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dayglow

Ai thread

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I want to continue the idea of my previous post.

Imagine ai quickly running from one side of the street to another. Nothing uncommon? Let`s see...

If AI knows about the players position, or if it`s a bit wiser, about the possible players position, and knows the direction of possible fire, than it could move from one object situated in the trajectory of enemy bullets to another, just as it would `think` about the danger.

This would cause some kind of AI`s `situation awareness`.

For ex:

   

X1 |house|       |\\\\\\|

#----------------------

x2  >   street              PLAYER

-----------------------

X3 |\\\\\\|       |\\\\\\|

    -------       -------

X1 - first position of ai (silent mode)

PLAYER - hmm

# - ai walks on the possible danger area (PLAYER can see the AI), AI knows about it and leaned out to check the sorroundings, now AI knows the danger is confirmed, switches to dynamic mode

x2 - ai quickly crosses the street

x3 - ai crossed the street

It`s just an example of crossing the street. AI in waypoint "#" ai could start engaging PLAYER.

[edit2]:When in team, some ai soldiers may try to cover those who are moving, or simply start shooting in PLAYER`s dirrection to suppress him. In "#" this point one of the AI leans out and watches the ">" direction.

Of course AI in safe mode, for ex. in it`s own base would behave quite normal.

I just want to prevent AI runing chaotically when under fire, or after seeing the enemy.

Another thing. If we don`t want to have 30 AI trying to check the street by leanin out of the wall(?), AI have to comunicate each other about the PLAYER possition.

Look at my beautiful pic.

X1 is AI from team A. X3 is AI from team B.

X1 is closer the corner so It leans first. Would be great if this second dude wouldn`t move at all. When X1 sees nothing it yealls "clear" or something like that, after that X3 knows that it`s ok. The same situation after X1 sees an enemy.

When X1 communicates with other team members using radio they might try to flank or ambush PLAYER without confirming PLAYERS possition. They should know (more or less) where PLAYER is after X1`s report.[/edit2]

 

I know it sucks, I`m after 14h of school now

tounge2.gif

edit1: I know it`s pretty much te same method  the AI works now, but I`m talking about putting it together with anims, I want to create system that would simulate more human-like behaviour.

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AI should be able to use whatever weapon directed against whatever target directed.

For example a MG position 400 metres away is killing your company.

As a section leader you command a rifleman to shoot his 66mm LAW against the bunker.

In today's OFP the 'AI brain' would say "This weapon cannot be used like that and that range is too far for normal usage".

In reality, fuck what the weapon is meant to be used for, having a bright 66mm fireball flying at you is going to have a mental detriment attached to it. Thus giving your MG gunner time to properly position his weapon.

...

Another example.

In reality tank crews like to travel 'turned out' so they have a better perspective of the battlefield and can spot AT traps better.

An anti tank team often fires a Medium calibre MG at the tank first, this forces the crew down into a low visibilty situation, then the AT gunners can engage with less risk of being detected.

So anything should be able to be shot at by AI. I want suppressive fire! I want to be able to direct MG fires against windows, bushes, small dogs, houses, hilltops, dirt and anything else present on the battlfield.

Same goes for rifle launched grenades, mortars blah blah blah.

If it's worth sticking on the scenery it's worth shooting at.

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System simillar like in Full Spectrum Warrior?

Would be great if AI knew about penetration values of some basic materials such as wood, glass and so on...

AI shouldn`t see through the bushes but It should definetely shoot through it in situations when enemy was seen before he hidden.

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Hiya guys and gals

My interest in the Game2 AI isn't merely how it behaves, but how it can be interacted with via the comref / scripting / mod engine. If I had my way I would want a system something like this:

OFP has Setskill 0-1

and a bunch of Setbehaviour and SetCombatmode commands.

As we all know.

Could Game2 have:

Setaccuracy 0-1

 >Small arms accuracy 0 = very poor (civilian), 1 = highly trained (SF).

