AI Tests

[stormbringer951]

I've been and will be conductiong some tests on BAI and CAI to see which ones are best suited to the mod.

I am considering for CAI

XAI (by xeryx, tweaked for our mod, of course)
Lusted's AI

for BAI

XBAI
Condo's BAI
Lusted's BAI



Any others you want to suggest?

[Unbowed]

Darth's battle AI was always a favourite of mine, but I'm not too sure.

What ai are we using now?

[Santiago de Pola]

In some of my tests Cond's BAI proved to be the best..followed by lusteds.

[stormbringer951]

Lusted's. I've run a few preliminary tests using almost matched AI forces. The slightly stronger one absolutely crushes the weaker force by at least a 2-1 margin. XAI and to a lesser extend Condo's AI fights to a standstill (1-1 and 8-10 respectively).

Condo's AI holds units in reserve and patches up holes in the battle line. Did well against itself, as they held a coherent battle line for quite a long time. Not sure how quickly I'd break their line so I need to conduct some less dependable human vs AI tests.

Lusted's AI tends to run it's cavalry in too soon, and it's marching formation is messy. I reckon with a well timed counter charge I could screw it over (that's why it lost repeatedly, as the weaker Lannister force rushed it's cavalry in too early and lost most of them before the battle proper started). However, it maximises it's advantages well, in that it completely dominated the weaker force once it had an advantage. XAI and Condo's AI left with almost even honours. Oh, and Lusted's is better at eliminating enemy generals. The second time, both enemy generals died around early middle of the battle.

XAI shows a commendable use of cavalry in the playthrough I did. Both AI used them for harassing enemies, and uses a bit of hit and run tactics occasionally. Not as coherent fighting formations as Condo's, but better than Lusted's troops running around willy nilly.

EDIT: saved replays, will post them up later once I've run three tests for all. At moment I'm just looking at the end scores, not considering advanced tactics. Will also post up battle replays of them with largely inequal forces, and with me vs the computer (laugh at my failings ), three times for each one.

Then rinse and repeat for sieges *sigh*

[Santiago de Pola]

Cool review!

I'm eager to see your experience in sieges, as I ran into quite a different results from those three BAI's, especially when defending!

[stormbringer951]

All right, wrote up the results for a few tests. Three each, with a limited army. The Lannister force had superiority in bowmen, the Starks had better infantry. This is utilising the mod, with RealCombat.

Condo's BAI plays similarly to how I would play. It skirmishes with bowmen as both armies advance. The cavalry charge in to take out enemy bowmen, enemy cavalry counter charge, and the infantry charge as the cavalry either pull back or rout. Then it gets into a proper little meleee as both sides grind each other down. They have units in reserve, these work quite well as they can reinforce weak points. Also, several times, I've seen cavalry gang up on an isolated unit, allowing the weaker force to achieve a local superiority for a while.

XAI plays quite similarly to Condo's, considering they are sharing material. XAI plays more like a mix of Lusted's and Condo's though. It tends to leave the archers further behind, and it plays strangely sometimes, with the archers stranded too far back to actually fire on enemies. Quite fond of cavalry hammer and anvils.

Lusted's is the favourite of many TWC'ers, but it has some flaws. The cavalry has a tendency to suicide by charging large amounts of enemies. I accept that this is a good tactic with infantry, as they can hold up many enemies, but Lusted's doesn't either use the hammer and anvil or hit and run tactics I'd expect there. Lusted's infantry does try to hold enemy units in combat but that would only be an inconvenience for human players (who'd pull troops out of combat and engage them somewhere else if the enemy is trying to slow them down with junk troops). However, it does press an advantage mercilessly, which is quite nice. However, it tends to rush straight for the throat, stranding and dooming slower units.

I've attached the replay files and the config I used to test the battlefield battles. Replay them yourselves by all means. I want to see more opinions on this. I've just fought the AI myself, and it's quite funny.

The first time I played, I fought against them using tactics similar to their own. I only just managed to win. The XAI battle AI suprised me with a cavalry charge against my own numerically superior cavalry, whittling off my numbers but losing theirs. The rest of their cavalry also sacraficed themselves to gain that nice little charge bonus. Then afterwards, I used my remaining cavalry in a hammer and anvil tactic and crushed their troops one by one. I won, but without a sufficiently large margin of superiority.

