Burner's "An Analytical View of ARMA's Artificial Intellig

[Burner]

[Burner]

WolfpackRealAI_2.0.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/download/szca1ky1a57x0kf/@WolfpackRealAI_2.0.zip

An continuing analysis of ARMA's struggling default AI...ARMA is an amazing open world military sim. But the AI seriously needs work. This demonstration is with augmenters like ASR SLX ZUES TPWAS & TPWLOS based on ChrisB's amazing work and the Wolfpack Real AI Accuracy mod .

ASR in conjunction with these mods seems to be a complete game changer. AI are acting much more naturally and realistically, staying behind cover, prone, and not running around evasively like default AI.

Check out our WolfpackMilsims AI Mod pack

Edited November 17, 2014 by Burner

[Burner]

This is a PM I sent to Wombat and thought I would share some thoughts with the community.....

I think its nice you and others are still enthused by GR. I have played it with friends every Sunday since 2003 and it would seem we would be tired of it by now. But we call it the 3 shortest hours of the week because we are having fun and lose track of the time.

-Wombat

I have been playing it off and on since 2001. I tried the OFP demo and it was amazing but way way too unrealistic in its difficult level (although an argument can be made for the gruesomeness of a modern combined arms battle between superpowers) and cluncky. ARMA is still plagued by unfriendly GUI and AI that are simply not believable. Theres so much potential for ARMA but the AI is so frustrating even with all the modern mods like Gl4, ASR, SLX, ZUES etc. I've done countless hours of testing to get ARMA even close to GR with things like taking cover properly, going prone under fire, reacting to sniper fire and suppressing the enemy.

Ghost Recon just has such an incredible foundation that makes it enjoyable to build on. ARMA 3, although beautiful with amazing physics, full battlefield including attack and transport helicopters, and artillery/support, is foundationally struggling with AI and user interface, not to mention the futuristic setting which most people are not overly excited about in my opinion.

(ARMA does truly shine as a MP platform however)

The conclusion is that GR does so many things that are essential for a modern military sim that ARMA does not.

Thats why we still use it. I still play ARMA and I love the huge sand box and flying helicopters, but as soon as the bullets start

flying, and my AI start dying, it loses its excitement.

[Burner]

[Burner]

Edited December 9, 2014 by Burner

[Burner]

[nyleken]

Have you considered trying bCombat by itself and on a default ArmA 3 terrain? Maybe try using urban terrain to see how well the AI fares there.

Speaking of ArmA's sound effects: It'd actually be pretty nice if Ghost Recon had similar audio. It kind of bothered me that I couldn't hear your firearms go off in M07. Probably because the game revolved around having limited visibility, however.

Edited December 10, 2014 by nyleken

[Burner]

Yeah Baltazar,

That was my next planned test in a forested or urban setting. Good idea with the ARMA 3 terrian, the AI may have certain triggers on Altis and Stratus that they dont have in the older maps.....

I would be awesome if GR had modern sound occlusion although it does have EAX. I think the sound travel is restricted by the view distance as you said. Thats why when we engage certain AI, the entire map doesn't respond as QRF.

M06 Witch Fire was a perfect example, as we were using unsuppressed weapons just outside of the castle,and the enemy AI in the castle acted like nothing was happening.

This is nice for step-by-step objective clearing however....for example: I remember an ARMA night mission that we had to assault an enemy tent outpost for a hostage rescue, where we were using GL4 which increases the distance AI can hear sound, and instead of sneaking up on the camp about 1 mile away.... we were ambushed by the entire camp at the LZ.

Edited December 10, 2014 by Burner

[nyleken]

So I decided to run Ghost Recon again to test the enemy AI. Went pretty well, to be honest. Except that I ######ed up the settings with the recorder and got GOD-AWFUL quality. I didn't save any replays so here I am a bit sad.

