This idea comes from AnnihilatorX. I know it's simple, but I think it's brilliant. So, GPG and Stardock, please think about this. And EVEN IF you didn't completely remove the gold/exp awarded from killing an AI, you could at least cut it by 3/4 or something. Please consider this because at the moment, if a player drops early in the game, it's almost futile to even keep trying. If a player drops late in the game when everyone is higher level, it's not AS MUCH as an issue, but the farming issue definitely still causes problems. So, think about it, and let us know?!
- andpancakes
Even you say "probably".
As Annihilator-X- and I and many others pointed out numerous times, the AI can and will always be a part of the game. There is no reason whatsoever to let the AI ruin the game.
Sure there is: implementation, testing, and future rebalancing costs time and money that could be better spent on other things... like actually fixing the AI.
If you really need your short term fix, implement my slider idea, let the community determine the best percentages for their taste, and thank me for offering the community a solution and not a dirty hack.
I agree. Hope they will change it. I think removing gold reward from killing the ai is a good thing.
Long thread... seems like Sly Squash versus the rest haha (sounds like DG matchmaking skills...)
IMO, just get rid of AI altogether. I can't think of any other RTS that replaces a dropped player (for whatever reason) for an AI in multiplayer matches.
Currently, it's REALLY stupid. At start, game result is determined by who has more AIs (ie the more u have, the more u will lose).
Mid-game AI means any decent player will hammer that AI non-stop and totally ignore the other human player to get gold.
Reduce xp/gold for AI? U'd still hammer them non-stop.
0 value AI? What's the point in having them at all? Unless you've already won in late game, you've lost anyway.
This is the way of multiplayer.
You can argue for much cleverer AI but then people will whine about AIs being too hard etc.
Just get rid of them. This is multiplayer, not half MP, half skirmish
Nah, I got Sakhari too. Which is nice, because from other threads I've seen he seems to know what he's talking about.
you have to explain what will happen when a player drops or your proposed solution is incomplete.
GG.
Well, nothing.
In AoE1/2/3, AoM, SupCom, when a player left, that was it.
It basically turns into a 2v1 or 3v2 or whatever (only human players).
It's then up to you to decide whether u want to carry on or not.
To summarise: NEVER have AI at all EVER in Pantheon.
I understand some people like to team up and play against AI for some weird reason, each to their own. Keep that in Custom.
(I did put JUST GET RID OF THEM in my original post which I thought was succinct enough).
Why do you need implementation, testing and future balacing at all for a 3 line code fix for not giving gold and exp?
Implementation: 3 lines of code, man hours, 10 minutes - cost virtually none
Testing: Several games, several man hours - cheap
Balancing: Not required. AI is never OP and never will be. Having them remain in the game while giving no gold does not make them OP. Still as easily killed as ever. The only change versus vanilla is now the losing team at least doesn't get disadvantaged, and only tiny bit slight advantage given, that is a bit of stopping power. So for any reapon people quitted, need to go on a date or so, the team who was doing good and suddenly dropped a friend can still win.
Re-balancing: Not required. If they release a better AI, it doesn't change the fact it's AI and no AI is as good as human unless on games like this. If by chance the dropped human player was worse than an AI, the game would have lost anyway regardless.
Did it?!?!
I cannot remember that at all... was this in beta?
What happens in SC or WC?
It's that easy eh?
No but seriously, developing AI is difficult in so many ways. The F.E.A.R. AI was praised almost universally, but it's still not good enough to really challenge you strategically. They didn't bother adding bots to multiplayer, I suspect because even the best single player AI can't come close to being competitive without horribly aimbotting in multiplayer FPS games.
Demigod doesn't have the aiming mechanic where the bots can be really good, since the game is much more about tactical awareness, which is an absolute bitch from a coding perspective. Think of how many play styles there are for the different Demigods, all the different item builds, and how differently you play each of those builds. So you're going to need some serious work getting at least one build for each Demigod working nicely, but what if the AI is taking over for a player who has taken a different build?
So you laboriously code up rules governing playstyle for each common build of each demigod and some item knowledge too...but then you're still not going to be anywhere near a human opponent because you need to know when to do things like switch lanes, port into backdoored portals to caplock, buy citadel upgrades, all of which are situation sensetive and vary from team to team.
I don't think the AI is ever going to compete with me, maybe that's just me being pessimistic and arrogant, but I really think just making the AI give less gold would be a more worthwhile solution than all this hassle.
you know guys, I thought I read that the AI that gets replaced when a human leaves is a Normal AI....
we could try giving them a Hard or Nightmare AI... ever think of that? Or *gasp* a setting to set what kind of AI should get substituted in the event of player drops that enables them to better scale between pro and newbie games!
Even if the AI is given bonuses due to their difficulty level it still makes more sense than capping their kill value because that's intuitive... people who have played RTS games know AI typically get bonuses, and when people comp stomp in single player this is what happens. It's also documented in their difficulty level. The issue I have is the special case of, without warning, suddenly the kill value of specific demigods change in MP under certain mysterious undocumented conditions. As a software engineer it just screams out "band-aid" and "hack".
Seriously, reevaluate the priority of this once existing fixes are underway. While you wait, think about my refinement of your idea into something semi-acceptable in terms of software design and get the shocked look off your faces that someone might not think this suggestion is the holy grail of support decisions.
