Cowardly A.I. or am I that awesome.

from Sins Forums
First off, I sadly don't think I am that awesome to inspire such fear. However it would be fun at parties.

So I have been playing a few games now, playing one at the moment as well, and I have noticed a trend when I get roughly around 150-200 ship fleets and I engage an enemy fleet around the same size if not larger. The trend is that after destroying one of their cap ships and a few frigates they recall fighters/bombers and turn tail and run, of course if I was some godless deviant (Advent) or some cesspool spawned Xeno I would run from the glorious TEC myself. But I digress. At first I thought it merely the A.I. pulling back from neutral space to a more defended part of space where they would have an advantage, sadly that was not the case.

Many times I followed right behind the fleeing fleet only to have it flee again, all the while my fleet pounding them into small collectible and easily marketable space dust, a few times I actually thought that they had a change of heart and would meet me head on half way through their retreat but no sadly they retreated through my fleet to get out of the gravity well. After a few following jumps their massive fleet had been destroyed down to only a hand full of ships and mine was almost completely untouched. I believe one such incident I did not lose a single ship.

The conundrum comes from where fleets smaller or equal to fifty ships will fight to the bloody last against a fleet the same size. However getting fleets of about 75+ the A.I. seems to want to at least have double the number of ships you do to have a stand up fight. I am curious if this is just a condition of my current difficulty (Medium/Normal) or that the A.I. just get spooked when they get in large numbers, and if anyone else had noticed this.
31,990 views 21 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
The AI is just a 'little' cowardly... Its a known issue, it is being worked on.

The problem i think is that the AI isn't suicidal (not a bad thing). The dev's explained that the AI determines its chances for victory before the battle starts, and keeps determining during the battle. If it has no chance to win it will retreat. It may have greater numbers than you, but if the "quality" of your fleet is better the AI will retreat. Example AI has 5 level 1 cap ships with a sizable support fleet of mostly colbalts. You only have 2 cap ships, but they are both level 6, plus a few repair ships, percherons, and LRM's. While the AI will have the numbers advantage, your fleet is the better quality of the two. This will trigger an AI retreat.

While a good function i do believe the dev's are tweaking it so that the AI wont retreat as much.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
I too am wondering. I am afraid to try "Hard" difficulty though, because in most games all it does is give the AI an unfair resource advantage and they send seemingly endless numbers at you in attempt to provide a "challenge" when all it is really doing is annoying you and slowing your inevitable win. I know that "no AI will ever substitute playing against a human", but if you have ever played Chessmaster you might beg to differ.
Multiplicity - Control multiple PCs using one keyboard and mouse
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
I've been having the same problem. I was running a 1vs1, spent tons of time building up a fleet while fighting off incessant raids (They had a wormhole that came right into the middle of my empire, which complicated things immensely)then rode forth with my glorious TEC fleet to vanquish the freakish horde and... I ended up playing interplanetary grabass for a good 2 hours. The only way I could take them out was by rounding up a small group of Kols and Kodiaks then attacking suicide style, which let me finally finish off their cap ships.

I can appreciate that the AI doesn't want to fight battles that they can't win in enemy/neutral ground, but I really wish that they took their own planets into account. What type of coldhearted commander turns tail and runs from a slight disadvantage, leaving millions of his own people defenseless on the surface below awaiting the inevitable rain of nuclear fire?
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
To the comment on leaving millions to die, if it was deviants or xenos what else can you expect? If it was a splinter faction of the TEC then well perhaps an issue with the end of the fiscal year budget. Who can say?