Setvehaccuracy 0-1

 >Mounted weapons accuracy and efficiency of use. 0 = untrained, 1 = specifically trained. Could be differentiated by base weapon class so a unit can be good at using mounted machine guns but poor at using tank guns.

Setmanouver 0-1

 >How well trained the individual is in personal manouver and team manouver if in a group. 0 = act as a bunch of individuals, 1 = dynamic military formations according to task and environment. This setting can also determine how effective an individual is in performing team tasks like healing wounded, carrying and resupplying ammo, etc.

Setdrive 0-1

 >How good the individual is at driving a vehicle and using vehicle team manouvers if in a group. This command could even be differentiated into vehicle classes.

Setawareness 0-1

 >How aware the individual is of their surroundings and how well they communicate this awareness to their team if grouped to other units.

Setskill "preset"

 >Use this command to set a unit to preset levels of all of the above. So Setskill "rifleman" would give something like 0.6 accuracy, 0.2 vehaccuracy, 0.8 manouver, 0.5 drive, 0.75 awareness. This command would be a shortcut for anyone wanting to quickly set up a bunch of units without having to go through the whole commands list.

Setbehaviour and setcombatmode can remain but they cause ai behaviour that is in accordance with the levels set by the prior commands. So a Setbehaviour "stealth" bunch of setmanouver 0 noobs would move very slowly in their attempt to be quiet, would have to look around at each other alot so they don't lose track of each other and would be slow at taking effective advantage of concealment. A group of Setbehaviour "stealth", setmanouver 1 SF commandos will be able to make better time, keep each other covered and will make excellent use of cover and concealment to remain hidden while doing so.

A civilian rally driver would have setdrive 1 and setawareness 0.9. He would be a whizz on the road but will be a poor marksman when he joins the resistance.

What do you all think? In Game2 effective AI won't just be about what the units can do and how they react to the environment, it will also be about how open their behaviours and capabilites are to scripting and modding.

PS: this post isn't about trying to make OFP2: the RPG, it is about giving the community the tools to do really interesting things with the units. Fine management of AI along with the option to circumvent it via a setskill "preset" command is a good step in that direction.

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Things I'd like to see in Game2:

-AI machine gunners don't snipe people

-AI lays down supressing fire instead of always shooting one by one and intermittent bursts in every situation

-AI responds to supressing fire by finding cover and staying behind it

-AI finding cover in general

-AI not having to be babied by the commander

-AI don't have the ability to see through bushes

-AI drive more skillfully (not bumping into other vehicles, etc)

-AI looks around during patrols or advances instead of looking straight all the time

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My suggestions:

- AI cannot see through smoke, fog and close snow precipitation

- AI will use other movement modi and formations for CQB (very close formation, the soldiers are securing in all directions, one looks to the back and moving backward when needed)

- AI will secure crossing of streets in the cities with mg gunner and one other gunner when their comerades are moving fast to the corner on the other side of the street (like Full Spectrum Warrior)

- simple command combinations to command your AI comerade to throw handgrenade in the windows in the houses

- AI can see you w/o NVGoggles only when you are in the light (under streetlamp ?) or very close

- guarding AI soldier will react only when you are loud

- tank commanders can use tower mgs and shoot with their handweapons. But they can use binoculars to overlooking the situation of the battlefield near their tank

- AI will place detention mines on the wheels of the tanks (WW2 missions - like "saving pvt. ryan")

- AI medic will carry (or pull when under fire) the wounded comerades in the cover before their will help their

- Realistic wound management - heavy wounds needs more time to heal it and when the soldier is wounded on their leg he will go slow and not straight (sorry i don´t knows the english worth for german "rumpeln")

- AI will handle realistic when it use radio - move to the radioman (or call the radioman), put radio receiver and communicate with the HQ (see my ChSBCS script)

I hope the BIS team can create realistic game with realistic atmosphere and reliable CQB aka "COD2" or MOHAA.

nener.gif

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I'd also like to have the ability of spotting targets myself, because sometimes you can see a tank from far away and no matter how many times you point your teammates in its direction, they don't see it until it's about 200m away, which results in our deaths ( And believe me, you could easily hear those tanks and the AI still doenst see them or make notice ). I'd prefer the AI to be able to see farther distances like how the gunners do in helicopters. This is especially important if your teammates are AT soldiers. Hopefully these things have been/will be addressed in Game2  smile_o.gif .

