a.i. Tactical Combat Link - TypeX

[AirShark 147]

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Which accuracy do you mean exactly? Shooting accuracy of A.I.?

yes, is there another accuracy settings lol 

[TesACC 39]

On 5/12/2019 at 8:10 PM, snkman said:

Well thats exactly how it works normally.

I just tweaked all the settings to make A.I. use all those features at first try and pretty fast to not end up with 3 - 5 GB video size file. 

Also A.I Radio Time ( time A.I. group(s) need to radio to other friendly A.I. group(s) ) already can be set / changed in the "TCL_Radio.sqf" settings.

This time is used for A.I. artillery request(s) too. 

 

See my post above: Click me!

Thanks, nice to know that the response times were tweaked to shorten the video. Still, I think there should be an additional value specifically for calling in arty that goes on top of the regular radio settings, as it should be much slower than relaying enemy possition to the other teams through the comm net. Why? Because of calculating and preparting fire mission, which takes no time for AI (and players that have Artillery Computer enabled) but can be a major pain in the ass when you have to do it for real. Sadly, its still Arma, so there's no hope for AI being able to call in area fire with specified number of rounds, adjusted fire and other fancy stuff which takes considerably longer to set up, but still, the simplest point fire preparation should per standard take at least a minute more than just relaying info. It might seem that such a short time difference isn't worth taking the time to implement, but it might be helpfull to the MM when he has the control over this variable, especially as they know best what kind of artillery they give to the AI and what it should be capable of in that particular mission. Is it doable? I dont know, but sure would be nice.

[Machiya 19]

12 hours ago, ZackTactical34 said:

I used Stealth with Limited movement.

 

 Sometimes I just miss the simple stuff -- good call.

 

@ZackTactical34 What does the 3-man team with an enemy look like? Does Combat vs. Stealth make a difference? If you 'Hold Fire'... does 'Engage' vs. 'Engage at Will' make a difference'?  TCL could (I'm sure) switch to 'Open Fire' or 'Fire' at the last moment -- if the CQB movement was really convincing ;0)
I was just thinking that the AI Engine is primed to fire ASAP, but -- as you demonstrated -- CQB balances pushing sectors whilst maintaining best cover elsewhere; so controlling firing might help.

[Machiya 19]

5 hours ago, TesACC said:

Sadly, its still Arma, so there's no hope for AI being able to call in area fire with specified number of rounds, adjusted fire and other fancy stuff which takes considerably longer to set up, but still, the simplest point fire preparation should per standard take at least a minute more than just relaying info.

 

@TesACC  If you want more 'authentic' BLUEFOR Arty then you might look at Drongo's Artillery MOD.  Otherwise, look at the FFE MOD (Fire for Effect) which ups the Artillery game generally (inc. allowing time for calcs + spotting/ranging fire).  With FFE, if they have got it, they will use it -- don't say I didn't warn you!

 

@snkman  TCL triggers Arty nicely, so -- before letting loose -- maybe think about a delay (simulating calcs) and emulating ranging (a couple of randomly located single shots on the 'perceived' position of enemy). Getting into shaping the sheaf (say based on AI knowledge of various groups in close proximity) might be a step too far?! 

[barccy 53]

16 hours ago, snkman said:

A.I. in general is unable to shoot flares! They shoot them straight into the ground instead of in the air.

I don't think you would like to see that.

Welcome to ARMA 3!

But back than game engines were by far not as complex as they are today and sometimes to me it feels like the more advanced all the A.I. stuff gets the more things they have to do the more problems they get.

I'm still in love with OFP A.I. compared to A.I. of modern games they were pretty simple and basic coded but somehow felt much more alive than most of todays A.I. in most games.

IDK if something about ARMA 3 would make it irrelevant, but WW4 Ext mod for CWA/OFP;R has ai that shoot flares into the air after detecting enemy. You could ask krzychuzokecia or Kenoxite how it was done. 

[snkman 351]

@ZackTactical34

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IIRC, I used Stealth with Limited movement.

Nope the question was if the A.I. unit(s) you are testing in the video have any enemy(s). ( Any other enemy A.I. unit(s) / group(s) they are aware of? )

Or are they just moving without enemy contact?