However despite this slight oddity, I have overall found the game completely addictive and the AI quite clever in some instances. Like in Zoloat's case I had a wormhole in a nexus point in my empire and I left it undefended thinking the comp would never us it. Well after being quite throughly convinced that this star system at this time should not be an outlet for our military budget and promptly relocated my intrests. (cough new game.  :SNIFF!: ) One case might have been pure luck or brilliance I don't know, but I was chasing a fleet after it retreated into a harmless unexplored system that I thought hey, maybe its just another run of the mill asteroid or gas planet. Heaven forbid when I pop into the pirate base after being lured there by his crippled fleet. *sigh* Never have I screamed so closely to a frightened school girl in my life until I saw 76 pirate corsairs screaming down unholy lead upon my Kol.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
What type of coldhearted commander turns tail and runs from a slight disadvantage, leaving millions of his own people defenseless on the surface below awaiting the inevitable rain of nuclear fire?
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A Vasari one. It's only human scum dying, for the most part.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
I hate it when this happens too. What I usually do is intentionally make my fleet "weaker" than the AI's (make it 2 less capital ships than the opponent, and whatever relative amount of support ships) and go bash him to pieces since that's the only time he won't run away. Pretty easy to do when you're Advent and have all those nifty tricks up your sleeve.
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
lol..paladin. The A.I has done that to me aswell. In the early game part i was pushing forward with LRM frigates chasing off A.I raiders only they didnt phase into the own territory they went straight for pirate held planet, before i realised what had happened my fleet was all but space dust, I actually sat watching the last bits of debri from my LRM frigates waffle around about on the pirate base, and thought 'wow, now that is something i never thought i'd see'.

AI

People stress that the A.I runs when its out numbered or outgunned..would you not do the same if it was you? i sure as hell would, i would run right back to my fortified planets mass produce cruisiers, let my battleships recharge then run back in to the fight.

Battles
People expecting the game to become massive battles against the A.I will be dissapointed, the only times i get very large battles is when the A.I has maybe only 2-3 planets left and ive pushed them right back in to a choke hold position. Thats when you get the really awesome battles that make you scream for more!!

Scopeh= 30+Hours game play. yet to play online. Look out for me soon online.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
What type of coldhearted commander turns tail and runs from a slight disadvantage, leaving millions of his own people defenseless on the surface below awaiting the inevitable rain of nuclear fire?
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Me, if my evaluation is that I am losing the battle. It's always better to live and fight another day.

What annoyed me was that the AI likes to play hide-and-seek sometimes. For example they decide to attack my planet with a force (siege frigates, grr), but meet resistance (my fleet waiting to crush them). They decide to turn tails and run back to where they came from and I follow. What happens next is they immediately change course for my planet again and I end up uselessly chasing them through the jump lane and back. Only way to stop that for me was dividing my forces in two and keeping one in reserve while the other was chasing.

How about implementing a time limit for jumping? Let's say one minute between two consecutive jumps? That would prevent an immediate AI retreat as they'd have nowhere to go to for at least a short while, and not hamper a normal movement from one jump lane to another (as it takes at least a minute for a ship to cross a gravity well). It would also encourage sending scouts in first before committing your entire force to a place. Or just have the phase lane disruptor do that instead of being useless.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
What annoyed me was that the AI likes to play hide-and-seek sometimes. For example they decide to attack my planet with a force (siege frigates, grr), but meet resistance (my fleet waiting to crush them). They decide to turn tails and run back to where they came from and I follow. What happens next is they immediately change course for my planet again and I end up uselessly chasing them through the jump lane and back. Only way to stop that for me was dividing my forces in two and keeping one in reserve while the other was chasing.
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This is an implemented scenario bare with me.

Right first off what would i do if say, i was fighting Irake instead of the AI. Irake was about to attack one of my systems and i had little defense on it but i had a few siege frigates at hand. Well this is what i would do. I would round up the siege frigates, wait for Irake to phase to my system, then i would simutaneously Phase to his 'UNDEFENDED' planet nuke the crap out of it, before he nukes mine then either do a victory dance or high tail it out of there because Irake fleet is coming back to get me because he has just realised i just out planned and outclassed him.

My point.

You are playing a 'RTS'or 'RTT' (which ever you prefer :D), Stop complaining when the AI makes a stratgic move or tactical move to stop you rushing one of there planets, my god the AI is probably cleverer then you and knows that when you phase into attack its planet, its got a good chance of nuking one of yours.

I personnally salute Iron Clad boys for this AI, is its truely ingenious, even on normal. I dare say its even better then the AI on supreme commander (but that AI cheats so its not the same) <3 Scopeh(To be Pro-Gamer?)
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

What annoyed me was that the AI likes to play hide-and-seek sometimes. For example they decide to attack my planet with a force (siege frigates, grr), but meet resistance (my fleet waiting to crush them). They decide to turn tails and run back to where they came from and I follow. What happens next is they immediately change course for my planet again and I end up uselessly chasing them through the jump lane and back. Only way to stop that for me was dividing my forces in two and keeping one in reserve while the other was chasing.