Edit: I'd also like to see the AI apply supressing fire. In OFP, the AI would usually snipe at you with either semi-auto or short bursts. It just feels kinda unrealistic to have massive battles in OFP and the only thing that you see and hear are machine gunners shooting 2 by 2 bursts and other soldiers firing bursts the whole time and having nobody using the full auto fire mode (The jeep/m113 turret gunners with their .50 calibers did the same as well). I'm not suggesting that the AI use supressing fire in every situation, I'm suggesting that they use it while defending a position or while advancing on a town or opposing force (or whatever situation suits best). It just ties in perfectly with those war stories you always read and hear about where there's chaos and sporadic gunfire all around. It would be pretty awesome if the AI responded appropiately to gunfire also, for example: the AI runs and finds cover instead of going prone where it is (unless it has to). The popular Tom Clancy game series (especially the Ghost Recon series) have superb AI features; the AI run for cover, they lay down large amounts of fire while others advance, the snipers shoot at you and run to a new position to snipe, and they just act like real fighters. I hope the AI in game2 will be even more sophisticated pistols.gif

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Well, AI should spread out and quickly run for cover when under fire...

If you start shooting at 2 guys in ofp, they`ll shoot back, standing or going prone, even if you`re 30m away with a machine gun...

I think It should be random...Some guys should start popping at you with their rifles and others should simply run to the nearest cover...

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According to rumours about Game 2 the civillians will be able to give short input on units and movement they have seen.

I took this a bit further in another context.

There should be a surrender option for enemy AI. Reasons for surrendering can be various ones:

- outnumbered

- split from own troops

- Injured / immobilized

- only survivor

- low skill and therefore missing motivation

Now the opposing party should be able to capture those surrendering enemy/ies and if they are injured apply medical treatment to them and afterwards interrogate them.

As civillian AI seems to know about enemy movements it would be just great if the units themselves could give information about troop strength, kind and position away. Depending on rank and skill this information could be more or less detailed. Like exact type of enemies, number, direction of movement, current orders, etc.

Sabotage units for example could try to fool the enemy by claiming false things or leading them into a trap. Maybe there could be a place in the unit setup box in the editor to define such behaviour or have a textbox for specific info that would be given to enemies in case of capture.

I guess this would make the Game2 AI aspect even a bit more realistic and certainly would add a new momentum to gameplay as the new possibilities for mission editors would create some kind of new mission concept and will make you think twice before you shoot a high ranked officer that could have vital intel for your purposes.

Any thoughts ?

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Hi,

In my opinion it would be a good thing to indeed have AI characters provide information that is to some extent unreliable, whether on purpose (outright lies, withholding of information) or not (mistakes, rumours). This would add an element of uncertainty to intelligence recovered from AI characters.

Regards,

Sander

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AI. Reasons for surrendering can be various ones:

- outnumbered

- split from own troops

- Injured / immobilized

- only survivor

- low skill and therefore missing motivation

Another thing, basically what I wrote earlier...

Supprised AI should surrender...

And moreover, you should have the ability to surrender to...

There were many situations in old ofp in which (in normal life) you would have a choice, an you COULD surrender (enemies like resistance fighters or some bullet-headed soldiers could kill you anyway, but It`s a different story) but you didn`t because you were forced to fight till you`re dead.

But what then?

A rescue mission? Situations like that are rather a rarity (especially when you`re on the stronger side)....

but if AI can surrender must have the ability to surrender too...

Moreover, imagine AI guy who only simulates it, and quickly takes his weapon and runs away/starts to shoot at you...

