Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

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Poison
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by Poison »

singalen wrote: March 15th, 2020, 7:32 pm I managed to win against Fred 0.14.14! (He got 125 starting gold, +3 or +2 per turn).
The matchup was in his favor, I think: he had Northerners and I had elves.
Not sure how useful my replay would be, I’m much worse at Wesnoth than I was in 2012.
Anyway, it’s an excellent competition offline!

I actually like him being aggressive, except for a few cases when he should better fall back and save his units.
I also have a feeling that he’s not paying “attention” when he’s losing the economy.
What an amazing replay, I'm also playing against Fred atm, this proves that AI matches can be interesting. There's a slider where you can adjust Fred's aggression though whether it works properly I cannot say.
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singalen
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by singalen »

Now actually played vs Fred. He seems to be doing worse than Experimental, the game on the same settings (+25 starting gold, +2 per turn) felt way easier.
His questionable decisions:
The initial investment in woses;
On turn 4, exposing lone archer in the center;
Turn 5: I like him moving raider to the flank where I didn’t have a piercing units, and moving woses where I had them. The aggression in the center is either unnecessary or insufficient, though;
I totally expected him to attack my leader on turn 9; he could lose the wose, but could easily win;
Same on turn 10 with Elvish Fighter;
Then I had some luck on western front, and got a too big advantage to lose.
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2p — The Freelands replay vs Fred 1 .gz
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singalen
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by singalen »

Another one, Fred played with his native Northerners vs my rebels, same money.
He feels not aggressive enough. At every moment, there were a couple of his units just hanging back. So he didn’t create enough pressure.
He also over-invested in Assassins, and neglected Archers.
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2p — The Freelands replay vs Fred 2.gz
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mattsc
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by mattsc »

singalen: thank you for playing and posting all those replays! I'll have to work through them more carefully than I have time for right now, so just a few comments for now:
As we discussed off-forum, the first replay is against the ExpAI, not Fred. So that's essentially the default AI (with a few improvements, but "play style" is the same). Which shows that, against all criticism, the default AI is really not as bad as some people think. :)
I'll check out the things you mention, such as units hanging back when they shouldn't or being exposed too much (on first look both of those look like problems I know, but I want to be sure). And not taking the possible leader kill is obviously bad. I know what's causing that and will work on it.
Besides that, as I have said before, don't expect Fred to play like a human. With equal gold, he won't stand a chance. And overall playing style is not going to change significantly either any more. I neither have the skill nor the time nor the energy for that. But there are a lot of knobs that can be turned to tweak things.
Oh, one more thing, since you comment on it: I have done (almost) nothing on recruiting. Fred and ExpAI recruiting are (essentially) the same.

Anyways, thanks again, I very much appreciate the feedback.
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sergey
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by sergey »

Hi mattsc! I am really happy for Fred as he learned to play all factions :)

I played with him a few times.

In Drakes vs Undead game he moved a ghoul and an adept to my western village and that group was too small, since I had much more forces there. Later he tried to counterattack during a day when I captured his villages, but he moved only few units and left ghouls near his leader instead of forming the wall. Perhaps he tried to protect his leader, but I think it would be better to form a wall or retreat rather than expose only several units.

In Northerners vs Loyalists I recruited almost all grunts for a first night rush. I think he recruited too many cavalry and for some reason exposed it in an early game, so I poisoned one on the west and zoc'ed another on the east. Cavalry is good in this matchup, but it is worse than spearman for protecting villages. Also I noticed he haven't recruited a single mage, that could help for clearing villages.

I will give him more gold next time and will see how it goes.

Comment regarding fog. Is it ok if I will play with fog and you will use debug during replay to unfog? Scouting is an interesting aspect of the game.

PS. He is not saying gg at the end anymore, I liked that :)
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Sergey (Drakes) vs Fred (Undead).gz
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Sergey (Northerners) vs Fred (Loyalists).gz
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Author of SP scenario Dragon Fight and SP campaign Captured by a Nightmare.
Created The Rise of Wesnoth (alternative mechanics) version of the mainline campaign.
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sergey
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by sergey »

I played with fog and gave Fred +25 starting gold and +3 base income.