Did capture this funny moment though:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grAobuq22pc&feature=youtu.be

Edited December 10, 2014 by nyleken

[Burner]

[Burner]

A quote from the creator of bCombat fabrizio_T:
http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?85105-Some-thoughts-about-ARMA2-AI-3-months-later

AI in ARMA2 is globally a big step forward, compared to ARMA.
Yet there are many BIG problems and some of them date quite some years now, as they were original OFP "sins".
Let me expose some thoughts about it:

Threat evaluation & rushing
What Arma2 AI lacks completely is a proper threat evaluation phase. In reality any military unit does some kind of target evaluation before engaging (if ROE permit).
Then it will or flank or keep position or retreat or ask for support ... depending on evaluated threat ...
In ArmA2 AI always engage/assault enemy on sight, even when outpowered. Once they get casualties they simply flee.
Group leaders always rush enemy and fall one by one like lemmings.
Also some AI features are a bit ridiculous, eg. the GUARD waypoint: units with a current GUARD waypoint will attack any enemy anywhere on the map and also in the case they know they can't harm it.

Spotting / target detection still flawed
In many circumstances AI is not able to detect nor target enemies properly.
Also AI has still problems in reacting quickly to hostiles in CQB and peeking around corners is done only occasionally (hence AI units still are mowed from flank at crossroads).

Concealement
Tall grass, smoke, fog should conceal from AI eyes. That's not happening.

AT Units useless
AT units are simply cannon fodder at the moment. Mostly their effort is unpredictable. What's sure is they will keep switching weapon till their last breath.

Unit Stance
The way AI choose stance / posture looks random, many times units stand, crouch and go prone intermittently

Pathfinding
It's just plain problematic now. Land vehicles and convoys work badly. Air units pathfinding is bad and there are serious issues with vehicles loading / unloading (especially for Helis in hot LZs).

Incomplete implemetations
Some AI features are incomplete: suppress command and find cover command does not work.
Findcover and sethidebehind functions are still "not implemented"

[nyleken]

Have you considered covering Ghost Recon's stealth? I found it quite enjoyable watching the AI searching for me as I retreated. Allows for some quick ambushes to occur.

[Burner]

Sounds like a great idea for both the ARMA series and Ghost Recon, reactions to stealth casualty and weapons...

[Parabellum]

Warning: Long read, but for anyone who wants to know a bit about Arma 3, please stick around. I've been modding for this game for 15 years, and worked as a developer for projects based on the RV engine, which the Arma series is based on. This is a discussion to which I would very much like to contribute.

To begin, some of the comments I'm reading seem to be confusing AI with scripting; Ghost Recon's AI wasn't great, in fact, they were highly predictable, frustrating and in many ways, completely horrible. Ex: The AI's habit of turning 180 degrees and instantly shooting you in the head, from the hip, while you were lying prone over 200m away. Ex: Hordes of enemies running from across the map toward the sound of gunfire, while enemies closer remained standing on their street corner, smoking their cigarettes. Clearly, those are some monumental failings. What Ghost Recon did well, however, was to simulate basic small-unit tactics by using scripted sequences to control the AI units in certain situations.

An excellent example would be the way Ghost Recon's AI teams would attempt to suppress you and then flank your position upon taking contact. That isn't AI at work; that's a script, written by the game's designers. The difference being that AI at work are largely autonomous and do more or less 'what they want', within the confines of their programming. Scripted sequences rely on, well, scripts which tell the AI what to do and/or where to go, while still allowing them some degree of autonomy, such as still allowing AI to communicate targets to one another, call for help and engage targets. Hence, the utter predictability of that particular maneuver. When Ghost Recon's AI had to actually fall back on their own routines, they'd do stupid things like walk out into the open and stand there. Or, somehow magically know exactly where you are, and walk right up to you, even though you're hiding in a bush. Or walk up to a pile of the bodies of their dead friends, and then look around, as if to ask "What happened here?" before being added to said pile.