This stuff must be done carefully to prevent situations like surrened men from both fighting sides, standing in the middle of the battlefield with hands above their heads....

edit:

How to make AI behave like real soldiers? Watch the real ones, techniques and tactics are important, but something over that would add alot of immersion. It`s old thing, I know, but I figured out how to make it a bit closer to real life. There`s a bunch of military movies done by soldiers for ex in Iraq (militaryvideos.net), which could help to create a realistic AI.

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Something I'd like to see is some more thinking on their feet. One of the biggest problems I have with the AI of Operation Flashpoint is that it's not smart enough to pick up anti-tank weapons lying all around if they don't have any and an enemy tank shows up. It also would be nice if the AI knew how to set up an ambush or set up anti-tank defenses like mines, and if it were smart enough to make use of empty vehicles on the battlefield. The only problem I can think of, other than this being hard to code, is too much AI autonomy could make a mission get out of the designer's control.

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Isn't the ultimate goal of improving AI to take the mission out of the designers control? A certain amount of unpredicability is exactly what we have in real life. Choreographing missions using triggers, waypoints and behaviour modes is necessary only because current AI is too limited.

I never enjoyed the missions I created in OFP much because I always knew too much about what would happen, where and when. The same goes for replaying missions designed by others.

This has to be the direction BIS are heading with Game2 if they are to achieve their truly dynamic campaigns and persistant game world.

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(1) I guess it is quite easy to simulate AI units taking cover behind objects by introducing 'safety zones' {green} around objects. When an AI unit is under fire it will simply move to the next safety zone. When the unit taking cover is in the 'zone' some scripts will kick in. Depending on other values assigned (courage, skill, speed mode, hit probability etc...) the unit taking cover will then display a certain behaviour - like peaking through windows or peaking around corners ...etc

cover15ul.jpg

(2) The real problem I see is making the AI take cover behind terrain features (not objects). Depending on the relative position of the unit taking cover and the unit firing, certain areas might provide cover and others may not. Certain areas might in one moment be no-go-zones while in the next moment they might provide excellent cover. So how can the engine test if a certain area can be seen (fired upon) by a certain unit?

I guess the easiest way would be a sampling: When unit {A} spots an hostile unit {B} the engine draws a random sample spot from the area surrounding unit {A}. [white circles]. Next engine simply checks whether or not that spot can be seen from where the shooter {B} is standing. (Technically that means: Can you extend a vector to that spot without hitting a surface?) If the spot can be seen than the engine will simply draw another sample spot and test again if it can be seen...and so on.

When the engine has finally detected some spots close to unit {A} that cannot be seen by unit {B}, unit {A} moves to one of these spots (randomly). If the spot is in a 'zone' the unit will start executing some script.

cover24wq.jpg

I don't think that the strain on the CPU would be too high because this function would have to be executed only every once in a while when a new unit is spotted.

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I dont understand the second idea...

Have you played commandos? There was this function showing the fov of an enemy unit... We just need the 3D version of this system. AI could hide behind objects ad also use ground as a cover.

AI should always pick the optimum cover/safe zone which should guarantee the 100% safety. So there`s no need to constantly check the courrent fov, where the enemy unit is watching at the moment (maybe on a very short distance). AI should be aware of the possible enemy`s fov instead . Ai should also have the ability to share this kind of info, for ex, if a commander knows that behind a wall or a building there are enemy units, the rest of his squad should also know this.

As I wrote earlier, AI should use safe zones everytime when in "danger" or "stealth" mode, especially in urbanized areas, and treat every surface like a safe* zone, because of possibility that enemy might be everywhere. That would help to create really "suspicious", and realistic ai behaviour. This way AI would act like a team and move in urbanized areas like real soldiers, checking every corner, covering each other, and moving when every possible "danger" dirrection is checked or under eye of a team mate. The less units in the squad the worst cover is provided...

edit:I also think that the ultimate goal of improving it AI is making it self-sufficient. When the campaign is fully dynamic, there`s no point in controlling the mission, since there are no missions in the classic sense. The mission design is one thing, but on the other hand AI simply can`t do everything planned in the mission scenario (every designer should take under concideration that AI can stop fighting and surrender, just one idea), because sometimes It`s just not realistic at all.

