RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel?

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RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/29/2007 9:29:01 PM

berto

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
Looking ahead as in chess/go isn't practical, the number of possible moves is almost infinite. TOAW is more like Go, and the computer can't play a really good game there yet. It is possible to have Elmer look at the situation and pick which objective track to follow, or even to pick his own depending on chokepoints, relative strengths and other criteria. It's also possible to save the history of past rounds and games and compare them to the current situation.

I've got a lot of thoughts about what I want to do with Elmer, we'll see what time I have, and what ideas work out in real life.<g>

I'd like to repeat here some comments I made in the War in the Pacific/Admiral's Edition Forum:

quote:

Heck, I'd be willing to wait overnight or even days for the AI to do its thinking.

If AI effectiveness is proportional to the time we allow it, give it more time!

How about something like this?

Give the computer more time?

[ ] No, use the default time [60 seconds? 5 minutes?]
[ ] Yes, give it 10 minutes.
[ ] Yes, give it one hour.
[ ] Yes, give it <fill in the blank> hours.
[ ] Give it unlimited time until I [the player] press the Stop button.
[ ] [any other option suggestions?]

Make this a pre-game selection, or even a turn-by-turn selection (see below).

For a game of this scope and complexity, If I the human player might take hours to plan and execute my turn, I'd think it only fair to give the AI equal time consideration.

If we're talking about a game that might take months and even years to complete, what's a few hundred extra hours among "friends" (you and your AI opponent), especialy if those extra hours you are (a) sleeping, (b) at work, (c) playing some other computer game, (d) whatever.

I could see playing in the following manner: I commit to playing one turn at a time, then giving the computer indefinite time--at least overnight, days if I get distracted and have to move on to other things (including playing other games)--to plan and "think" through its response. Distracting time off between moves would even be a virtue. It I knew that the longer I wait, the better the AI move might be, I'd not fret over my time away from the game. In fact, variable AI time between moves might have the added advantage: For complicated situations and important turning points in the war, give it full time consideration. At other times, when there is little for the AI to do, give it as little time as your experience and/or impatience to "get on with it" deem necessary.

For the life of me, I can't fathom why game designers try to make their games, and their AI, fit one mold. Break the mold! Give the players a choice! If enabling a competitive AI is a matter of giving it more time to think, let us the human players decide for ourselves the limits of our (im)patience. These games allow us, the human players, to set all sorts of optional rules going in. Why not give us as many AI options (particularly PO time to think), too?

Variable, human player directed AI time!

Where it makes sense, and where it is implementable in future versions of TOAW, please give the AI more time to "think" according to our, the players', choosing.

< Message edited by berto -- 12/29/2007 11:52:41 PM >

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Post #: 61

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/29/2007 9:55:47 PM

marcusm

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I can also see WEGO colliding with the Combined Arms game(if it gets finished hehe).

Now that I understand what you guys meant with 3D I am less worried. As long as it doesn't
look like that ugly Bulge game I saw recently(no, not Panther games but the other).

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Post #: 62

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/30/2007 9:03:42 PM

ralphtricky

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quote:

ORIGINAL: marcusm

I can also see WEGO colliding with the Combined Arms game(if it gets finished hehe).

Now that I understand what you guys meant with 3D I am less worried. As long as it doesn't
look like that ugly Bulge game I saw recently(no, not Panther games but the other).

The standard view is probalby going to look exactly like the current view brought into the 21st century.

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Post #: 63

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/30/2007 9:13:56 PM

ralphtricky

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quote:

ORIGINAL: berto
Where it makes sense, and where it is implementable in future versions of TOAW, please give the AI more time to "think" according to our, the players', choosing.

I'll do that, but the problem is fundamentally different from chess. In chess, the computer wins by figuring out moves 8+ moves ahead. In a game like TOAW, it isn't even possible to look at the next move in that kind of detail because the number of potential end positions in a typical turn is huge.

There are 2 options for a non-cheating Elmer.
1) Do like a human does, and try to remember where you've seen units, rely on your memory of past times playing the game and starting positions, and make some sound decisions about what your options are and what's likely to work, guided by hints from the designer.

2) It's possible to play Elmer with both sides so that he can estimate what you might have done, unfortunately because he play by the same rules you do, after the first couple of moves, that becomes very, very, very difficult.

#1 is much more practical, and is probably where I'm headed with Elmer, along with giving the designer greater control over Elmer's behavior. There are also things called influence maps that can help to analyze maps. I'm not sure what part of that will be in the initial release and what parts will come later.

