Does the grass effect the AI, is my game fudged or am i insane?

[maturin 12]

Crysis has the best AI spotting system

They always see you, no matter what?

And does the AI use rays to check if you're behind a hard object like a house? Because they will sometimes "see" you (or else pinpoint exactly via sound) through all manner of fences and walls and shoot through it, or attempt to.

[AfricanWarhead 10]

I downloaded Duala and made a simple mission that I have to advance towards a complex with four targets. I altered the terrain to replicate the thick african bush (craploads of salix trees - the busy ones - had to adjust my graphics to accommodate for it).

Right, so I play the mission. Within like 100m of the complex the AI see me and fire accurately at me. Now, between me and the complex there are like 12 salix trees in a row (and bushes), not to mention all the other trees to the side. I cannot see the AI at all. (I set damageAllow to false to experiment) After carrying on through the bushes, these guys fanatically unleash a barrage of fire at me and still I cannot see them. Only when I have 2, 3 trees left to go can I see the complex, and a little dark shape running around, and then a tuft of gunsmoke.

Sorry guys, say what you will, but this part of the game is flawed. In real life, visibility would only be within 3, 4 bushy trees. These AI can see me through a small forest :P

For the rest, Arma 2 is friggin AWESOME!

cheers

AW

Edited July 2, 2010 by AfricanWarhead

[sniper pilot 36]

What difficulty did you have the AI set to? If you have them all defaulted to super soldiers- then that's what you got.

Try to find a sweet spot by playing with the sliders in the difficulty menu. It's not perfect, but with a game this open and moddable you can't possibly expect perfection.

People will always complain either of how well or how crappy the AI is at detecting you. BIS is trying to make an AI that is dynamic but one that still makes mistakes. So I think it's a good thing to think about before totaly damning it to hell.

Edited July 1, 2010 by Sniper Pilot
Boo I see you.

[AfricanWarhead 10]

I did notice a difference but I have to test this further.

But even so, not even an experienced SAS soldier would be able to spot me coming through 100m of thick bush so quickly... and then recognise me as a threat and write my name in my chest with bullets... but I guess that's what they're A.I for :)

I guess I shouldn't really be complaining because I know what a biaaatch it is to program this stuff (I am a part-time software developer) but I think that it would be easy to add a method involving simple visibility parameters that override A.I spotting functions by setting concealment to 100% if the players relative location meets a critical density of trees beyond a certain distance from the A.I, depending on skill obviously... This way you can set the skill of the A.I to max and have a serious, but a more fair challenge. Or perhaps a calibration at the beginning of the game with a number of visibility tests (and shooting tests), where the A.I gets the same spotting (and targeting) skills as you have... and you can set them to slightly higher or slightly lower than you depending on how lazy or hyped you are ;D

would this be possible in an addon perhaps??

Edited July 3, 2010 by AfricanWarhead

[Hedo 10]

Are the trees from an addon? (for example African foliage) If yes, maybe the viewgeometry LOD is bugged/not finished.

[AfricanWarhead 10]

Are the trees from an addon? (for example African foliage) If yes, maybe the viewgeometry LOD is bugged/not finished.

Duala uses African foliage yes, so that might be a problem... but I use the BI Salix trees made available through the @MAP mod (they are more bushier - not all of africa is acacia). So I presume that the view geometry is fine. I'll give it a test though.

I wouldn't be surprised that A.I's have such sharp vision that if your ear would be visible through a hole of 0.1mm^2 through 8,192 leaves at a range of 112m, that would be enough for him to consider you a threat and blow a 7.65mm piercing in that same ear :D

Edited July 3, 2010 by AfricanWarhead

[NeMeSiS 11]

I wouldn't be surprised that A.I's have such sharp vision that if your ear would be visible through a hole of 0.1mm^2 through 8,192 leaves at a range of 112m, that would be enough for him to consider you a threat and blow a 7.65mm piercing in that same ear :D

Yeah im pretty sure that its a case of 'They see you, or they dont see you at all' where your toe is enough to reveal you. But i dont think that the viewgeometry is that precise. ;)

Its mostly the edges of bushes you should be aware of, always hide it the middle of them if possible.

Edited July 3, 2010 by NeMeSiS

[ceeeb 147]

I've just been experimenting, and have also found that AI targetting is not affected by grass that the player can not see through. On an island like Chernarus, this creates some really frustrating gameplay that really cripples ArmA2. I really hope this is resolved in an upcoming patch.

[walker 0]

I've just been experimenting, and have also found that AI targetting is not affected by grass that the player can not see through. On an island like Chernarus, this creates some really frustrating gameplay that really cripples ArmA2. I really hope this is resolved in an upcoming patch.

Hi ceeeb

Sorry but you are continuing a myth and one that has been busted already with statements from BIS, videos showing it is not true and example missions. If you can prove the myth then do so in the ArmA Mythbusters thread:

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=103866

It is listed as

MYTH: The AI saw me when I was down in the grass, it should not have been able to.

And remains a myth untill someone can come up with a working vanilla ArmA test mission that can prove it.

Until then Mythbusted.

Kind Regards walker

Edited August 11, 2010 by walker

[ceeeb 147]

Walker,

I've seen your thread - there is much discussion that I don't really want to get involved it.

As I see it, there are two separate issues related to AI and grass:

AI ability to spot an unknown unit laying in the grass - Grass is simulated for AI, I'm reasonably happy with it.

AI ability to fire upon a known target through grass - Grass does not affect AI sufficiently. In conditions of intervening grass, AI can fire precisely upon a target in conditions that a human player is unable to see.

Edited August 12, 2010 by ceeeb

[metalcraze 290]

Just because grass covers your eyes doesn't mean it covers your body. When you lie down you put the grass down around you and it obviously will tell your enemy much.

One of the best proofs about grass affecting AI I saw was in an MP game where me and a sniper were moving through the grass prone and AI 50m to our rear started firing, I turned around to check - and saw that he was firing at a position where we were 10 seconds ago. I took him down.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

But it's really not a grass thing, it's a surface thing. How would AI enemy, which is local to server, know if you have grass turned on or off, an effect which is local to player? I assume the same is taking place for daylight (skipTime being local) and weather effects, and which is why local weather effects was removed from Domination a long while ago.

[lapa 1]

I think the AI's vision is quite well adjusted at the moment, the AI definitely isn't all-seeing. You can hide in the grass and if you stay put the AI may pass you by a few meters away. Also, if the AI sees you in a corner of a building/rock, it will use supressing fire and you may retreat and change location and the AI doesn't automatically know where you are.

However, I find that the AI does have a slight advantage in areas with dense vegetation in terms of getting the first contact, but that goes for friendly AI as well, which balances things out. In less dense vegetation, human player has the advantage, as you can usually spot the enemy before the AI.

[Grizzle 0]

Is there some information about what is considered "vision" in the arma engine? I see lots of people talking about pixel level identification. Is that really a valid description?

The way I assume it works is that a 'line' is drawn between targets and a value is calculated based upon the number and type of object intersections on that line as well as the terrain type the objects are situated upon. Or something very similar to that.

The way some describe it, the vision system actually takes into account holes in LOD and objects. Meaning, if you stood behind a wall with a small hole in it and part of you was visible through that tiny hole, the AI would see you. I have a hard time believing this is how it is implemented. Does anyone (besides BIS devs) know for sure?