question about tactical AI

[marvalis]

I am trying to figure out why the shade in the example below is not using tidal wave and battle call.

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============================== TACTICAL AI	The Shade
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL	closein	weight	4.7184299145073
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Attack	T_ATTACK
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Manathrust	T_MANATHRUST
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Weapons Mastery	T_WEAPONS_MASTERY
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1	mana	weight	2.0715669459446
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Stamina Pool	T_STAMINA_POOL
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Mana Pool	T_MANA_POOL
Tactical ai report for	The Shade
 * escape	8.3677602740994	(mult)	nil
 * mana	1.1281277984032	(mult)	nil

[marvalis]

Probably this:

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	ai = "tactical", ai_state = { talent_in=3, ai_move="move_astar", },

Ill see if I can dig out what that means.

[edge2054]

Tidal Wave has an escape weight with fairly low attack and disable weights. He'll probably only use that when he wants to get away.

Battle Call probably needs this.

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	direct_hit = true,
	requires_target = true,

Right now I don't believe the AI knows it can hit you with the talent.

As to the ai state it means he won't even use talents that often and doesn't have a preference to ranged or melee as long as he's able to hit you and his life isn't to low.

[marvalis]

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The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE
[DEBUG] hit self!
[DEBUG] hit a foe!

After adding

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   direct_hit = true,
   requires_target = true,

Do I also need to add friendly fire or something?

[edge2054]

Nah, friendlyfire is already set to false on it. The AI should know that based on how it's built. That target function gets passed to the AI I believe.

[marvalis]

Adding friendly_fire=false, made it use tidal wave,
But it is still not using battle shout. I gave it a close in value of 4 :/. Let me try even more.

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============================== TACTICAL AI	The Shade
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL	closein	weight	8.6733770822077
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE	disable	weight	3.3562389120154
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE	escape	weight	3.117337122213
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE	attackarea	weight	6.3506582982471
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Attack	T_ATTACK
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Attack	T_ATTACK	attack	weight	1.2902114852858
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Manathrust	T_MANATHRUST
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Manathrust	T_MANATHRUST	attack	weight	4.3701257967499
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Weapons Mastery	T_WEAPONS_MASTERY
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1	mana	weight	1.8363074703698
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Stamina Pool	T_STAMINA_POOL
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Mana Pool	T_MANA_POOL
Tactical ai report for	The Shade
 * disable	15.598440409218	(mult)	nil
 * mana	1.8977836302365	(mult)	nil
 * attack	9.0106467726406	(mult)	nil
 * attackarea	12.78899419459	(mult)	nil
Tactical choice:	disable	T_TIDAL_WAVE

[marvalis]

Yeh, for whatever reason closein wasn't working
Adding disable 2 got me this;
I still do not know why close in didn't trigger the use.

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============================== TACTICAL AI	The Shade
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL	disable	weight	4.1345439211061
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL	closein	weight	8.2835003583756
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE
[DEBUG] hit self!
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Attack	T_ATTACK
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Manathrust	T_MANATHRUST
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Manathrust	T_MANATHRUST	attack	weight	4.4663360322818
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Weapons Mastery	T_WEAPONS_MASTERY
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1	mana	weight	1.574653552763
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Stamina Pool	T_STAMINA_POOL
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Mana Pool	T_MANA_POOL
Tactical ai report for	The Shade
 * mana	1.1249417027713	(mult)	nil
 * disable	17.526008540806	(mult)	nil
 * attack	9.000577586129	(mult)	nil
Tactical choice:	disable	T_BATTLE_CALL
[LOG]	The Shade uses Battle Call.
[LOG]	Player is called to battle!

[marvalis]

Even putting close in to 10 does not make the shade use it at all:

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============================== TACTICAL AI	The Shade
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents can use	Battle Call	T_BATTLE_CALL	closein	weight	20.426805774301
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Attack	T_ATTACK
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Manathrust	T_MANATHRUST
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Weapons Mastery	T_WEAPONS_MASTERY
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Rune: Manasurge	T_RUNE:_MANASURGE_1
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Stamina Pool	T_STAMINA_POOL
The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Mana Pool	T_MANA_POOL
Tactical ai report for	The Shade
(nothing)

And I am still getting this:

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The Shade	1073	tactical ai talents testing	Tidal Wave	T_TIDAL_WAVE
[DEBUG] hit a foe!
[DEBUG] hit self!

So friendly_fire= false did not solve anything.

[yufra]

Your first problem is that there is "friendlyfire" and a "selffire" attribute. You need to set "selffire" to False.

For your second problem I'll step through how the tactical AI works. The available talents are all evaluated to figure out their tactical subtypes and respective weights. That is what you are seeing in the first bit of the log, where each talent is tested. After the talents are categorized the immediate needs (or wants as the table is called) are evaluated, shown here:

Tactical ai report for The Shade
* disable 15.598440409218 (mult) nil
* mana 1.8977836302365 (mult) nil
* attack 9.0106467726406 (mult) nil
* attackarea 12.78899419459 (mult) nil

Finally the highest weighted talent from the highest weighted need is chosen:

Tactical choice: disable T_TIDAL_WAVE

So the real question is why does "closein" not show up in the wants table? Well the "closein" need is special in that it requires a flag set in the ai_tactic table to indicate that the NPC does indeed want to be closer to the target. This is automatically set if you use the "melee" or "tank" resolvers, but otherwise is nil. Maybe we should change the default behavior to always on, and let NPCs opt out of that instead?