Ralph

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Post #: 64

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/30/2007 10:01:42 PM

Veers

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So the long and the short of it is. Ralph happened to mention 3D first, everybody jumped on that as, "OH MY GOD, that's all he's thinking about!!" and then Ralph mentioned the real meat and potatoes are going to be worked on as well, and we all settled down.
Awesome. Ralph, James, etc: I look forward to shelling out another wad of money for T4. Keep up the good work.

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Post #: 65

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/31/2007 2:19:37 AM

berto

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick

quote:

ORIGINAL: berto
Where it makes sense, and where it is implementable in future versions of TOAW, please give the AI more time to "think" according to our, the players', choosing.

I'll do that, but the problem is fundamentally different from chess. In chess, the computer wins by figuring out moves 8+ moves ahead. In a game like TOAW, it isn't even possible to look at the next move in that kind of detail because the number of potential end positions in a typical turn is huge.

There are 2 options for a non-cheating Elmer.
...

Ralph

Good, glad to hear that you'll "do that".

I trust, then, that at no point will you conclude, "No, that would take too long, so I'll cut it short." I'm not referring to your, the developer's programming time. I'm referring to in-game time for the AI's "thinking"--whatever that means, and whatever internal form it takes. As stated, for the sake of better AI, I personally would like to set the limits of my own impatience.

Let me add, if the AI is at all scriptable, please open up the scripting engine as much as possible. And make it scriptable not through dialog boxes but rather via developer/modder editable script text files. Then we the players/modders can tinker with the AI and "fix" it to our heart's content.

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Post #: 66

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/31/2007 9:46:05 PM

ralphtricky

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quote:

ORIGINAL: berto

quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick

quote:

ORIGINAL: berto
Where it makes sense, and where it is implementable in future versions of TOAW, please give the AI more time to "think" according to our, the players', choosing.

I'll do that, but the problem is fundamentally different from chess. In chess, the computer wins by figuring out moves 8+ moves ahead. In a game like TOAW, it isn't even possible to look at the next move in that kind of detail because the number of potential end positions in a typical turn is huge.

There are 2 options for a non-cheating Elmer.
...

Ralph

Good, glad to hear that you'll "do that".

I trust, then, that at no point will you conclude, "No, that would take too long, so I'll cut it short." I'm not referring to your, the developer's programming time. I'm referring to in-game time for the AI's "thinking"--whatever that means, and whatever internal form it takes. As stated, for the sake of better AI, I personally would like to set the limits of my own impatience.

Let me add, if the AI is at all scriptable, please open up the scripting engine as much as possible. And make it scriptable not through dialog boxes but rather via developer/modder editable script text files. Then we the players/modders can tinker with the AI and "fix" it to our heart's content.

I'll try not to set limits on the AI if I see parts where more time would help.

I'm hoping to open scripting up to any .Net language (C#, VB, F#, IronPython, Ruby, etc.) as well as the current dialog based model. We'll see how everything goes. The hardest part will be adequate documentation.

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Post #: 67

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/31/2007 10:41:35 PM

berto

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick

I'll try not to set limits on the AI if I see parts where more time would help.

Great!

quote:

I'm hoping to open scripting up to any .Net language (C#, VB, F#, IronPython, Ruby, etc.) as well as the current dialog based model. We'll see how everything goes. The hardest part will be adequate documentation.

Wonderful!

Or even use your own custom script language.

Another advantage of scripting the AI is that player-developers/modders can do interesting and creative things with script text files where they could not with embedded, compiled, proprietary AI and game configuration code.

Sounds good!

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Post #: 68

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/31/2007 10:43:22 PM

JAMiAM

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
I'll try not to set limits on the AI if I see parts where more time would help.

Given that computers will be be between 2 and 8 times faster than they are now, by the time we finish TOAW IV, this shouldn't be too much of an issue. Especially, with off-loading to the GPU, the GUI and map. We might even be able to take advantage of multi-threading some aspects of the game, for further speed improvements.

quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
I'm hoping to open scripting up to any .Net language (C#, VB, F#, IronPython, Ruby, etc.) as well as the current dialog based model. We'll see how everything goes. The hardest part will be adequate documentation.

Trust me...if you've ever had to decipher Ralph's private development notes and posts, you'd know what I mean. I swear, sometimes, he just speaks in code...

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Post #: 69

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 12/31/2007 11:10:20 PM

berto

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quote:

ORIGINAL: JAMiAM

Given that computers will be be between 2 and 8 times faster than they are now, by the time we finish TOAW IV, this shouldn't be too much of an issue. Especially, with off-loading to the GPU, the GUI and map. We might even be able to take advantage of multi-threading some aspects of the game, for further speed improvements.

