the guy get inside the chopper and fly it, because there are many situations where this would break a mission if it was designed for the pilot to just stay near the chopper and not fly it.

[froggyluv 2130]

What you are saying is simply not true, AI can in fact, enter a building and kill a player...

They can but I don't think anyone would suggest their proficient in that regards. Would take a pretty bad player to lose out to AI indoors.

[maturin 12]

What I expect from AI is to function properly. Mods like ASR AI and SLX/Zeus AI make AI more challenging, smarter and aware. They do something that should've been there in the first place. Why can't AI just enter a house and kill the player inside? Even "ambient animals" in DayZ can do it but not a soldier AI eating all those precious CPU cycles?

The AI can enter houses if you give them the right waypoint. But once inside, they are no more intelligent than a Day Z zombie. All they can do is walk along the hallway to their assigned position to get gunned down on the staircase.

Why can't AI squads share info about foes by default? In ASR AI they do and it only makes the game better. You don't have one squad being engaged while the squad just 100m away relaxes like nothing happens. In fact I think Robalo has it tied to whether the squad has a radio or not which is another thing that should be there.

They do, actually, but it's a highly limited and inconsistent feature. One more case of the AI needing a more tweak to improve it greatly.

[katipo66 94]

If I hide in a building from a tank, the tank will what seems like circle the building trying to get at me. I think the AI needs some sort of central intelligence so it understands what assets it has and knows which one to use and how to use it accordingly, this is the sim part I'd like to see before all the eye candy in the world.

[metalcraze 290]

Weird, I don't remember the press release where BIS said: "The AI will not be improved, because they're like totally perfect in Arma2. Instead we are having the AI programmers make new animations, because that just makes so much fucking sense."

Must have missed it.

Animations are not mocap only. They need coding too. Suma seems to be responsible for both core things like these.

Metalcraze,

What you are saying is simply not true, AI can in fact, enter a building and kill a player...

That didn't happen to me once since OFP.

The AI can enter houses if you give them the right waypoint. But once inside, they are no more intelligent than a Day Z zombie. All they can do is walk along the hallway to their assigned position to get gunned down on the staircase.

And if you won't give them a waypoint - they will just dance around the building the enemy is in, without ever trying to breach it.

[antoineflemming 14]

The AI can enter houses if you give them the right waypoint. But once inside, they are no more intelligent than a Day Z zombie. All they can do is walk along the hallway to their assigned position to get gunned down on the staircase.

They do, actually, but it's a highly limited and inconsistent feature. One more case of the AI needing a more tweak to improve it greatly.

Part of that "walking to assigned position to get gunned down" has to do with the AI reaction time (or, mainly, turning-to-react time). Notice, when there's an enemy that is NOT in front of them, they pivot slowly till they are facing their enemy, at least that's been my experience.

[maturin 12]

Part of that "walking to assigned position to get gunned down" has to do with the AI reaction time (or, mainly, turning-to-react time). Notice, when there's an enemy that is NOT in front of them, they pivot slowly till they are facing their enemy, at least that's been my experience.

In CQB, yes, in buildings, no.

The AI can't seem to navigate buildings the way they do any other space. They won't go prone, work together or take cover, just follow the path nodes of the model forward.

[-Coulum- 35]

Actually, Coulum, the AI pays absolutely no attention to your arms, legs and waist area.

I think one of BIS devs said that AI ignores feet and hands. And in fact that's my experience from my observations... The myth about AI seeing one pixel of your foot sticking out from the bush and instantly knowing it's you is just a myth.

I just tested this and I am surprised to find that you are both right. Just goes to show how very little I really know about the ai.

It's like OFP all over again. Once you learn AI shortcomings you can start wiping out squads without AI being able to do anything to you ever.

Well I would argue that in the larger battles with many ai squads it is often harder to take advantage of their weaknesses But when it comes to platoon sized engagements and smaller you are right. You can pretty much go rambo on the enemy ai and your chances of getting killed are low, although still much higher than in OFP.

I'm not really sure what you're expecting of AI in a game, some sort of Turin-like human analog? Not going to happen. Its not exactly surprising that tactics can be learned to overcome AI, thats what tactics is. Tactics overcome human opponents. Different tactics, but you get the idea.

Yes, the ai will never be perfect and there will always be ways to exploit it... But the thing is the "tactics" that are currently required to defeat ai are not realistic, and don't at all match the tactics used to defeat humans. I would be very pleased with the ai, even if I got tons and tons of kills against it, if I had to first gain fire superiority over them, pin them, flank them and finish them. If this were the "exploit" of the ai I would be totally satisfied and if I got 50 frags in a match I would laugh but still be happy and immersed because I felt like I was taking down the ai so fast because of my superior tactics. Now I feel cheap when I have 50 frags in a battle and all immersion is lost, because I know it was simply because The enemy ai couldn't see me beyond a certain range, never took effetive cover and walked into the buildings I was hiding in like sheep to the slaughter, even when there's already a pile of the last 10 guys I disposed of at the door way.

