AI Discussion (dev branch)

Suggestion: When an AI squad member is told to do something twice in a short period of time (10 seconds) like 'get in a vehicle', they ignore everything esle and get in the bloody vehicle lol. I really dislike spamming the 'get in the vehicle' command with frustration while they just stand there and ignore me.

I would like that! I like thinking independent AI, but sometimes they are too stubborn and put the group at risk and very often die.

Well I mean I am losing interest online but I still want to play. It is just frustrating at times and the end result is less time spent on it. I mean I understand that you'll never be able to get AI to the point of a human especially with so many AI in each mission. There have been times it was quite good, and other times extremely poor. It is that consistency that we want in tandem with challenge. As it stands now if you parachute into a field and there are several soldiers 100m away.. I should die unless it is right near some cover and I get lucky. That is pretty effective. But it seems to be in certain situations the AI just doesn't know what to do and it just seems to "sit there" and accept death.

There have been times I was holed up in a windmill poking out and trying to shoot them and they actually had a few guys head to my direction and make their way slowly until they were pretty close before I got them. But I planted claymores outside the windmill door just in case. I had to poke myself to realize they would never come that close nor would they ever enter the building because the AI is too dumb. So I was safe. That took away from the realism. It also destroyed my ability to use mines and or claymores as a defensive measure because it is rare that you can sucker AI into an ambush unless they are out of danger mode and are patrolling a set path.

I really don't know what advice we can offer other than reporting bugs. But to me the whole thing is bugged and every night its something different. I don't know how to reproduce these issues and or capture them for analysis. All I can offer is what behavior probably "should be" if a tank comes rolling up towards you and you don't have anything that can defeat it, I'd be shitting my pants and running for cover and or into a building.

If a tank is headed toward me I wouldn't lay down and let it run me over. Running to the safety of cover should always be the first priority upon entering danger mode. As time goes by they should be able to zero in on your position and advance if necessary toward your position if safe. If they detect a lone sniper it would be stupid for them to leave cover as flanking or sniping them back is the only offensive option you have at long range. Or getting into a vehicle and driving out there to investigate.

With AI it is a lot of IF IF IF IF THEN THEN THEN THEN you just have to define the proper behavior for the situation and govern them by the overall rules of engagement. Is it a defensive mission or an offensive mission?

Suggestion: When an AI squad member is told to do something twice in a short period of time (10 seconds) like 'get in a vehicle', they ignore everything esle and get in the bloody vehicle lol. I really dislike spamming the 'get in the vehicle' command with frustration while they just stand there and ignore me.

The issue of AI being slow to obey orders, especially boarding vehicles, was discussed extensively with A2 CO years ago. I'm having a déjà vu. The only way to get them to board faster is to set them to Aware mode, which is impossible if under fire. If the AI know about enemies, they will protect themselves by acting in danger mode and looking for a shot, and will take their own sweet time boarding the vehicle. I've learned to live with it....

The issue of AI being slow to obey orders, especially boarding vehicles, was discussed extensively with A2 CO years ago. I'm having a déjà vu. The only way to get them to board faster is to set them to Aware mode, which is impossible if under fire. If the AI know about enemies, they will protect themselves by acting in danger mode and looking for a shot, and will take their own sweet time boarding the vehicle. I've learned to live with it....

Yes, we need a combat behaviour "obey at all costs", which could be followed by default only by skilled units, or twicked by mission designers.

Yes, we need a combat behaviour "obey at all costs", which could be followed by default only by skilled units, or twicked by mission designers.

yes! and we need that as a script command too. every single AI modder is thirsting for this, pretty sure.

The AI can be suppressed.

Suppression affects aiming speed and accuracy.

I know that it's too hard to suppress them and suppression doesn't have enough of an effect (I regularly shot people in the torso at 50-150, only to have them kill me right back within a second, back before I installed TPW Fall).

But you're all perpetuating myths and inaccurate reports, creating radio interference with our link to the devs.

You should be critiquing the balance and trying to provide usable repros. Constructive feedback needs to be heard the loudest.

Instead, you're all just spamming the thread.

If that is the case why do suppression mods use their own scripts rather than modifying the behaviour that is already there? Can you link to a changelog showing that suppression has been introduced? - I'd be interested to see it.

Btw. guys, this subject (the need to be able to override combat behaviour) is contained here in this ticket. Please VOTE!

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=3920

It was assigned to a dev some days ago, but nevertheless vote. :)

If that is the case why do suppression mods use their own scripts rather than modifying the behaviour that is already there? Can you link to a changelog showing that suppression has been introduced? - I'd be interested to see it.

Excellent question. I never saw suppression until I started using the TPW CAS mod.

The AI can be suppressed.

Suppression affects aiming speed and accuracy.

I know that it's too hard to suppress them and suppression doesn't have enough of an effect (I regularly shot people in the torso at 50-150, only to have them kill me right back within a second, back before I installed TPW Fall).