Turn 5 Fred placed fighter in water 19,12
Turn 6 shaman on flat 11,12. Besides that I liked how he moved mage, archer and fighters on the western flank.
Turn 14 Wose ninja was cool, though I think he had not enough units there. Plus one mage would be great.
Turn 16. I think I made not a very good move. I decided to kill 2 shamans. Probably better would be to kill a shaman in 20,15 village, take and cover it.
As a result my units ended up exposed. Fred could retake the village and kill ulfserker near it. Instead of that he tried very hard to rescue that almost dead shaman. Attacking full hp dwarvish fighter on a hill with his elvish fighters on flat. One turn later I liked his attack with leader on almost levelled footpad.
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Sergey (Knalgans) vs Fred (Rebels).gz
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Author of SP scenario Dragon Fight and SP campaign Captured by a Nightmare.
Created The Rise of Wesnoth (alternative mechanics) version of the mainline campaign.
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sergey
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by sergey »

Fred +25 starting gold and +3 base income.

Turn 11 Fred could use backstab with thief, but insted he moves footpad from the opposite side to attack and only after that thief attacks without backstab.
Turn 18 All units retreat, but a lonely dwarf attacks without a chance to kill.
turn 21 Didn't retreat poisoned poacher to heal and didn't attack ghoul with leader (trapper), though moved leader near the ghoul
Turn 22 Lonely dwarf on 13,13
Turn 23 Fred attacks unit close to level up and with chance to kill - I like that
No single Ulfserker in this game, they can counter dark adepts. On the other hand I had so many ghosts so it could be pretty hard to use and cover an ulf.
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Fred (Knalgans) vs Sergey (Undead).gz
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Author of SP scenario Dragon Fight and SP campaign Captured by a Nightmare.
Created The Rise of Wesnoth (alternative mechanics) version of the mainline campaign.
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sergey
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by sergey »

Fred +25 starting gold and +3 base income.
I set aggression to maximum and expected Loyalist's rush. And Fred was super aggressive, I didn't take all villages on my side as cavalry and horsemen arrived. He was pushing even at night. If he had better luck I could lost more units during that rush.

Turn 9 stays with almost dead cavalry instead of retreat
Turn 19 strange move with heavy infantry 18,9 vill -> 19,11
Attachments
Fred (Loyalists) vs Sergey (Knalgans).gz
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Author of SP scenario Dragon Fight and SP campaign Captured by a Nightmare.
Created The Rise of Wesnoth (alternative mechanics) version of the mainline campaign.
mattsc
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by mattsc »

Hi sergey! Thank you very much for all the replays and the comments, and sorry for the slow reply. I'm not around a whiole lot at the moment. One of the common aspects of your (and also singalen's) comments is something I have been fighting with essentially forever: Fred not using units coherently. I don't want to "hard code" that sort of behavior as that causes all kinds of unwanted side effects, so I am trying to make Fred "discover" it himself, but it's not as simple as I had hoped.

Anyway, when I get to this, your detailed comments will be very useful as they give me specific starting points to look into. Unfortunately, I don't currently know when, or even if, I will be able to return to Fred (or even Wesnoth in general) for any appreciable amount of time. We'll have to see. Never say never ...
sergey wrote: April 3rd, 2020, 8:36 pm PS. He is not saying gg at the end anymore, I liked that :)
:) I thought it was "getting a bit old", as it's clearly just an automated line, but I can add it back in. Or I could add an MP option so that those who like it can add it.
sergey wrote: April 3rd, 2020, 8:36 pm Comment regarding fog. Is it ok if I will play with fog and you will use debug during replay to unfog? Scouting is an interesting aspect of the game.
Yes, of course. First and foremost you should play in whatever way you enjoy it most. I always get something out of the replays, no matter how they are done.

Thanks again, much appreciate the feedback!
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Alarantalara
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Re: Help with testing Fred - Freelands MP Custom AI v0.14.15

Post by Alarantalara »

sergey wrote: April 4th, 2020, 11:36 am No single Ulfserker in this game, they can counter dark adepts. On the other hand I had so many ghosts so it could be pretty hard to use and cover an ulf.
Since it sounds like recruiting hasn't changed much in the last five years, I can explain this. When the recruiting portion was first written, all the available AIs had no idea how to protect ulfserkers and so their berserk ability was deliberately ignored when calculating their effectiveness. Perhaps it's time to change that for Fred and have it pick up 1-2 when there are sufficient other units to protect it (or they're just too good because the opponent recruited nothing but Dark Adepts).
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