This is an implemented scenario bare with me.

Right first off what would i do if say, i was fighting Irake instead of the AI. Irake was about to attack one of my systems and i had little defense on it but i had a few siege frigates at hand. Well this is what i would do. I would round up the siege frigates, wait for Irake to phase to my system, then i would simutaneously Phase to his 'UNDEFENDED' planet nuke the crap out of it, before he nukes mine then either do a victory dance or high tail it out of there because Irake fleet is coming back to get me because he has just realised i just out planned and outclassed him.

My point.

You are playing a 'RTS'or 'RTT' (which ever you prefer ), Stop complaining when the AI makes a stratgic move or tactical move to stop you rushing one of there planets, my god the AI is probably cleverer then you and knows that when you phase into attack its planet, its got a good chance of nuking one of yours.

I personnally salute Iron Clad boys for this AI, is its truely ingenious, even on normal. I dare say its even better then the AI on supreme commander (but that AI cheats so its not the same) <3 Scopeh(To be Pro-Gamer?)

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You can't be serious. The AI is cowardly as hell in the game, and constantly gives ground even when it obviously cannot afford to do so.
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
I rather has A.I retreated if they think they unable to do so, I dont want feel like play vs a dumb, but rather smart A.I, if you are about to lose, will you retreated to save your fleet, crew, time and cost? or Throw awary? But they should not retreated in thier homeworld most of the time, sometime they do retreated like that and planing retook planet like a story. Just wish think, want A.I almost like Human, but I KNow there is online, but I never want to join online due to online problem and some people are rude, and I have to look for it and join and wait for it. I rather to have to play with AI since I dont worry about online, and wait for it to play game, or even look for it.
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
Maybe if you stopped playin the AI on 'easy' and tried normal or hard you would see where im getting at.

The AI knows when to run and hide. If it just continued to pound you into submission you would be on here crying that the AI is to difficult and that it keeps killing you.
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
I rather has A.I retreated if they think they unable to do so, I dont want feel like play vs a dumb, but rather smart A.I, if you are about to lose, will you retreated to save your fleet, crew, time and cost? or Throw awary? But they should not retreated in thier homeworld most of the time, sometime they do retreated like that and planing retook planet like a story. Just wish think, want A.I almost like Human, but I KNow there is online, but I never want to join online due to online problem and some people are rude, and I have to look for it and join and wait for it. I rather to have to play with AI since I dont worry about online, and wait for it to play game, or even look for it.
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All i can say is lol. Dude are you like 7??
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
I'm really not complaining, and as I said it's easy to counter. However they don't have time to do anything as I just jump back, and they jump away again. Their time window for actually doing damage is around 15-20 seconds. This only counts when we're talking siege frigates of death vs asteroids with 1000 hp.

I'd like to have a way of forcing my opponent into a decisive battle when he's attacking and then mounting a counterattack. And this could mean a trap for me too. Think like this, the TEC (me) gathers its forces for a raid on a supposedly undefended Vasari world that I had explored five minutes before. I gather a cap ship and a few frigates and then jump in. Current system is: either the Vasari world is undefended and gets trashed or, the Vasari have a superior defense fleet and I decide to jump back and get reinforcements. Shots fired: 0

My scenario: TEC ships jump in and find a massive fleet awaiting. Knowing that they need at least a minute for their jump drives to recharge I have them stay and fight, while probably losing at least 30-50% of my ships. Next time I send a scout frigate ahead instead of jumping in blindly.

Maybe I just like those tense moments in BSG when they wait for the jump drives to spin up and pray they don't get blown to bits before that.
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top

You can't be serious. The AI is cowardly as hell in the game, and constantly gives ground even when it obviously cannot afford to do so.
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Yes, i thought the same thing. Being careful is good and all but sometimes its better to take a stand even if chances of survival are slim.
Also, the AI sometimes retreats way to soon if they attack you. In my current game i was repeatedly attacked by an huge AI-fleet, but each time they would retreat after they had lost a couple of ships. At that point it was, at best, highly unlikely for me to win the battle.