That's good to keep in mind. But with faster computers several years from now, and given that by then you are able to code a good, competent AI, if I have the option to set my own, longer time limits for the AI's "thinking" such that the AI becomes not just good but excellent and ultra-competent--if I have that option, I'll take it!

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Post #: 70

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/1/2008 12:55:58 AM

ralphtricky

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quote:

ORIGINAL: JAMiAM

quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
I'll try not to set limits on the AI if I see parts where more time would help.

Given that computers will be be between 2 and 8 times faster than they are now, by the time we finish TOAW IV, this shouldn't be too much of an issue. Especially, with off-loading to the GPU, the GUI and map. We might even be able to take advantage of multi-threading some aspects of the game, for further speed improvements.

We'll definitely molti-thread to take advantage of the extra CPU cores. the quadcores (4 CPUs) are becoming mainstream already. There's also a lot of other optimizations I can do, Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint. I can use more memory for faster results for some things.

quote:

quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
I'm hoping to open scripting up to any .Net language (C#, VB, F#, IronPython, Ruby, etc.) as well as the current dialog based model. We'll see how everything goes. The hardest part will be adequate documentation.

Trust me...if you've ever had to decipher Ralph's private development notes and posts, you'd know what I mean. I swear, sometimes, he just speaks in code...

Hey, I can't help it if I leave out some of the words! You guys do a great job of understanding me.

Anyway, I've done language creation, it's going to be much easier to just use an existing language, and the one I listed are free, it's hard to beat that.

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Post #: 71

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/1/2008 2:57:49 AM

ralphtricky

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And, just to stay focused, there will be at least 2 more patches for TOAW III, after that, we'll see if we want to do another one.

Ralph

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Post #: 72

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 11:17:32 AM

golden delicious

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quote:

ORIGINAL: L`zard

How many of you can prove to me that Your really alive and not an AI..........

I can do a good job. I've met seven other TOAW players in person, most of whom have posted here at one time or another. Meet any one of them and they can attest to my existence.

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Post #: 73

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 5:09:55 PM

a white rabbit

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quote:

Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint

..Ralph Trick

..Ralph, regardless of new cpu types/abilities, that is one limit that could go, given the cost of reliable plug-in storage now, i strongly doubt that anyone is running on less than 200GB of HD..

..yes the game should move on with the improvements of the machinery, you want i should have a toaw-dedicated 20GB of drive, ok, no worries, you got it.....

..of course, if you could stay below 8GB for the basic engine, then i can burn it on currently max-available discs as back up..

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Post #: 74

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 5:31:12 PM

a white rabbit

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..
quote:

Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint
..Ralph Trick

..Ralph, regardless of new cpu types/abilities, that is one limit that could go, given the cost of reliable plug-in storage now, i strongly doubt that anyone is running on less than 200GB of HD..

..yes the game should move on with the improvements of the machinery, you want i should have a toaw-dedicated 20GB of drive, ok, no worries, you got it.....

..of course, if you could stay below 8GB for the basic engine, then i can burn it on currently max-available discs as back up..

..sits back and waits for the screams...

..the equipment improves folks, so how about we move out of the Bronze Age too ? We've got an engine that's stood the test of time, BioEd access, we've got ODD assistance, we've got an intelligent and experienced company, Matrix, backing this nothing special, base-line game, and we've an interested, competant and dedicated programming squadron ..

..me, i say let's bite the bullet and attack..

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Post #: 75

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 6:13:28 PM

golden delicious

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..
quote:

Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint
..Ralph Trick

..Ralph, regardless of new cpu types/abilities, that is one limit that could go, given the cost of reliable plug-in storage now, i strongly doubt that anyone is running on less than 200GB of HD..

That's great. But I'm fairly confident that Ralph meant RAM- not disk space.

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Post #: 76

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 6:19:09 PM

Jeff Norton

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quote:

ORIGINAL: JAMiAM

quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
I'll try not to set limits on the AI if I see parts where more time would help.

Given that computers will be be between 2 and 8 times faster than they are now, by the time we finish TOAW IV, this shouldn't be too much of an issue. Especially, with off-loading to the GPU, the GUI and map. We might even be able to take advantage of multi-threading some aspects of the game, for further speed improvements.

quote:

ORIGINAL: ralphtrick
I'm hoping to open scripting up to any .Net language (C#, VB, F#, IronPython, Ruby, etc.) as well as the current dialog based model. We'll see how everything goes. The hardest part will be adequate documentation.

