4.11 - AI debugging

[Bearcat]

Originally Posted by X-Raptor

Dear pursivant , sadly ME, YOU and BEARCAT are the few other here are writing here with nonsense, as you can easly notice from DT anticipations on 4.12 release that there isn't ANY mention about correct all these A.i. bad behavior we diligently are reporting to the Daidalos Team.
They are going to release 4.12 with just other things improved... ..but IMHO way less important compared to try to resolve all this A.I. "bugs" we still notice in 4.11

I can't speak for anyone else but while these AI issues that I mentioned are indeed quite annoying .. I understand that TD is doing this work for free and on their own time and I do greatly appreciate it. I hope that at some point sooner rather than later these issues can be addressed fully.. and the thing that kills me is.. sometimes they actually do work right, which was what prompted my question about resetting the AI in another post.. thinking that perhaps that was the issue.Just last night in an online mission I was attacking a two man flight and I told my wingman who was AI to attack fighters.. he promptly changed his attitude to pursue the wingman of the bandit I was chasing .. which really surprised me because usually they break off to attack the target I am in pursuit of ...

[IceFire]

Keep in mind folks that the QMB and FMB don't make a lick of difference in terms of the AI. It's the same algorithms no matter what. The QMB isn't anything more special than a bunch of mission templates with the ability to adjust the type of plane and altitude. Everything else is just a .mis file to correspond to that situation.

I haven't seen a sniper gunner since 4.11 came out but apparently some still are. Any good track files with examples? Apologies if some have been posted already. If there is a problem... document it to the n'th degree.

[Bearcat]

Track files are no longer valid.. I have tried to make a few tracks and when I play them back they are all out of synch.. The guns are firing when there are no planes. even though I know I was shooting at a plane.. Maybe it is just with mods. I haven't tried it with stock yet.

[Bolelas]

I gess it will be the same. That was allready explained somewhere in the forum. The tracks are not realy a record, but a new loaded game with all the initial parameters and all the movements/actions you made. But on the load the game uses random things for AI. So, this is like the butterfly efect, and at the beggining that AI plane took a little different manouver, in the end you are shooting nothing. When this happened to me i passed the same track several times until i got the wright one.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by majorfailure

Hmm, I don't think that better AI should have tighter formations, they should have less trouble keeping in formation though.

You're right. I'm stating it the wrong way. Ace and Veteran bombers should have an easier time keeping formation and flying at assigned distances. Average planes might straggle a bit, or very rarely accidentally collide. Rookies might straggle more and might accidentally collide with other planes in their formation if they panic.

For fighters and other single-engined planes, Situational Awareness should go down at virtually any level of skill if you're flying in tight formation. Station-keeping requires a certain amount of work. In particular, rookies often focused on keeping formation rather than looking out for danger. Looser formations should allow maximum situational awareness.

[Pursuivant]

I'm not sure if this is an AI, a GUI or a graphics problem.

Some planes with manually-controlled multi-stage superchargers (e.g., the La-7) start the game with the supercharger set to the wrong setting in high altitude Quick Combat scenarios, causing the plane to produce black smoke trails until the player fixes the problem.

If you set the plane to autopilot before fixing the supercharger setting, either the AI-controlled plane doesn't switch to the proper supercharger stage or the smoke trails associated with a too-rich fuel mixture don't go away after it does so.

As a test to see what I mean, try setting up a QMB scenario with an La-7 starting at 5000 meters, then immediately switch to autopilot and then external view.

[Pursuivant]

It appears that AI aircraft have no idea what to do about V-1s. Even if the whole point of the mission is shoot down V-1s, and there's nothing else in the sky to shoot, and the V-1 is right in front of them, AI aircraft will ignore them!

It seems like it would be a very simple bit of programming for Average, Veteran or Ace aircraft to either take sniper shots at a distance, or try to "run down" the V-1 and flip it using their wingtip. Rookies would take shots from within the blast radius.

[Jumoschwanz]

In case it has not been reported yet.

In a mission I built in the FMB I have some late 1943 IL2 aircraft attacking some German tanks. The Ace IL2 aircraft hit the tanks with their cannons right on the mark, but when they fire rockets the rockets always hit the ground pretty far behind the tanks.

The firing of the rockets, machine guns and rockets is all done in one second at the most so it looks like when the aircraft's sight is on for the guns and cannons, it is low for the rockets.

I have tried altering the flight path and position of the waypoints in relation to the tanks, thinking that maybe the angle of attack was too shallow and that did not help at all.

[Aviar]

Originally Posted by Jumoschwanz

In case it has not been reported yet.

In a mission I built in the FMB I have some late 1943 IL2 aircraft attacking some German tanks. The Ace IL2 aircraft hit the tanks with their cannons right on the mark, but when they fire rockets the rockets always hit the ground pretty far behind the tanks.

The firing of the rockets, machine guns and rockets is all done in one second at the most so it looks like when the aircraft's sight is on for the guns and cannons, it is low for the rockets.

I have tried altering the flight path and position of the waypoints in relation to the tanks, thinking that maybe the angle of attack was too shallow and that did not help at all.

This is a real problem...and since I make and test all of my own missions, I see it all the time. Without a doubt, the AI are aiming their rockets at a point too 'early' or 'below' their intended target. This applies to both moving and static targets.

If I remember correctly, this started a few patches back when rocket trajectories were given an overhaul to to act more 'realistically'. I have no problem with that, but it looks like the AI was not 'updated' to account for the new trajectories, and so appear to be aiming their rockets as if they were using the 'old' rocket trajectory.

As a result, the AI ends up 'walking' their rockets towards the target, with the hope of hitting the target with their last 2 rockets. Many times, none of the rockets come close to hitting the target.

I understand that in the early years of IL-2 the rocket trajectories were pretty much arcade-like in that they flew more like a laser beam. I like the way they behave now in a more realistic manner. However, I do think the AI needs to be reprogrammed to aim these rockets in a more efficient manner.

Check out the simple test mission I have uploaded. The AI is set to Ace.

*After viewing this test mission a number of times, I think I know why the AI is always initially hitting well 'below' the target.

First of all, you will notice that the AI is still firing it's guns and rockets at the same time. (I've never liked this but this has been present since day one.) Notice that the bullets are pretty much on target. This means that the AI is 'aiming' with his guns, not his rockets. (In the old days of IL-2, if you placed your gunsight on the target, you could hit the same spot with both your bullets and your rockets.

After the the rocket trajectory was adjusted, they now drop off in a more realistic manner. You have to aim 'above' the target if you want to hit it. Now back to the test mission. Since the AI is hitting the target with bullets, it is obviously placing it's gunsight on that spot. However, since it is also firing it's rockets at the same time, because of the new trajectories, the rockets are dropping off and hitting well below the target.

Here is my idea of how to resolve this issue. First of all, if the AI is attacking with rockets DO NOT program the AI to fire it's guns until all of it's rockets have been released. (Since the bullets and rockets now have drastically different trajectories, one of them will be off-target for sure...unless your target is a large one, like a ship.)

Secondly, the AI needs to be reprogrammed to 'aim' the rockets we have now (with the more realistic trajectory).


Aviar

[ckolonko]

Every time the AI use rockets for ground attacks, IL-2s that is, the rockets detonate in the air like the timed rockets do. So they rarely end up destroying their target.