Conversely, if you look at Arma, particularly at Arma 3, the AI can be unpredictable on the battlefield, sometimes frustratingly so. When you want an AI squad to do one thing, even after you've given them waypoints and scripts, they still do what they want. Sure, you can predict in the macro sense what they'll do: If you fight a single squad, then they'll pretty much fight you head-on. If you inflict enough damage, then they'll retreat, regroup and counterattack until they're all dead or you're dead or you retreat. But, on the macro scale, they aren't predictable. This is because AI is actually doing the work, rather than scripts. Obviously, this isn't the case, if you're using Zeus AI, ASR AI, UPSMON (my personal favorite) or some other community-generated addon that claims to modify AI. They don't. None of them actually modify the game's AI. What they do is control and constrain the AI through the use of scripts and/or modified configuration files (we'll get to the latter in a moment -- it's of vital importance). Ghost Recon's developers simply used scripts to enhance the AI in-house, out of the gate.

On a macro scale, however, if you were to sit back and watch Arma 3's AI battle it out over a large area of terrain, over a long period of time (via the Zeus game mode, for instance), then you'd see something different. You'd see that the AI in Arma 3 actually do use coordinated tactics such as bounding movements and flanking maneuvers, both at the squad level and at the higher level. Does it look clean, neat and precise? No. It looks sloppy and chaotic. As it should. But they do what they should be doing. Most of the time. They will also call for reinforcements or support, provided you have placed those support assets and given units the ability to do so. No scripting is needed for this any more. Simply place BIS's game modules down, synchronize them with the desired units, and go.

As has been mentioned, Arma's AI does have some failings. They stink at driving, especially in convoys. Hot LZ's are another concern. (Note: This is a great reason to play with a gaming group that has competent pilots: You don't need to rely on AI to get you into and out of combat.) They're also nasty in close quarters, due to their habit of going prone upon enemy contact. Your team's awesome breach tactic, perfectly executed? Doesn't matter, because you weren't expecting a prone RPK gunner to be lying down at the end of the hall, just barely within view of the doorway, and he smoked your whole team. In some ways, that's maddening. In others, it simulates the behavior of other people pretty well. Yes, they also do silly things like turn in circles, stand/kneel/prone repeatedly and walk into walls on occasion. But on the large scale, it works. Also, there aren't any other games out there that offer an AI package capable of so much, especially one that is so easily complemented by community-created script packages.

Lastly, on to config issues, one of the game's biggest failings. To put it plainly, Arma's AI issues have very little to do with the actual AI, and almost everything to do with some other aspect of the game. That 'other aspect' is usually one of the game's main configuration files, which may control vehicle-handling, weapons-handling, etc. In particular, the weapon config entries, vehicle entries and the CFGAISkill class have a profound effect on AI. For clarification, all people, whether human or AI-controlled, are vehicles in the Arma engine. BIS are notorious for using a sledge hammer when they should use a scalpel, when it comes to some of their config values. This is especially true for weapon-handling values, in particular those which constrain the ranges at which AI will engage you. Have you ever gotten up close to an enemy AI in Arma 3, say, within 10 meters or so, and just had him look at you, as if he really wanted to shoot you, but couldn't? That's because he couldn't. By default, Arma's carbines, rifles, machine guns and long rifles are coded so AI can't engage closer than 30 meters. Think about that for a moment, and then ask yourself why they panic in close quarters. It's because their AI routine is telling them to shoot you, but their equipped weapon won't let them do so. Hence, chaos ensues. This is quite easily solved, and there are some mods out there that make the game a lot more fun by doing nothing more than -- I kid you not -- changing the ranges at which AI can see you and engage you. I won't go into the problems with the vehicle values or CFGAISkill, because they're numerous and would likely bore most readers to tears. I will, however, say that, by simply redefining many of the variables in CFGVehicles (the class in which all people are found in Arma), CFGWeapons and CFGAISkill, my gaming group was able to provide for ourselves a much more enjoyable and much more realistic experience. This is partially because, by redefining these variables, we've basically allowed the AI to do what they were programmed to do in the first place. You just aren't seeing in the vanilla game what the AI were actually designed to do.