IMO some situations reveal that the AI are far more aware than humans, if I have AI squad members they always spot enemy far quicker than me. Even after a contact has been called out most times I cannot see it.

With vanilla ai this is very rare, but happens for me when in forests, or really complex areas. It is hard to process all the contrasts and pick out another soldier. But that's just one of many scenerios. On the hills of takistan or the open fields of chernarus you can easily spot units from 800m and the ai won't be aware of it until 500 or so if your lucky. Then the player can identify that unit at around 500m based on operational awareness and silhouetting. The ai might be able to identify the unit at 200m away depending on how many ai you have in the squad spotting.(this is assuming nobody is firing and everyone is standing up and moving.)

That to me is inadequate. The ai needs to be able to see farther in open areas and less in dense areas. I suggest that terrain should make units harder to spot, just like stances do currently. If a unit is in a forest he should get a bonus to his camoflauge and if a unit is in the open they should get a penalty. That way the ai would be able to spot more realistically.

Part of that "walking to assigned position to get gunned down" has to do with the AI reaction time (or, mainly, turning-to-react time). Notice, when there's an enemy that is NOT in front of them, they pivot slowly till they are facing their enemy, at least that's been my experience.

Yep thats one of the things that ruin CQB against the ai. of course the fact that they don't really know how to work together in a building to clear rooms and what not doesn't help and they also need to be aware of what a window and door is and how it can be used, or be dangerous.

Edited May 18, 2012 by -Coulum-

[mordeaniischaos 3]

I haven't played a lot of ARMA 2, I'll be honest. But there's a reason for that. For one, there are a lot of janky ass issues with the engine, and it can be a pain in the ass trying to shoot a guy who's clipping through the LOD terrain. And it's frustrating when I can't figure out why guys continue to shoot at me after being shot 5 times in the bloody face.

But my biggest issue with the game is easily the AI. It's dog stupid. I'm sure there are things in the AI that are complex. But the way they just kinda run around, then drop to the ground, in the open, and fire without any concern for their life is incredibly frustrating. They never seek cover, they never seem terribly phased by the 10 bullets that just replaced their eyes, and they rarely use any sort of tactics.

Now, part of this problem is because of the nature of the environments in Arma. They are flat, desolate, and open. However, most real world terrain, particularly in combat zones today, even when they consist of open fields, at least have ditches, local buildings, fauna, just generally a much greater concentration of available cover. That being said, it is ludicrous when a group of enemy combatants in the middle of a forest spread out wherever they feel like it, never adopting proper positions behind so much as a bush, let alone trees or rocks.

There are two problems I have with this. One is that it makes the game at times far too simple. While I have have some amount of cover, perhaps in the form of a rock at the top of a hill that I am prone behind, or a concrete wall or building of some sort, the idiots shooting at me are in the middle of a clear field, very visible and completely unprotected. Yes, they go prone. But that just means I don't have to ever lead shots. I aim a little high, and ping them in the head 3-20 times (seriously, fix the damage models or make it more obvious where to change this), and they die without getting a shot on me, no problem.

However, the other side of this is when they start firing from a position that serves them no protection, and because they get me in their magical suppression field, I can't aim for shit and by the time I get enough rounds downrange to suppress them, I'm bleeding like a stuck pig and my view is jerking around like a lunatic suddenly inhabits my character.

It'd be awesome if the AI was much more pro-cover, because a more cautious enemy is harder to hit, but also less likely to just spray bullets in a show of incredible bravery that just ends up getting me killed because I wasn't an idiot who wandered into a field to fire at my enemies.

It'd also be nice to see the AI be more intelligent in moving around the battlefield. As it stands, they don't seem to have any real direction, often just running back and forth on some barren hill, occasionally going prone. They never seek cover, they never try to push forward to a better offensive position, they never retreat, nothing. It feels incredibly mechanical to watch a guy take all those shots and not only survive but continue to shoot at me instead of trying to preserve their own lives. It would make for more interesting, more dynamic, and more realistic conflicts, rather than short spurts of action that last about 20 seconds. Real firefights can last up to an hour even with small scale operations. With larger forces, things get even longer. And that is because hitting a guy in a real combat situation is hard, because they are taking cover, being smart, and doing just about whatever they can to preserve their life, or the lives of their comrades.

[Flash Thunder 10]

We have a big thread about AI even on the same page did you not see it????

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?133738-AI-Improvement

Please search before you post and welcome to forums.