Vanilla AI is suppressed only when bullets impact the ground next to it. That's a very limited implementation of suppression, and far from enough. The AI should be suppressed when bullets pass by close enough. Hitting them has nothing to do with suppression, although I agree the effect of bullet impact should be much more prominent.

How in the world would I make a repro in which AI doesn't use windows and doors (for intelligent fire) or interiors corners for lean? Basically it's like a negative trying to prove a negative. I have a 100 vote ticket on the matter on the FT yet no response -that leaves only vague forum rambling :/

Aren't repros for bugs?

That's more the lack of a feature, not a bug. I'm sure devs know what the AI can't do already, like intelligent use of windows and doors.

About AI preferring crouch stand more in combat:

Well, the setting I think need to be upped more... They still fight standing... last time the issue was the AI was moving to slowly when in combat... Some people don't like it, for me it was ok... maybe we can for example if the AI want to shoot, go crouch/prone first then shoot. Or if he's stationary without any order or intention to displace, then go crouch/prone... only stand up if wanted to displace

Recent change (from 24.10)

It was already improved in previous versions, but caused visual artifacts during rotation of turrets, basically seems like AI is able to move turret instantly, without accelerating the rotation. Now, this was fixed, still keeping AI ability to keep aiming on moving targets.

Typical test cases are: car with turret engaging infantry moving perpendicularly, AI gunner in combat chopper engaging other moving choppers or fast moving cars and so on.

Nice fix. It was awkward to see heavy tank turrets just snap on targets :)

Nice to see Ai improvements.

From my POV it's one of the few things where Arma3 is weak.

Is it possible to make the AI more "aware" of buildings?, it seems like they won't try to close in on you when you are inside a building or on a roof. (shooting an ai squad from an easily accessible roof turns into a trench war)

Same thing for grenades, I wish they tried to dodge the ones being thrown at them.

Turret rotation still seems a little odd, with the overcompensation of turning.

Today I experienced the most stupid AI reaction ever.

We were driving along in a Hunter when we met a Group of enemy AI on the road. Somehow I managed to not kill anybody. 100 meters further down the road was a roadblock consisting of a large AI group that was facing us, and a stationary MG. We decided to break through but ended up in a wall behind the roadblock. We disembarked, turned around and the AI was just standing there as if nothing had happened :omg:. As if they didn´t see this huge enemy vehicle speed through their roadblock.

They only started to react when we began to shoot at them. Us three killed around 10 enemys. Then we discovered that the AI group further down the road (the one we came by half a minute ago) was still doing their patrol thing as if nothing had happened.

I will do some tests tomorrow...

I believe I have already made a ticket for AI being alarmed by gunshots. It's a staggering oversight.

Tested it in the Editor. AI behaved better then it did in our Mission yesterday. They identified the vehicle as enemy shortly after I came into view (around 200 meters away from them) but didn´t fire. It looked like they were busy getting into cover first. The MG didn´t fire as well. I was able to simply speed through the roadblock and continue driving. I will try to get my hands on the Mission we played yesterday to see if something was done to the skill of the AI Group but regardless of that there is definately room for improvement, especially with the stationary MG.

Proper convoy behavior would be nice. Along with the ability to tell a unit to protect another unit.

I don't know if this has been addressed in the development forum; this happened in released version. I searched this thread for this specific problem. Today, I had two events that should never occur:

1. I'm injured and need a medic. I stand in front of the Medic, select him, hit the 6 key, and tell him to heal the Squad Leader (me). He replies affirmatively. He never moves. To heal, I opened his backpack, grabbed a health kit, and treated myself.

2. My squad needs to destroy an ZSU Tigris AAA. I'm standing next to the AT guy. I select him and point to ZSU and tell him to attack. He responds affirmatively. He never moves. I tell him again...no response. In order to complete the mission, I had to kill him. Then take his AT weapon, and destroy the ZSU myself.

I've been a developer for over 40 years. I would be embarrassed to allow code this bad to leave my system.

AI can only walk up and down hills falling hundreds of meters behind player(s).

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=15967

This has been the issue plaguing ArmA2 too. Vote up to get rid of this issue once and for all

Voted...that is indeed an annoying problem.

We need better ways of telling an AI team member to interact with certain things...

E.g. tell the AI to "trade" inventory with this chest/body and not just any body the AI thinks is cool, like the "open inventory" option does.

the interaction menu that just lists all options that are available is not good enough. Particulary not if its spammed full of either doors that could be opened, or dropped weapons that could be picked up!

We need better ways of telling an AI team member to interact with certain things...

E.g. tell the AI to "trade" inventory with this chest/body and not just any body the AI thinks is cool, like the "open inventory" option does.

the interaction menu that just lists all options that are available is not good enough. Particulary not if its spammed full of either doors that could be opened, or dropped weapons that could be picked up!