*by safe zone I mean place where AI can go to avoid being seen or to avoid enemy fire, so when on this `suspicious` mode they should concider all the walls as a safe zones and all dirrections as a danger zones.

edit:

Funny thing, the AI desn`t care about it`s life as much as it cares about waypoints, no matter given in the editor or ordered by player.

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With a brand spanking new PC and no ARMA to play I bit the bullet and bought Rainbow Six Vegas. Now I'm not normally a console shooter fan, but I've heard so much about it's much ballyhooed 'cover' features so I figured wth.

The game as a whole does have a very strong 'console feel';Ai that can't seem to locate you beyond 100 ft, predictable enemy placement,Star Wars tracers, AI that likes cussin' etc...

But damn that cover is good!!! Not only can you use just about anything, peek out from side and above, but the AI uses it extremely well. Granted, the environments are small by OFP standards and you only have 2 AI squadies, but if Game 2 could utilize even half of this for it's CQB it would be fantastic. I had an incredibly exciting shotgun shootout with me and an enemy using the opposite sides of a parked car that lasted over a minute until his squadies finally flanked me.

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Isn't the ultimate goal of improving AI to take the mission out of the designers control? A certain amount of unpredicability is exactly what we have in real life. Choreographing missions using triggers, waypoints and behaviour modes is necessary only because current AI is too limited.

I never enjoyed the missions I created in OFP much because I always knew too much about what would happen, where and when. The same goes for replaying missions designed by others.

This has to be the direction BIS are heading with Game2 if they are to achieve their truly dynamic campaigns and persistant game world.

Maybe because ultimately mission makers should be making missions for others to enjoy as well and share them.

And as a mission maker I find those commands incredibly usefull. If I want to make a mission that has a particular objective I can entice players into it by the way i set up the enemy. And there was always atleast one way to add an element of randomness. ie waypiont size or scripts.

And don't forget there was the Dynamic missions by DMA and the template Tacrod released, very easy to set up random missions with various units and addons

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ah.... I orignaly wanted to say that the AI needs a weapons skill that tweaks thier ability to hit and not just thier ability to engage. The melding of a soldiers entire skill into just 1 stat is what I believe has complicated the whole AI debate ie,anything other than vetran skill level exihibit outragous behaviour and snap head shots ALL the time, while the vets do it HALF the time.

I've ranted in another thread about skills that tweak for players and think it should be fine for AI as well.

I'm not sure exactly how Arma may have changed (I get my copy in a few more days) but it would be good to get away from that old OFP problem where you need a vetran to do the driving if you wanted to stay on the road.

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Hey i found this video of ghost recon 2, the player in it isn't important (he's not that good and has invulnerability on), but the AI, wow man.

Just look at them move around, they convince me a thousand times better that they are human then ArmA's AI.

They advance, flank, rush him. They don't use grenades and are a bit too agressive for their own health but you get the idea. Hope game 2's AI will move around similiarly...

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As someone said this is not interesting to create missions based on scripts 'cause u know what,where and when.Stalker has system of life simulation (Life A),using scripts only in cycled actions like weather,day and night and so on. Make Life B. To make player feel he's not head of the train.That another world lives itself and without him.

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cool, my thread is still going yay.gif

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cool, my thread is still going yay.gif

Stay on topic please! tounge2.gif

Anyway, played GRAW a bit recently, and I must say that I'm rather impressed how good the friendly AI was in terms of movement and awareness. I don't give a damn about how it was made, nevertheless it looked quite nice. I'm not an expert, but I think BIS should focus more on the AI stuff this time. What do you need 10000 km^2 for, with the AI that acts like wolves, especially when majority of missions are based on rather small distances with no cqb techniques at all? Long ranged fights aren't superb either because of tanks engaging other armor with MGs or helos not using missiles properly, and AI that doesn't know what to do on the battlefield. At least it's a matter of some config tweaks.

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What you really should do is to make it possible for third-party editors to create own AI. Then you would eventually have different ai' personalitys and strategies

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