Well to me it looks like they have NO enemy(s) assigned and they are not in combat mode.

In this case your video show ARMA 3 vanilla A.I. movement!

 

GL3 / GL4 and T.C.L. they all need enemy(s) to trigger! No enemy(s) = no mod use.

 

@AirShark

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yes, is there another accuracy settings lol

Yes A.I. knowledge accuracy!

Why do you think i asked? lol

 

@TesACC + Machiya

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Still, I think there should be an additional value specifically for calling in arty that goes on top of the regular radio settings, as it should be much slower than relaying enemy possition to the other teams through the comm net. Why? Because of calculating and preparting fire mission, which takes no time for AI (and players that have Artillery Computer enabled) but can be a major pain in the ass when you have to do it for real.

 

TCL triggers Arty nicely, so -- before letting loose -- maybe think about a delay (simulating calcs) and emulating ranging (a couple of randomly located single shots on the 'perceived' position of enemy). Getting into shaping the sheaf (say based on AI knowledge of various groups in close proximity)

 

There is much more stuff which will randomize A.I. artillery request(s) it's not just the radio time but radio time will be used as base time till artillery feature get's triggered.

 

@barccy

A.I. shooting flares directly worked till ARMA 3.

In ARMA 1 and ARMA 2 it was not a problem in ARMA 3 i tryed almost everything possible but couldn't get it to work.

Anyway thanks for your help.

[Machiya 19]

Just tested TCL with AI Groups of TWO; set to Stealth and Slow.  I also tested Squads of 8 -- and it wasn't as interesting.  When TCL calls for reinforcement, its less of a rush [note the two OPFOR units to the rear not engaged YET].
TCL Reinforcement Request (Knowledge) is set up a notch at '1' [0-4; default =0].

 

 

[ZackTactical34 86]

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[chrisb 196]

On 5/15/2019 at 12:45 PM, snkman said:

 

GL3 / GL4 and T.C.L. they all need enemy(s) to trigger! No enemy(s) = no mod use.

 

 

Not really what I see . With GL4 you had to place enemy units on the terrain for the mod to initialise properly. But they didn't need to be in combat  with those enemies for the mod to work. The units would garrison (mod use gl4/zeu_glx), patrol (mod use, gl4), use idle anims (mod use, gl4) etc, etc.

 

Now where I would partially agree, until in combat the mod use lays dormant for the combat side, although again not always, depends on what a player considers 'combat'.. I would say when they use mod tactics, it comes under the combat side (zeus_findcover etc, etc).  But to say the mod isn't used, isn't really correct.

 

Just my experience as a player using the mod (check some of my videos). But you provided GL4, so would know that. Perhaps it was the combat side you meant. 😉

[snkman 351]

@ZackTactical34

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Yeah, there were no enemies in the first video. I don't know why, but I thought that TCL, as well as GL4/GL3, were activated if the AI were given Stealth or Combat (learn something new each day )

Yes A.I. movement behaviours ( CARELESS / SAFE / AWARE / COMBAT / STEALTH ) are hardcoded in the engine.

There is no way to change them.

Also i don't think that any A.I. modder(s) would spend their time to improve none combat A.I. behaviours / movement. ( A.I. without enemy contact )

Most ARMA player's just don't play the game by just watching A.I. moving from A to B without any enemy contact i guess.

Pretty much the same should be the case when it comes to your ARMA 2 SMART A.I. MIX as well!

What you see there is pure A.I. vanilla movement given to A.I. group behaviour!

 

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The oddest thing about the whole situation is that the tank does not even engage them (will have to test it in few other situations/maps).

Yes that's really strange neven seen this before...

Right now i can't tell what's going on and that's why i developed the debug system!

So if you really like to do some serious tests i highly recommend you to enable the debug system!

Else it all comes down to just guessing once again...