PS: The Guard Waypoint was completely misrepresented in Burner's quoted piece above. It's one of the most powerful tools Arma can give a mission maker, provided the mission maker actually knows how to use it.

[Burner]

Parabellum, first I want to say thanks for the constructive criticism and enlightening comments. I have (like most of the ARMA community) tried to figure out the 'mystery' of the sim's AI.

1. To begin, some of the comments I'm reading seem to be confusing AI with scripting; Ghost Recon's AI wasn't great, in fact, they were highly predictable, frustrating and in many ways, completely horrible. What Ghost Recon did well, however, was to simulate basic small-unit tactics by using scripted sequences to control the AI units in certain situations.

When Ghost Recon's AI had to actually fall back on their own routines, they'd do stupid things like walk out into the open and stand there. Or, somehow magically know exactly where you are, and walk right up to you, even though you're hiding in a bush. Or walk up to a pile of the bodies of their dead friends, and then look around, as if to ask "What happened here?" before being added to said pile.

I have heard this point before regarding scripting vs. real AI for example, Ive heard GR enemies in missions act realistic and believable, however, in fire fight scenarios, the AI do not behave as realistically. In fire fights we can often see the AI standing upright and not taking evasive actions.

The small unit tactics exhibited in GR are what makes it realistic and believable. In the context of missions, it seems that GR knows when to assault, suppress, and take effective cover, something that is not seen very readily in ARMA. I didnt realize that most of this was scripting, but it seems like they were making some "right" and humanistic decisions.

2. Conversely, if you look at Arma, particularly at Arma 3, the AI can be unpredictable on the battlefield, sometimes frustratingly so. When you want an AI squad to do one thing, even after you've given them waypoints and scripts, they still do what they want. Sure, you can predict in the macro sense what they'll do: If you fight a single squad, then they'll pretty much fight you head-on. If you inflict enough damage, then they'll retreat, regroup and counterattack until they're all dead or you're dead or you retreat. But, on the macro scale, they aren't predictable. This is because AI is actually doing the work, rather than scripts. Obviously, this isn't the case, if you're using Zeus AI, ASR AI, UPSMON (my personal favorite) or some other community-generated addon that claims to modify AI. They don't. None of them actually modify the game's AI. What they do is control and constrain the AI through the use of scripts and/or modified configuration files (we'll get to the latter in a moment -- it's of vital importance). Ghost Recon's developers simply used scripts to enhance the AI in-house, out of the gate.

On a macro scale, however, if you were to sit back and watch Arma 3's AI battle it out over a large area of terrain, over a long period of time (via the Zeus game mode, for instance), then you'd see something different. You'd see that the AI in Arma 3 actually do use coordinated tactics such as bounding movements and flanking maneuvers....

ARMA AI can be extremely frustrating, not due to their unpredictability, but rather due to incompetence. If ARMAs AI was unpredictable and reacted in believable human ways, it would be epic. THe most frustrating part for me is the random intervals (or maybe decisions) that cause them to sprint, crouch, prone, crawl in situations that do not call for it. I dislike watching AI running all over the place during a fire fight when they are completely suppressed or under sniper fire when the proper thing to do is take cover and stay there until the suppression stops. USMC Carlos Hathcock and his spotter kept an entire company of enemy VC down for hours eventually into the night. When the VC peeked around cover they were shot. Carlos would fire sniper rounds over thier cover every few minutes just to let them know they were still there. GR does not simulate this for more than a few seconds, as it would make for "boring" gameplay, but ARMA taking cover even for a few minutes is better than running idiotically everywhere.

Your absolutely right about mods like Zeus AI, ASR AI,... they modify parameters but do not inherently change how the AI foundation ally react. I have noticed this on numerous tests. I will make an argument for GL4 however, the AI behave drastically different. Any insight on how they force the AI to be more aggressive, move out of the kill zone where vanilla just sits there are takes bullets on the open tarmac?