[max power 21]

By "clipping through the terrain", possibly you're referring to the clutter layer that's intended to simulate the height of the grass. At any rate, it would be better if you used one of the AI threads already in progress. There's even one on the first page. I'll merge this one this time but next time most likely your topic will just be closed.

[BlueWolf 1]

Just make it so they can't snipe me with an AK47 in less than a second when im hundred meters away.

+1

what he said.

[-Coulum- 35]

+1

what he said.

Uhmmm... currently it is very easy for a human player to make that shot so why should it be hard for the ai. read some more of the thread. If that still doesn't convince you that the ai are crapshots then go in the editor, place one down 450 metres away with a sniper rifle and give yourself a sniper rifle. see who can shoot the other first.

The ai are very bad at shooting, which is another reason for this

I haven't played a lot of ARMA 2, I'll be honest. But there's a reason for that. For one, there are a lot of janky ass issues with the engine, and it can be a pain in the ass trying to shoot a guy who's clipping through the LOD terrain. And it's frustrating when I can't figure out why guys continue to shoot at me after being shot 5 times in the bloody face.

But my biggest issue with the game is easily the AI. It's dog stupid. I'm sure there are things in t....

....ast about 20 seconds. Real firefights can last up to an hour even with small scale operations. With larger forces, things get even longer. And that is because hitting a guy in a real combat situation is hard, because they are taking cover, being smart, and doing just about whatever they can to preserve their life, or the lives of their comrades.

I agree with many of your points (although me thinks there may be a bit of exaggeration at times). The ai Is a component of the game that needs tons of work and is very important to gameplay (most in important IMO but thats just me), The ai is generally poor at taking cover and using it to effectively protect themsleves, the ai doesn't fear for its life enough and would rather make a suicidal attempt to kill you rather than try to stay alive, and, finally all these things add up to make an unrealistic experience in which firefights are far to short and far from realistic.

Ideally, Ai should be able to know how to fully hide behind cover so they cannot be shot at. when rounds come by they should assume this position so they can not be hit. When rounds stop coming towards em they should pop out again to shoot. Essentially they need a cover system, which they sorta already have in a2 but with only one exposed stance. not only would this increase their survivability, but it would also make them suppressable - vital for a realistic firefight.

And as long as ai is under significant fire they should not move. Until they gain fire superiority, they should essentially camp in cover. Only when that superiority has been gained should they advance and flank or call in arty. and advancing/ flanking teams should be composed of more than 2 men. Also when in combat, ai should stand less and assume a crouched or prone position, unless they are beside cover and need to stand in order to see over it. There's some similarly related tickets in my sig. sign up to devtracker if you haven't already and vote for em.

[codarl 1]

Uhmmm... currently it is very easy for a human player to make that shot so why should it be hard for the ai. read some more of the thread. If that still doesn't convince you that the ai are crapshots then go in the editor, place one down 450 metres away with a sniper rifle and give yourself a sniper rifle. see who can shoot the other first.

The ai are very bad at shooting, which is another reason for this[/qoute]

Last time I played ArmA 2, I called in mortars on an enemy location and during the slaughtering, started to engage from half a kilometer away. I never got past one bullet, because a BMP, amidst of the mortar strike, shot me within seconds, despite my minimum profile and distance, and the fact that the world around him was blowing up.

Both FDF and BAS (Finnish Defence Forces, and Ballistic Addon Studio's) have released methods to make firefights longer: an absurd weapon dispersion, or, as FDF did it: weapon sway. FDF firefights were long and intense.

Don't forget that even though the rifle itself may be very accurate, in practice it still takes hundreds of rounds to kill one enemy. Right now, I just dont get the feeling this is represented in ArmA.

[Dragonshot 1]

This is because in real firefights the enemy uses cover.

[-Coulum- 35]

Last time I played ArmA 2, I called in mortars on an enemy location and during the slaughtering, started to engage from half a kilometer away. I never got past one bullet, because a BMP, amidst of the mortar strike, shot me within seconds, despite my minimum profile and distance, and the fact that the world around him was blowing up.

Was more talking about ai infantry. BMP's, and static weapons in the hands of ai are rather ridiculous, because they literally experience no sway. But infantry are not nearly that accurate. And more importantly they are not nearly as accurate as the player, making them not much of a challenge. But both infantry and vehicles alike do not suffer from fear or panic enough. Like you said the world blowing up had no effect on the bmp's aim and very rarely does incoming rounds, or nearby explosions cause the ai to panic and have worse aim. You are right, that is a problem.

I am all for making ai less accurate to make firefights last more realistic amount of times... But this means that the player must also be made less accurate to give the poor ai a fighting chance. As is, the ai can't shoot nearly as well as a human, so either the ai needs a slight decrease in aiming accuracy and the human a major decrease, or the ai needs to increase to human levels. I would prefer the former.

