/tech/ - Technology★

>>1021294

you're missing the point.

game AI is more like game design than properly coding.

pacman AI is one of the top examples of great game AI.

>>1021291 (OP)

Perfect timing, I'm trying to make a combat AI for my game but I'm not sure how to do it, here's the general idea:

>turn based game with various elemental attacks

>everyone attacks at the same time but you don't get to see who attacked who with what, you must infer what happened from the aftermath

>A uses ignite on you but B also used douse on you so after the round you are engulfed in steam. Since you know B has douse and you also know that you didn't use a fire spell on yourself you might assume that A used a fire spell on you.

It's intended to be similar to Mafia/Werewolf where there might be a traitor in a given fight and you have to find out if someone is secretly attacking you.

Right now each of the AI maintain a list of all the spells they think their opponents have (some are known before the fight begins) and which tactic they think everyone (including teammates) is using. Tactics are kind of like a goal of how to damage an enemy, like "if they are wet -> use spell to dry them, if they are dry -> use spell to burn them, if they are on fire -> use spell to disable them". NPCs will give up and choose a new tactic if they are countered several times (the number depends on how stubborn they are), and their choice of new tactic depends on what tactic will take the least number of moves, is different from the current one, and can actually be accomplished with the spells they have available.

I'm fine with this (though I'm open to suggestions), but what I'm stumped on is how will they guess who used what spell on who to try and determine who the traitor is. I'd also like to have dialogue where they try and share information like

>B: "C is steamy 'cause I used douse on him to protect him from the traitor, who we know has fire magic"

>A (the traitor): "Bullshit, I'm the one who doused him, this man's lying!"

>C: "If you have douse then prove it, both of you douse yourselves next round"

And so on. It would be cool but I'd need a way to decide if they feel that sharing what they did last round (or lying about it) is useful to their goal. Would be much easier to keep dialogue limited to banter/observations and try and make the player think they're smarter than they really are but that wouldn't be nearly as cool.

>>1021296

I'd say FEAR's is the best, not the most complicated but they constantly yell out their tactics and there's a lot of ways for you to fuck with them which makes them both fair and fun to fight.

>>1021328

I think you're underestimating how beatiful pacman AI is.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMEjovSlyqs

watch this video.

>>1021328

think of making each character having a diferent gameplay function.

Like:

>Healer

>Ranger

>Tank

>Offensive

>Defensive

Also, for the love of god think of them having group tactics, like the healer enemy healing their allies, the tank defending the healer, the glass cannon enemy keeping you from attacking the healer.

Things like that.

>>1021330

I wasn't going to do discrete archetypes like that before and instead rely on one character just happening to be the only one with healing spells but perhaps that would be good to add to the tactic choosing part. Like when choosing a tactic if someone is the most capable of healing they should choose to heal, that way there won't be multiple people that try to do the same thing. None of those other classes really exist though since there's no way to influence who the enemy chooses to attack and there's no distinction between ranged/melee.

Group tactics would be great but really complicated because they wouldn't be distinguished in ways as simple as you're describing. Someone could choose to go with the "burning" tactic despite not having a way to dry their opponent if their ally happens to have that ability and is willing to choose the same tactic. However since the whole point is for it to work in situations where you don't know who the traitor is I wasn't intending for NPCs to be able to privately coordinate who does what tactic, so they would need to trust their ally enough to use the same tactic as them. I can cheat though and give certain NPCs the ability to secretly coordinate as a representation of how well they know each other, like two characters that are best friends share ability pools when choosing tactics.

>>1021335

I literally gave you a video that explains the pacman AI.

think of something like Doom AI, where every monster has a diferent pattern and tactic, and they have just one, but in combination, they compliment each other nicelly.

Compare that with modern FPS where the enemies are shades of the same monster with the same tactics.

>>1021337

And that's what results from the tactic system, they choose a tactic until it fails. They are differentiated in that only a couple tactics would be available to them since noone has every single spell, out of the 30 tactics a given NPC is only going to be capable of using around 4. Even in the pacman vid they change tactics by switching between pursuing the player and hanging out in their zones which gives some needed pacing.

>>1021329

>that voice

I couldn't make it more than 30 seconds into this, holy fuck someone shoot this guy

>>1021344

you need to start thinking in terms of what tools do the NPC has to combat the player and how fair it would be for him to make a good challenge to the player.

think in terms from the NPC point of view, how would they react.

>>1021347

google pacman ai on youtube.

>>1021330

>Advocating Tank-Healer-Mage

That shit is so fucking played out. Can you faggots please get over your D&D fetish? D&D was, and continues to be complete shit.

>>1021335

>I wasn't going to do discrete archetypes like that before and instead rely on one character just happening to be the only one with healing spells but perhaps that would be good to add to the tactic choosing part. Like when choosing a tactic if someone is the most capable of healing they should choose to heal, that way there won't be multiple people that try to do the same thing. None of those other classes really exist though since there's no way to influence who the enemy chooses to attack and there's no distinction between ranged/melee.

Perhaps you could set a "role-value" for each skill and the character who has the highest sum of values in a role takes that role during combat. For example, a priest would have lots of healing spells and some damage spells, so he would become the healer of the group, and when no one needs healing he would become an attacker. If the priest dies, then a character like the paladin, whose healing healer-rating is lower would take on that role because he's the one with the highest healing rating left in the party.

>>1021329

>https://youtu.be/xMEjovSlyqs?t=389

>"Last week we talked about why it's important to play as gay characters."