Trust me...if you've ever had to decipher Ralph's private development notes and posts, you'd know what I mean. I swear, sometimes, he just speaks in code...

Its a geek thing, you wouldn't understand....

If you ever sat in on a business-technology conference, the looks from the MBA's and "movers/shakers" when we bring up bandwidth/DBA/overhead/etc technology constraints is priceless - the classic deer in the headlights image.

Almost feel sorry for them, except, they're *usually* the bean-counters.... then I come to my senses...

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Post #: 77

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 8:05:06 PM

a white rabbit

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quote:

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..
quote:

Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint
..Ralph Trick

..Ralph, regardless of new cpu types/abilities, that is one limit that could go, given the cost of reliable plug-in storage now, i strongly doubt that anyone is running on less than 200GB of HD..

That's great. But I'm fairly confident that Ralph meant RAM- not disk space.

..i think he meant what he wrote..

..giving Elmer a decent memory of previous moves takes space, RAM just makes him/it process that memory (note MEMORY) quicker..

..and more CPU's let's him compare quicker..

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Post #: 78

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 8:10:47 PM

Curtis Lemay

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..
quote:

Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint
..Ralph Trick

..Ralph, regardless of new cpu types/abilities, that is one limit that could go, given the cost of reliable plug-in storage now, i strongly doubt that anyone is running on less than 200GB of HD..

My laptop has 40GB of hard drive. 10GB of that is currently free.

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Post #: 79

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 8:16:28 PM

a white rabbit

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..
quote:

Norm wrote for the minimum memory footprint
..Ralph Trick

..Ralph, regardless of new cpu types/abilities, that is one limit that could go, given the cost of reliable plug-in storage now, i strongly doubt that anyone is running on less than 200GB of HD..

My laptop has 40GB of hard drive. 10GB of that is currently free.

..your laptop ?..oh soooorrrryyyyyy, and your main-frame ?..

..buy a plug-in, cheap-skate

...

< Message edited by a white rabbit -- 1/8/2008 8:17:52 PM >

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Post #: 80

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/8/2008 9:44:56 PM

Karri

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I find it pretty hard to believe that a game like TOAW will ever take mor than 1GB of space...unless indeed 3d graphics, animations and other unnnecessary things are added.

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Post #: 81

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 3:57:09 AM

a white rabbit

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..currently my t3 folder is at 756MB, i wonder how much space 10 memory turns of FITE takes up...

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Post #: 82

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 11:02:13 AM

golden delicious

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..currently my t3 folder is at 756MB, i wonder how much space 10 memory turns of FITE takes up...

The largest saves take up around 800kb.

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Post #: 83

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 11:05:44 AM

golden delicious

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..giving Elmer a decent memory of previous moves takes space, RAM just makes him/it process that memory (note MEMORY) quicker..

..and more CPU's let's him compare quicker..

I'm sure you're a great farmer, Richard, but you really could do with learning a bit more about computers.

The actual code- the things which control the way the game works- is all in that tiny little file with the .exe on the end. The vast majority of the space taken up by a TOAW install is the graphics. However, the code in that little .exe requires a fair old bit of RAM (CPU, too, but RAM is almost always the limiting factor) to operate.

_____________________________

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"War Studies"
"War? Huh. What is it good for?"
"Absolutely nothing."

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Post #: 84

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 1:09:56 PM

a white rabbit

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quote:

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

..giving Elmer a decent memory of previous moves takes space, RAM just makes him/it process that memory (note MEMORY) quicker..

..and more CPU's let's him compare quicker..

I'm sure you're a great farmer, Richard, but you really could do with learning a bit more about computers.

The actual code- the things which control the way the game works- is all in that tiny little file with the .exe on the end. The vast majority of the space taken up by a TOAW install is the graphics. However, the code in that little .exe requires a fair old bit of RAM (CPU, too, but RAM is almost always the limiting factor) to operate.

..yes, like i said, the larger RAM helps him compare the history quicker, better, effectively using more of the program, so ?

.. i'm suggesting more storage space, so Elmer has a decent memory for comparison. As you wrote above 1 big save is running at 800KB so 10 moves, his own and the player's is 16MB ish, then he needs somewhere to store his own provisional planning unless you want to wait for him to recalculate evry time you load, so that's some 20MB, then he needs space to try out the planning in theory during play, no idea there..

..but, he really should have more than that, so 20 moves ?..

...then he needs space for his tactical models, almost a sub-game and all the space that needs..