This is because in real firefights the enemy uses cover.

For the most part yes. But also, in real life it is because people are less worried about lining up the perfect shot and more interested in popping off as many shots as possible and then getting into cover as quick as possible. In arma 2 it is so easy to line up accurate shots quickly that there is no need to shoot inaccurate quick shots - just shoot off accurate quick shots instead. Thus it should take more time for the player to shoot so accurately. Also the fact that ai isn't suppressible would mean that suppressing shots are essentially a waste of ammo, and don't achieve anything, so why bother doing it. which would not be the case in reality. Thus the ai needs some proper suppression mechanics.

[rye1 21]

This is because in real firefights the enemy uses cover.

Searches for cover then decides on a course of action. How do BIS implement the enemy searching for then using appropriate cover?

[Nicholas 5]

Place about 30 OPFOR soldiers and 30 BLUFOR soldiers in Zargabad. Make a waypoint for them to "move" near each other. You will see that the AI uses cover AND leans out from corners to shoot the other AI.

Here's a post I made a few months ago;

You must not be paying enough attention then. Open up Zargabad and place BLUFOR and OPFOR groups. Set a waypoint for each group to just move near each other. Eventually they will engage and start taking cover.

I just did this a few seconds ago, no scripting was involved:

As you can see, this soldier is using the wall for cover. He is behind the wall leaning out. At the same time, he is looking back and forth for other potential dangers.

Edited May 21, 2012 by Nicholas

[Dragonshot 1]

Searches for cover then decides on a course of action. How do BIS implement the enemy searching for then using appropriate cover?

It's probably not possible to implement in a huge sandbox game like Arma3. My personal solution is to make the enemy AI super deadly accurate by altering all their relevant profile settings numbers to 1. I know this workaround isn't perfect but it does make aiming extremely hard because you only a split second to aim and fire because the enemy AI aims super fast and is devestatingly accurate.

[rye1 21]

They don't always chose appropriate cover or break for cover in a time-critical manner is all I was trying to get across. For instance Nicholas, sometimes they are outflanked and still use the 'cover' like they were facing the same threat direction and not try to get flank cover, retreat or anything really other than flanking fire, proning or moving off with the rest of its group.

Dragonshot, so maybe not the accuracy being faster, but the speed of reaction and movement instead of going prone, or crouched, before making a decision, they get straight to cover and decide what to do then instead of the repeating nature of contact currently seen. A mixture of scripts that would make the engagement more randomised would be interesting. It would also be interesting for them to break from the known mid-script if a parameter is met, and conduct something else, i.e. a contact drill. This would prevent those 'dosey' enemy combatants you come across on the odd occasions who skip past you or are in the middle of another state or action before turning to engage.

A few thoughts, don't know if I'm anywhere near achievable or comprehensible, I'm not a scripter.

[-Coulum- 35]

Place about 30 OPFOR soldiers and 30 BLUFOR soldiers in Zargabad. Make a waypoint for them to "move" near each other. You will see that the AI uses cover AND leans out from corners to shoot the other AI.

The problem is the ai takes cover but never really "uses" it. It is great that they lean out from behind a corner to make them selves harder to hit, but When incoming rounds snap by they should ideally stop leaning in order to fully protect themselves, like a human would. Currently they don't. the ai need to know how to use cover to fire as well as to fully hide themselves. currently ai the ai only knows the former.

In addition to this, ai need to stick to cover more. Often they leave it to advance well before it is safe to do so, getting themselves killed. this alone would increase ai survivability greatly and make firefights much more realistic. I find most ai are killed while trying to foolishly advance under heavy fire.

Searches for cover then decides on a course of action. How do BIS implement the enemy searching for then using appropriate cover?

Searching for the best cover is a hard one. In such a large open environment I am not sure there is an effective way to search for cover. As for usinng cover, I think a cover system (only for the ai) would work. It is somewhat done in a2, it just needs some tweaks and additions, mainly what I mentioned abouve about ai exposing themselves to shoot and then fully hiding themselves when under fire.

[metalcraze 290]

True. When we play online we never advance from a more or less safe position unless we are sure we won't get shot.

But AI will keep moving even if under direct fire.

Of course they should follow their leader and in case of human player leading them - they should but let's consider AI leaders here.

It should be like how human players play. Take a position. Kill everyone you can kill from there. If shots stop incoming - advance.

And of course as it was discussed some time ago - when AI leader sends someone to kill someone he should send groups, not lone guys. And he totally shouldn't send soldiers to engage if it's just a fireteam because that will quickly stretch it thin and easy to pick one by one.

Edited May 21, 2012 by metalcraze