 

To make sure the mod was initialized correctly:

  // ==============================================================
  // T.C.L. System Debug:
  // ==============================================================
    // True / False, default is False
    TCL_Debug set [0, True];

 

To get some visual feedback about A.I. current movement and cover position:

  // ==============================================================
  // T.C.L. Development Debug: ( System )
  // ==============================================================
    // Choose ( True ) to enable Development Debug System.
    // True / False, default is False
    TCL_Debug set [6, True];

This will help you to understand and clearly see what and how T.C.L. is affecting A.I. and what T.C.L. currently is supposed to do with A.I. instead of guessing.

Without such an debug system it would be impossible to do any A.I. mods because you would never know what happens right now.

 

@chrisb

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The units would garrison (mod use gl4/zeu_glx), patrol (mod use, gl4), use idle anims (mod use, gl4) etc, etc.

Yes that's correct those none combat features you described of course work without A.I. having enemy contact i did not mean the entire mod isn't working without enemy contact.

What i was talking about are the combat features of the mod.

 

As already explained to ZackTactical34 A.I. unit(s) / group(s) which move from A to B WITHOUT enemy contact ( without any kind of threat ) will use pure vanilla ARMA movement given to their current behaviour!

Those A.I. movement behaviours are hardcoded and what you see in this case is a comparison of ARMA 2 A.I. vanilla Stealth / Limited vs ARMA 3 vanilla Stealth / Limited movement.

 

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Now where I would partially agree, until in combat the mod use lays dormant for the combat side, although again not always, depends on what a player considers 'combat'.. I would say when they use mod tactics, it comes under the combat side (zeus_findcover etc, etc).  But to say the mod isn't used, isn't really correct. 

What COMBAT means when it comes to ARMA engine:

There are multiple scripting commands to find out if A.I. is in combat mode or not but all of those scripting commands require at least 1 object ( enemy to given A.I. ) to return something.

So if there is no enemy which A.I. is aware of there will be no combat behaviour mod usage because there is nothing which those scripting commands return.

So there always have to be at least any 1 threaten A.I. to make them switch to combat mode in terms of how the engine handles it!

Thats pretty much how ARMA A.I. engine works from O.F.P. till today ARMA 3.

 

Yeah pretty hard to explain it on a easy and good understandable way but you can trust me with what i say! ( Even if you may not believe that i'm still the same =\SNKMAN/= as back in the days )

 

I'm doing all this stuff since the very first day's of ARMA 1.

 

[chrisb 196]

21 hours ago, snkman said:

@chrisb

Yes that's correct those none combat features you described of course work without A.I. having enemy contact i did not mean the entire mod isn't working without enemy contact.

What i was talking about are the combat features of the mod.

 

As already explained to ZackTactical34 A.I. unit(s) / group(s) which move from A to B WITHOUT enemy contact ( without any kind of threat ) will use pure vanilla ARMA movement given to their current behaviour!

Those A.I. movement behaviours are hardcoded and what you see in this case is a comparison of ARMA 2 A.I. vanilla Stealth / Limited vs ARMA 3 vanilla Stealth / Limited movement.

 

What COMBAT means when it comes to ARMA engine:

There are multiple scripting commands to find out if A.I. is in combat mode or not but all of those scripting commands require at least 1 object ( enemy to given A.I. ) to return something.

So if there is no enemy which A.I. is aware of there will be no combat behaviour mod usage because there is nothing which those scripting commands return.

So there always have to be at least any 1 threaten A.I. to make them switch to combat mode in terms of how the engine handles it!

Thats pretty much how ARMA A.I. engine works from O.F.P. till today ARMA 3.

 

Yeah pretty hard to explain it on a easy and good understandable way but you can trust me with what i say! ( Even if you may not believe that i'm still the same =\SNKMAN/= as back in the days )

 

I'm doing all this stuff since the very first day's of ARMA 1.

 

 

I think we can agree, when there is no reason for the mod to work, or isn't required, then its stays dormant, or those parts do. I understand the basics, from a players point of view, of course. I look at combat slightly differently to the arma engine, but that is because I want to believe in the ai and what it is doing, so yes, from a tech point of view, your quite right of course.

It's not always nice to look behind the curtain, it destroys belief.

 

Snkman (you) and the others involved with previous ai mods, left some very nice work for A2. Private mods left even better work in some cases, so I'm always very grateful for that.