..if it's any help, the best iGo program was some 3.5 GB, and that before i left France, most of which was previous championship games used for Elmer-san's planning, the "thinking" bit, the .exe if you really wanna get picky was some 150KB, and given the game, i really doubt that the graphics were much at all..

..if it helps your world-view Ben, i'm happy with my simplistic attitude to computer construction, it worked well enough when i learnt machine-code and you were still in nappies, so cute too, and not a lot has really changed since. It's still a y/n system, no maybe..

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Post #: 85

RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 2:13:20 PM

berto

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Again, whether we're talking time, disk space, whatever--I hope that there will be no (or as few as possible) arbitrary, fixed constraints on the AI. Let us decide for ourselves how much time we'll give the AI, and how much computer resources we'll devote to it.

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RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 2:32:48 PM

Karri

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit
.. i'm suggesting more storage space, so Elmer has a decent memory for comparison. As you wrote above 1 big save is running at 800KB so 10 moves, his own and the player's is 16MB ish, then he needs somewhere to store his own provisional planning unless you want to wait for him to recalculate evry time you load, so that's some 20MB, then he needs space to try out the planning in theory during play, no idea there..

That one save has ALL information regarding the scenario in it. Saving 'elmers' moves would probaply take like 10% of that. The trick is not just giving him more storage space, the problem is coming up with a way for Elmer to use those 'previous moves'. What you are asking is not using more space but building some kind of real artificial intelligence.

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RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/9/2008 2:44:07 PM

golden delicious

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quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit

.. i'm suggesting more storage space, so Elmer has a decent memory for comparison. As you wrote above 1 big save is running at 800KB so 10 moves, his own and the player's is 16MB ish,

No, actually. The 800kb includes all the scenario data. You may have noticed you're never prompted for a scenario file during play; that's because you don't need it. All the information- the map, units, events etc.- is stored in the save game file. Since the scenario file itself is only a little smaller than the save, we can deduce that the space taken up by the stored moves is less than 100kb- in the extremely large scenarios.

But I don't see where you're going with this. You want the PO to calculate possible future moves like a chess program? TOAW is far, far more complicated than chess- and involves random factors.

The PO's strategic brains currently depend entirely on the objectives plotted by the scenario designer. Something more is required- but I think the objectives are still going to have to feature in there unless we're going to do a massive AI project, which requires development time more than tech specs.

quote:

..if it helps your world-view Ben, i'm happy with my simplistic attitude to computer construction, it worked well enough when i learnt machine-code and you were still in nappies, so cute too, and not a lot has really changed since. It's still a y/n system, no maybe..

Chess and Go are "yes/no". TOAW is definitely maybe, as in "maybe this attack will work". That's why the AI has trouble.

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RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/10/2008 3:14:35 AM

a white rabbit

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..no, computers are y/n, it's an electrical thing, the switch is either on , y, or off, n, there's no uncertantity state, maybe on/maybe off..

..as to a decent AI, a "thinking" Elmer, part of it's design parameters have to be potential space available for temporary storage, the more he has, the better the comparisons and the sounder the end decision. As to it's complexity beyond that of chess or iGo, a study on our own human CP analysis shows that isn't the case, we simplify, so why shouldn't Elmer. He doesn't have to analyse the whole map, just bits, one after another, as we do. In gross detail, first we look at a formation, it's proximity to a given objective and any major obstacles, access to long-range support, all this on low map magnification, then we focus in on the details, and then we focus down real tight on observed bottle-necks, on max zoom, finally we make a decision, compare with our own objective track planning and from our stored maps and analysis take action..

..none of the above is beyond Elmer's ability, nor beyond the standard RAM capacity or chip size, the computer algorythmns (sp) exist, and now-a-days, the needed storage space for the comparison models also exists on the normal home computer, at prices we can all afford..

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RE: Chance of Norm Koger doing a sequel? - 1/10/2008 3:18:15 AM

a white rabbit

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Karri

quote:

ORIGINAL: a white rabbit
.. i'm suggesting more storage space, so Elmer has a decent memory for comparison. As you wrote above 1 big save is running at 800KB so 10 moves, his own and the player's is 16MB ish, then he needs somewhere to store his own provisional planning unless you want to wait for him to recalculate evry time you load, so that's some 20MB, then he needs space to try out the planning in theory during play, no idea there..

. What you are asking is not using more space but building some kind of real artificial intelligence.

..yup, i am, i want an Elmer that can, without cheats, beat me evrytime, if i get one move a day, and he needs all night to think, s'ok..

..it'l make for an interesting breakfast..

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