3. Lastly, on to config issues, one of the game's biggest failings. To put it plainly, Arma's AI issues have very little to do with the actual AI, and almost everything to do with some other aspect of the game. That 'other aspect' is usually one of the game's main configuration files, which may control vehicle-handling, weapons-handling, etc. In particular, the weapon config entries, vehicle entries and the CFGAISkill class have a profound effect on AI. For clarification, all people, whether human or AI-controlled, are vehicles in the Arma engine.

Interesting.....I never knew that characters are vehicles!.....whaaaatttt? really? No wonder why solider animations feel like your floating and seem awkward.

4. Have you ever gotten up close to an enemy AI in Arma 3, say, within 10 meters or so, and just had him look at you, as if he really wanted to shoot you, but couldn't? That's because he couldn't. By default, Arma's carbines, rifles, machine guns and long rifles are coded so AI can't engage closer than 30 meters. Think about that for a moment, and then ask yourself why they panic in close quarters. It's because their AI routine is telling them to shoot you, but their equipped weapon won't let them do so. Hence, chaos ensues.

Yes. This is also very interesting. Why would BIS implement something like this?

5. This is quite easily solved, and there are some mods out there that make the game a lot more fun by doing nothing more than -- I kid you not -- changing the ranges at which AI can see you and engage you. I won't go into the problems with the vehicle values or CFGAISkill, because they're numerous and would likely bore most readers to tears. I will, however, say that, by simply redefining many of the variables in CFGVehicles (the class in which all people are found in Arma), CFGWeapons and CFGAISkill,

You mentioned you liked UPSMON, I havent tried it.... My personal favortie is GL4, but unfortunately the AI do not follow waypoints well. On one mission we had a night insert about a mile to a mile and a half half away (vanilla AI I dont think can hear that far but GL4 can) , the AI were set to guard a camp with some intel and a prisioner. Instead of guarding the base, the entire platoon stormed our covert LZ and left the camp unguarded. Now we simply could have done a fly over of the LZ, headed back to the camp, rescued the hostage and mission complete.

6. My gaming group was able to provide for ourselves a much more enjoyable and much more realistic experience. This is partially because, by redefining these variables, we've basically allowed the AI to do what they were programmed to do in the first place. You just aren't seeing in the vanilla game what the AI were actually designed to do.

Do you have any other recommendations or mods? I would love to test them and compare them to previous results.

PS: The Guard Waypoint was completely misrepresented in Burner's quoted piece above. It's one of the most powerful tools Arma can give a mission maker, provided the mission maker actually knows how to use it.

The Guard way-point works awesome! This video was in the context of GL4 which causes AI to break away from guard way-points and be completely antonymous in hunting down the enemy . I will say that I did not have the guard waypoint attached to a building or object but rather an area. Could that be the problem?

Anyway, thanks for the feedback and insight. Looking forward to the community's responses.

Burner

Edited December 16, 2014 by Burner

[Burner]

[Burner]

[nyleken]

Speaking of AI, here's a reading by one of the developers of FEAR: http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~jorkin/gdc2006_orkin_jeff_fear.pdf

[Burner]

[Burner]

[portland]

It took us ages to find a great ai mod. Working our way through all of the ones for the series, wow it was time consuming. Each time one mod came out and we'd set the damn thing up, it died. Support was pretty bad back in the day.

[Burner]

Test of GL4, intense firefight in the ToraBora ARMA 2 map. GL4 combined with TPWCAS is really a great combination. Enemies flank effectively, are suppressed realistically, enter buildings like real humans would and create unique CQB experiences.

Edited March 27, 2015 by Burner

[Burner]

The Secret Battles Between US Special Operations Forces and Chechen Terrorists in Afghanistan.
Special Thanks to all real operators in harms way.....this is not an easy calling.

Edited March 27, 2015 by Burner

[Burner]

Speaking of AI, here's a reading by one of the developers of FEAR: http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~jorkin/gdc2006_orkin_jeff_fear.pdf

Nyleken, here is a lecture called "Facing Your F.E.A.R." by Thompson. Extremely insightful analysis and quotes Orkins Paper I believe.

[Burner]

Edited May 9, 2015 by Burner