I then played my favourite formation for the test, with a five line setup. First rank is longbowmen with stakes in the ground (it was a very funny moment when my scouts broke and fled straight backwards into the stakes *facepalm*). Second rank is spear militia to absorb the first charge, third rank is my heavier infantry to wear them down and my fourth rank is low rank archers, who will expend their missiles and throw themselves into the fray. My cavalry on the flanks will dominate their cavalry and then destroy their archers before using the hammer and anvil tactic to rout their infantry.

1) vs Lusted's AI. Fought well, but not notably. Better than vanilla though.
2) vs Condo's AI. Reserves were very annoying. Prevented my cavalry from neatly crushing their archers, so it was a bit more messy.
3) vs XAI. Decent grasp of priorities. Pulled back spearmen to actually defend their archers from my cavalry. A slightly annoying but ultimately futile gesture.

I suggest people try this setup against the three AI's, as I played with a tactic I knew would probably rip them apart (I normally fight field battles with this setup against Western-style armies, and I've only ever lost once, and that was massively outnumbered and outclassed). I want to see how they perform under different circumstances as well

Will have Siege battles up soon I hope.

[xeryx]

Thank you very much for testing our BAI's The Tests overall seemed fair, but isn't there more testing to be done? We have been working on these AI's for much longer. How long have you actually tested for? one day? The posts are vague too me, can you please elaborate.

I also have a question? Did you change your edu to reflect, any changes for the Skimishers? (as per the directions) Mainly the short range. Also what version of the game are you running. XAI is solely for Kingdoms, at least 1.3 patch and above because of the differences in the game engine? Did you know there are differences in the game engine? and it's not bug fixes, but upgrades to the engine.

If that criteria has not been met, then many problems could have arisen, but may have been unseen. (like skirmishers using missile ranges etc) (not using the proper tag) there are defaults which are included, but you will not get the full specialized XBAI.

Also, why are you only playing open battles? Sieges is where the true power of XAI will make you hurt.

This is good though, if the XAI works fully with your mod, if so we will have to revisit our findings.

But according to Condo, our tags for commands will not read, like they do in the Kingdoms.exe. There is definitely a difference on the Campaign side of it as well, my CAI will not work with you mod, unless you try the 2.20 version that Condo uses in his TLR mod. It is a pain in the arse, However we now have one of the most immersive diplomacy systems available.

[Condottiere SOG]

I am pleased with your post, sotrmbringer951. I have to agree with my colleague, however. We've tested these AIs over thousands of simulations. I have 21 decent AIs at hand. These represent over 2000 hours of play, more if you include MTW and RTW. A good assessment of an AI takes time. Like a fine wine. Or a beer. It must be brewed to perfection. Lusted's AI doesn't require much thought and is not far from vanilla, if you look at it correctly. Simplicity gathers about itself results. Like his spirit. XAI is a marvelous composite of much deliberation, true grit. With mine; I like taking apart cars and putting them back together. I am working on my beautifully golden Mercedes wagon all the time. It takes time. 90 miles an hour, without so much as a sweat, in the country is nice. We are all far from the Golden Mean. One day, one of us at TWC will get there and we will all be thankful for it.

I do enjoy my heated dialogues with House Lannister. I am House Tyrell(Tyrel Corporation).

[stormbringer951]

I've only had a brief look at the AI's. I recognise more testing needs to be done (in fact, I posted that I'm going to do a few tests of siege battles in my last post ). I'll see if it works better when I plug Kingdoms into it. I recognise that this is mostly a futile exercise, but I just wanted to see the different AI's in action against themselves. But yes, I'll be posting up siege battles later, and then when I have time I'll be setting them a few more different battles .

Also, I'll be trying Westeros with XBAI and Kingdoms (possibly just as a pet project addon rather than the final product, as the team formerly agreed to use M2 as a base not Kingdoms) but still. Thanks a lot for your input.

[xeryx]

That is good to hear, if you have anymore questions. Please let me know.

[stormbringer951]

We're using Condo's AI for this mod, by the way. Firstly, XAI works on Kingdoms and we don't have the manpower to convert to Kingdoms. Secondly, Condo is part of our team now, so it's more convenient