 

But I see things from a players point of view, well not so much a player as a believer's point of view. I try not to peek behind the curtain too much, as it would probably make me stop playing.

 

Q/ Do you still play, and if you do, are you always analysing things ?

I feel sort of sad for modders in a way, they sacrifice so players can believe in the game, that much I do feel sure about. If you analyse what the game is doing (behind the curtain) as you play, I would have thought that makes for a very different Arma experience. Whereas your not really playing the game as it was intended, but instead visiting from a dev view.

[snkman 351]

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It's not always nice to look behind the curtain, it destroys belief.

lol yes you are so right!

When i first started to port KeyCat's GL2 script to ARMA 1 and when i started to understand how things have to be made and how they work i was like WTF...

 

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Snkman (you) and the others involved with previous ai mods, left some very nice work for A2. Private mods left even better work in some cases, so I'm always very greatful for that. 

Thanks!

 

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But I see things from a players point of view, well not so much a player as a believer's point of view. I try not to peek behind the curtain too much, as it would probably make me stop playing.

Sure i totally understand this.

Back in the day's before my modding times i was pretty much the same like this... Using GL2 and get blown away by what it does or at least by what i "thought" it does.

 

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Q/ Do you still play, and if you do, are you always analysing things ?

Yes that's pretty sad to say but i'm not really playing the game too much since i've started with modding.

Most of the time while i'm trying to play ARMA i find myself with new ideas or stuff i would like to do / change and quit playing just after 10 - 20 min. returning to modding...

Well guess that's the curse of a modders life! Not able to enjoy playing what he is doing...

But during all my debugging and testing sessions i at least TRY to kind of play to be able to see how it all works from a player(s) prospect.

So guess... 99% from my time in ARMA since i've started modding i'm more on the developer side than real player.

Its really amazing to see what you can do with ARMA and how you are able to change the game to something totally new.

[snkman 351]

@ZackTactical34

Well just to show you how in approximately i test A.I. behaviours.

 

Just watch this video:

In the very 1. second of the video you can see the A.I. group walking down the hill with safe behaviour and limited speed mode. ( No combat! No threats! )

Right after i start attacking them T.C.L. kicks in which clearly is visible by all the markers and lines showing up!

All the stuff you see after i started attacking the A.I. group was done by T.C.L. mainly.

This way you clearly see what is going on.

[chrisb 196]

Had a long post took it off, didn't want to seem ungrateful..

 

Can you get them to go to cover.. i.e. similar to zeu_findcover, I'm sure your familiar with it.

 

 

 

[Machiya 19]

7 hours ago, snkman said:

As already explained to ZackTactical34 A.I. unit(s) / group(s) which move from A to B WITHOUT enemy contact ( without any kind of threat ) will use pure vanilla ARMA movement given to their current behaviour!

Those A.I. movement behaviours are hardcoded and what you see in this case is a comparison of ARMA 2 A.I. vanilla Stealth / Limited vs ARMA 3 vanilla Stealth / Limited movement.

From the testing I did earlier this week -- and for people setting stuff up in Zeus -- Stealth + Vanilla + 'Crouch' and 'Staggered Column' made a positive difference to CQB movement PRIOR to COMBAT (seeing the enemy).
Also, Fireteams moved better than squads -- basically you get two groups of four moving, which more real.

[snkman 351]

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But its the cover that makes a massive difference to ai mods. For them to use cover correctly, or as correctly as possible.

Agree!

GL4 if i remember correctly did not have any A.I. take cover feature but as you can see in the video i posted A.I. take cover is one of the main system features in T.C.L. A.I. with correct direction and distance calculations.

The blue arrors shows A.I. unit(s) possible cover and after given A.I. unit(s) reached their cover position they will switch to green.

 

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GL series ai are way too eager to die, but the other ai mods seem to hold them back and make them more tactical (imo just players view). 😉

True.

GL series did not use any A.I. movement direction calculations.

A.I. simply was send to a random position 100 meters within their enemy which very often results in A.I. moving directly in front of their enemy.

This has been drastically changed and improved as well!

Guess T.C.L. A.I. movement calculations and conditions are one of the most complex part.

