Massive Assault
http://www.massiveassaultnetwork.com/forum/

creating computer opponent
http://www.massiveassaultnetwork.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=415
Page 1 of 1

Author:  jsmoreland [ Tue Jan 27, 2004 11:31 am ]
Post subject:  creating computer opponent

chess computer games (chessmaster.etc.) allow you to create computer opponent containing variables such as strength, defense/offense, etc.. in
graduating degrees starting from 1(very weak) all the way to 100 (grand chessmaster). I would love to be able to tweak the strength of my computer opponent, (with save option) gradually building his strength as my skills improve. How's that for an idea. o

Author:  Maelstrom [ Tue Jan 27, 2004 2:00 pm ]
Post subject: 

A nice thought, but I don't think its very feasible with Massive Assault. Here are a couple reasons:

1) Massive Assault is hugely more complicated than chess. The maps are larger, there are terrain considerations to account for, each unit has different range, movement, health, and damage characteristics, etc.

2) To win in Massive Assault, it takes a large amount of coordination between units, so not only do individual units take processing power, but also the AI's overall strategy and coordination. That's why many view the AI that we already have with Massive Assault as very good. It protects week units, considers overall strategic situations, purchases the right units for the right situations, and so on.

3) The Chess problem has been revisited countless times. It is almost a science in itself, as people study the strategy and depth of the game. Massive Assault has been available for just a few months, so there is no initial research or algorithms that the developers could use.

4) Along with that, vast sums of money have been supplied to research into how to make computers play chess better. Ever since computers were invented, people have tried to make them better than their human opponents. It is only after millions of man hours of reasearch and millions of dollars that a computer can now play chess at a very high level of skill. And the way it does that is through millions of calculations. The amount of calculations that are required by the Massive Assault AI is even more severe, and the developers don't have access to the resources that people have supplied for chess research.

Even with all these reasons Developers have been successful in dividing the AI up into three difficulties. And I agree with many of the game reviewers who say the AI of massive assault is amazing. Sure, it can't do well against experienced players, but maybe it will in 40 years... We'll have the Deep Blue of Massive Assault defeating Tiger 2 out of 3 times :D

I'm not trying to strike down the idea of having more resolution to the AI, just saying that it would be very difficult to accomplish.

Page 1 of 1 All times are UTC - 5 hours
Powered by phpBB © 2000, 2002, 2005, 2007 phpBB Group
http://www.phpbb.com/