I thought it must be those particular AI´s character, and seeing how the guy only had 2 planets it might even be wise to not sacrifice much of his fleet for a planet he cant hold, but sure did surprise me.

Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top

I rather has A.I retreated if they think they unable to do so, I dont want feel like play vs a dumb, but rather smart A.I, if you are about to lose, will you retreated to save your fleet, crew, time and cost? or Throw awary? But they should not retreated in thier homeworld most of the time, sometime they do retreated like that and planing retook planet like a story. Just wish think, want A.I almost like Human, but I KNow there is online, but I never want to join online due to online problem and some people are rude, and I have to look for it and join and wait for it. I rather to have to play with AI since I dont worry about online, and wait for it to play game, or even look for it.


All i can say is lol. Dude are you like 7??

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Or he could be,like, foreign......
Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top
Irake i do agree with you about the phase jumping in and out exceptionally quickly, being a long time RTS player i just see it has a hit and run tactic, for those of you who prefer your drawn out battles increasing the jump time to 1 minute per jump might make it a bit more interesting.

How ever i prefer to have a fast jump phase time because it just makes for better tactical movement, if there was a longer jump time, imagine how long it would take for you to get 1 fleet from one side of a star system to another. maybe 6-7 minutes depending on how many planets you have to travel through it would be rediculous.

Heflys-: what do you class as foriegn, im from England, so does that make me foriegn to you?
Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
So I did a little test. Started up a new game as TEC, and constructed a scout frigate.

The map had me starting in the gravity well of planet A which was linked to planets B and C. The angle between the phase lanes was about 120 degrees (OK, this I didn't measure but just approximated). So it's like B - A - C (with the appropriate angle).

I sent the scout to planet B. Then once it had arrived there I ordered it to go to planet C (while obviously it had to pass through A). Started timing the moment the ship got back into the well of planet A. It took it 41.7 seconds to get to the point where it had to charge up its engines to jump to C. And all other ships are a lot slower than a scout frigate.

So, fleet movement would not be seriously affected unless you were dispatching your huge armada of scout frigates to take your enemy out (and scout ships could get a reduced time anyway).
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top

=

Heflys-: what do you class as foriegn, im from England, so does that make me foriegn to you?

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If he's foreign, there is obviously a chance he might not speak the English language adequately or not at all. Foreign is a relative term, and anyone outside your culture could be termed "foreign", differences in language are one plausible aspect of being foreign. It's obvious you got the gist of my meaning, and I fount your arrogance in response to his post slightly repugnant.
Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top
I can’t believe you made that comment about we would all be complaining that the AI if it was pounding us into submission we would all be complaining. You gotta be kidding me right? That’s what I prefer an AI that’s ruthless and cunning and persistent as hell at trying to take you out. Calculating what his odds are of surviving a battle is BS. That’s like saying your home world or any of their colonies are not worth fighting for so let’s let everyone get killed and bombed to death just so we can run away to fight another day.
This is what I loved about Conquest. The AI in that game was blood thirsty as hell and would constantly probe and attack you like crazy. Losing a fleet of ships is what this game is supposed to be about, this is why we conquer and take new territory so we can build up new resources and build new fleets of ships. Sorry but the AI is cowardly and does need to be fixed in a bad way. I want massive Capital ship battles, not let’s play hide and seek and catch me if you can crap.

And this is taking on the HARD AI. this AI of all AI should be Ruthless as hell.
Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top


I personnally salute Iron Clad boys for this AI, is its truely ingenious, even on normal. I dare say its even better then the AI on supreme commander (but that AI cheats so its not the same) <3 Scopeh(To be Pro-Gamer?)
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I hope you don't mean the AI in vanilla Supreme Commander, it was terrible. It would build hundreds of t1 units until it hit the unit cap, and then it would do nothing until you attacked it. Half the time it would never attack. Once in every 10 games or so, it would field a small number of t2 or t3 units. Now, it's much better, but when you don't specify, I have to be suspicious.


The AI knows when to run and hide.
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An attack force of 3 capital ships, 12 corvettes and 20 frigates ran (and fled the system) from my force of.. well, 3 level 3 capital ships. That is far more cowardly than it should be.