An AI giving less or no gold and experience at all to the enemy is not more of a "hack" than the AI getting gold and experience multipliers. Both address the fact, that the AI is inferior to a human player.
I don't get at all why you consider this a dirty hack, considering we already have something like that in the game, as you pointed out yourself. And yes, I am a software engineer too.
Hang on, I've lost your train of thought!
What was your argument again, Sly?
Is it that you want modifiable AI to replace a human in MP?
Or don't u want AI at all?
What was your argument against removing AIs altogether?
His argument is, that he thinks the AI giving no gold/xp to the enemy when killed would be a "hack" or "band-aid", even though he acknowledges the existense of gold and experience multipliers for AIs.
So why not just remove them?
They're completely pointless anyway.
What hap to the good old days when MP was MP, not MP with a bit of Skirmish.
I really don't want some turbocharged AI getting involved in my MP games.
The following could be options set before a game starts. The only problem is that people might fight over it in the lobby.
When a player drops/leaves/rages (one of the following)
If the the computer plays they can:
If the computer plays they can:
For the auto difficulty to work this game would need way more than easy, normal, hard, nightmare difficulties because I would say even to begining players that easy and normal are even far too easy. Making the AI better would be an obvious solution but since there is a wide range of skill for players its not going to please everyone. I would think that at least making it a game option players would get what they expect and not a feeding AI in the case of whatever reason a players leaves/drops/rages.
Wouldn't having NO AI be the simplest solution...?
We appreciate your ideas, but take your condescension elsewhere. You are part of the minority in arguing against what 90% of the communtity would deem fit or appropriate in this particular case. And, no, you aren't a prodigy with a counter-culture opinion that just so happens to be valid. Sure, what you are saying is meticulous and reasonable and should complement what this thread proposes, but our suggestions are simply more fit and appropriate. You have ignored every comment I have made about the underlying fact of the matter of this entire situation. That is, as long as AI exist, there will be AI farming. There are no ifs/ands/buts about that fact. It is truth, and everyone but you seems to realize it. And because AI farming will always exist, there needs to be something done about the way it is being exploited right now. There is no work-around to that fact; it is a fundamental reality of this entire topic. Why is that so hard for you to comprehend? This isn't about software design philosophy or a band-aid fix; it's about a competitive aspect of a quintessential competitive game that needs to be addressed in order for the majority of online matches to proceed more fairly.
We the proponents in this thread for the suggested idea in my OP will only need to re-evaluate our suggestion if AI are miraculously taken out of the online gaming experience of Demigod (because no AI means nothing to exploit) - which, by the way, probably won't happen and, in fact, doesn't need to happen. Until then, however, the logic behind this idea trumps anything that you could possibly come up with, no matter how eloquent, articulate or clever it may be or you may sound.
Why don't u think AIs will be taken out?
Must be easier to take something out than putting something in.
The thing about keeping AIs in is that you're then gonna start whining about how good the AI is.
If the AI is like now, just remove it. It's just extra bandwidth and processing power for nothing (assuming you remove the gold/xp from it which u really have to do).
If you improve it's hardness by allowing it to cheat, that's just stupid.
The AI slots could be offered in the lobby for new players to take the spot. Now that the network works.
Hmm, I'm guessing that's next to impossible to implement.
Besides, how would u do it?
What happens if you're 10 seconds from defeat?
Or you're midway thru the game and someone quit cos you were getting hammered beyond belief.
You wouldn't want to join either.
I'm a big believer in KISS - keep it simple, stupid.
You get equal players to start, if someone drops/quits, then it's unbalanced teams (no AI).
You decide if u want to carry on.
I persoanally doesn't like a game ruined because some people quit for whatever reason and is satisfied with AI which doesn't give advantages nor disadvantages. If you remove AI, it's giving the team disadvantage of losing at least some harrasement capability. If there's the AI at least if it was a good going game then people can continue.
I've won games with an AI on my team. Having a dropped player just vanish is game over for all intents and purposes. No thanks.
we have to get the facts straight
I dont consider myself a whiner, i stay every game i play even so i have disconnected or crashed a couple of times.
Saying disconnects arent an issue is just not real, for a majority of players it is a reality they have to face.
Punishing players for something they cant control isnt a good solution
Banning players with a dodgy connection is very harsh, i know people that have a good connection but they can get problems beyond their control, like certain weather conditions or isp failures (when theres only 1 isp they can subscribe to). These players are able to play but they might have problems now and then.Banning them would exclude them forever even though their connection is good again.
Excluding players for whatever reason doesnt seem tobe a real good solution, since the playercount in this game isnt huge anyway.
Like stated elsewhere nomatter how many hours u spend on fixing u will see AI players taking over. The real question is how to deal with it.
Saying u can improve AI upto human lvl is a ridiculous statement, that wont happen in the near future (near as in this year)
What is suggested is a real simple fix, calling it a bandaid doesnt change the fact that it stops the bleeding (again weak argument)
The only 3 valid reasons opposed to this are (as far as i can see):
1) the fix doesnt have the desired effect
2) the fix would have unwanted sideffects, that will make the game WORSE than the current problem
3) there are better ,and more important: REALISTIC, ideas to solve this problem
I havent seen any of these reasons convincingly displayed in this thread so maybe the people against it can try to fill in these points and make me see different
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