T.C.L. tryes to calculate if A.I. should move / advance or stay at their position which is pretty hard to do correctly especially in urban areas where distance calculations are kind of useless because A.I. and their enemy(s) can be very close to each other but without LOS separated by just a wall or a building which needs some specific LOS calculations to check if A.I. can see their enemy(s) or not.

Thankfully ARMA 3 provides some new scripting commands which will return much more precise informations about A.I. unit(s) enemy(s) than any other ARMA game before.

[chrisb 196]

5 minutes ago, snkman said:

Agree!

GL4 if i remember correctly did not have any A.I. take cover feature but as you can see in the video i posted A.I. take cover is one of the main system features in T.C.L. A.I. with correct direction and distance calculations.

The blue arrors shows A.I. unit(s) possible cover and after given A.I. unit(s) reached their cover position they will switch to green.

 

True.

GL series did not use any A.I. movement direction calculations.

A.I. simply was send to a random position 100 meters within their enemy which very often results in A.I. moving directly in front of their enemy.

This has been drastically changed and improved as well!

Guess T.C.L. A.I. movement calculations and conditions are one of the most complex part.

T.C.L. tryes to calculate if A.I. should move / advance or stay at their position which is pretty hard to do correctly especially in urban areas where distance calculations are kind of useless because A.I. and their enemy(s) can be very close to each other but without LOS separated by just a wall or a building which needs some specific LOS calculations to check if A.I. can see their enemy(s) or not.

Thankfully ARMA 3 provides some new scripting commands which will return much more precise informations about A.I. unit(s) enemy(s) than any other ARMA game before.

GL3 had 'take cover' script, you removed it for GL4. But for me, ai looking as if they are wanting to live, helps, getting to cover gives that impression to the player. 🙂

[snkman 351]

@Machiya

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Also, Fireteams moved better than squads -- basically you get two groups of four moving, which more real.

Yes thats really true!

The more A.I. unit(s) A.I. group(s) have to more they get massed up.

ARMA 3 is very seriouse when it comes to A.I. group formation.

If the A.I. group use combat mode "COMBAT" and if only 1 A.I. unit gets out of his group formation position the entire group will be kind of stuck in formation till every A.I. unit returned to its correct group formation position. ( While moving )

The more A.I. unit(s) a group has the higher the chance to get this stuck in formation thing.

[snkman 351]

@chrisb

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GL3 had 'take cover' script, you removed it for GL4.

Yes you are right!

I did not really remove it B.I.S. simply removed / disable the scripting command to make A.I. find cover in ARMA 2.

 

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But for me, ai looking as if they are wanting to live, helps, getting to cover gives that impression to the player. 🙂

Sure they will!

Even A.I.s are just human.

No seriously... I'm really trying to make them as much tacticall and make them behave and react as best as possible.

[ZackTactical34 86]

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[AirShark 147]

why TCL in armaholic is outdated 

[snkman 351]

@ZackTactical34

True A.I. developement really is hell of fun!

Too bad many games of today are focused on PvP only!

Its really hard to find a game which at least is kind of moddable like ARMA.

 

@AirShark

I don't know...

[AirShark 147]

Ive made more tests today ...in CQB I was 3 meters away from an enemy inside a building, he wasted all his magazine to scratch my arm ...I went unconscious and then woke up I ended him with 1 bullet in the head.

to be honest I really miss the old settings in GL4 especially the (shooting) accuracy but I cant find the skills setting in the userconfig is it under progress ?

[snkman 351]

Yes you are right!

A.I. Skill calculations are wrong which result in pretty low A.I. skills.

 

Right now there is no value to change only thing you can do to solve it is to disable the A.I. skill feature:

 

UserConfig > TCL > TCL_System.sqf

    // ------------------------------------------------------------
    // T.C.L. Skills: ( System )
    // ------------------------------------------------------------
    // Choose if A.I. unit(s) should use advanced skills.
    // True / False, default is True
      TCL_System set [4, False];

Thanks for the hint AirShark!

 

[Broreale 0]

Sorry for this fairly obvious question, but I've been looking in all the wrong places I guess and haven't been able to find the answer I'm looking for. How do you set up radio reinforcements/artillery in the editor?