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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

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Author Topic: the #1 reason I don't play this game  (Read 17787 times)

Deshara

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the #1 reason I don't play this game
« on: May 31, 2021, 11:32:26 PM »

is that your fleet's AI is unplayably timid. Anyone else notice this? I have a fleet entirely of reckless & aggressive officers & I can't get them to engage an enemy fleet in a fair fight. It's coming up in basically every combat encounter that I have that I have to manually order my fleet to engage every enemy 1 at a time, which Alex has specifically made (with the command points mechanic) not doable.
Heres a quick screenshot of what im talking about.
https://imgur.com/a/bBAVrrE

1 vigilance with a tac laser is keeping 1 cruiser with an ion & kinetic beam and 2 tac lasers & missiles and 1 destroyer with dual heavy burst lasers & missiles at bay at 2k range. Notice that neither ship is moving towards an enemy??? One of them has a reckless officer, the other aggressive. Yes, I'm using mods, but Im p sure none of them affect the AI, and I get the same problem in vanilla. This is an evenly matched battle in theory bc its 1 cruiser & 1 destroyer plus frigates vs 1 cruiser & 1 destroyer plus frigates, but in actual practice its 3 frigates vs ^ bc more than half of my fleet (if u count a destroyer as 2 frigates & a cruiser as 3) is being knocked out of the fight by the friendly AI just being borked & refusing to fight anyone for no discernible reason.
or, later, having manually cleared out all of the enemy's fleet & having nothing but an enemy cruiser with 4 tac lasers left, I order my entire fleet to eliminate the cruiser and this is what they do
https://imgur.com/a/oBXBHoy
nobody's doing any damage, or taking any (except for my flagship), nobody's advancing. It might look like they are trying to catch up to the enemy but just before I took that screen all of my ships were nearly in range at 1k and just backed away from the cruiser to 2k range with 0 flux. My flagship is literally running out of CR & about to start breaking down LITERALLY WAITING FOR MY FLEET TO SHOOT AT HIM
In fact! (I tried to take a screenshot before exiting the game to reload a save to try this fight again which I've been doing on repeat for at least the last 2 hours but it didnt fire this time so I didnt get it), since that last screen shot where my flagship is at 40% CR & waiting for my cruiser destroyer & brawler to engage the enemy cruiser, I literally hit 0% CR while waiting & my 7 hammers went unused bc my reckless brawler sat at 2k range & just watched me literally age to death. Its absurd

Every battle is like this.

My first non-frigate battle this release (before I modded) was joining an ally fleet defending against a tritach drone swarm fleet of an Astral & a couple of shepards. I had my HVD brawler & my heavy torpedo drover flagship go after the enemy Astral, if I tanked for my brawler until it cracked the Astral's shield I could hammer it into dust, and then once it was nuked the rest of the battle would be a cake-walk & I spent like a solid 5 hours trying to get my brawler to shoot the Astral. I can force it to get near range of the Astral by making it escort me, but at basically no point was I able to get it to fire at the Astral more than once before the Brawler flipped around & presented its unshielded backside to the Astral to destroy.
Even when the Astral's wasps (which are such little of a threat + so incapable of the Brawler to deal with anyway that it shouldn't even be acknowledging them if there are either enemy or ally ships nearby) were elsewhere bc they were focused my ally fleet, the Brawler refused to shoot at it and would just sit inside the range of the Astral's guns until it or I died having done 0 shield damage to it.

I don't get it. The game definitely didn't have this problem back in 0.6. Back then I tested the AI heavily at the time bc I was impressed with it & remember noting explicitly that the battle AI was more or less point-perfect in how it handled battles, how when outmatched the AI would do its best to get in what it could get in before dying & give its allies a shot at taking down their opponent (I spent literally hours testing an enemy lasher against varying fleet comps to test the AI).
Now my fleet REFUSES to fight -- even literally a reckless cruiser and an aggressive destroyer will not engage a vigilance.

I get that the reason its been changed to be this way since the procgen was added to the game was to allow AI fleets to last longer while traveling around the overworld, give them more self-preservation instinct, bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbuuut, it seems to be to such an extent that its making the game nearly unplayable for me bc MY ai does not respect what battles I want to fight. It feels like, there's no point in giving me a choice what battles to engage or not engage in bc my fleet AI is going to decide for me whether the battle will be possible or not. Might as well just have the game select battles on my behalf, not even waste my time asking me. It feels like I'm the second in command in my own fleet. If they did this in an IRL military they'd get a pistol bullet to the back of the head for dereliction of duty.

I just don't find my #1 enemy in every engagement being my own reckless officers refusing to engage unless I manually order eliminate on every enemy one at a time until I run out of command points then watching my ships die from CR loss as they refuse to engage while I wait for a point to replenish to be fun. At this point I don't know that I'm gonna reinstall for 1.0, bc the game that I love died after 0.7

edit: and yeah, just double checked, no mods that change the AI. https://imgur.com/a/0F9yXfE
« Last Edit: May 31, 2021, 11:36:07 PM by Deshara »
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I cant be blamed for what I said 5 minutes ago. I was a different person back then

Histidine

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #1 on: June 01, 2021, 12:03:14 AM »

Post the save before the battle, if you still have it. (Both for Alex to have an easy repro case, and because I want to try this battle myself out of idle curiosity)

(If the issue turns out to be that the AI breaks if it doesn't have any hard flux sources, I will be simultaneously annoyed and amused)
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ElPresidente

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #2 on: June 01, 2021, 12:37:57 AM »

I second the Command Point annoyance.

You can't even order your low CR ship to retreat without CP, and in large battle you can have several ships get below 30 at the same time. And you have to order them to retreat INDIVIDUALLY! You cannot just select 5 ships with low CP and hit retreat - no, you have to spend 5 command points!

This is garbage!
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Histidine

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #3 on: June 01, 2021, 01:59:14 AM »

You can't even order your low CR ship to retreat without CP, and in large battle you can have several ships get below 30 at the same time. And you have to order them to retreat INDIVIDUALLY! You cannot just select 5 ships with low CP and hit retreat - no, you have to spend 5 command points!
You can retreat any number of ships for just one CP, additional retreats don't cost any points as long as you haven't closed the map and the "command frequency open" bar in the top-right hasn't run out. (IIRC this also works with assigning multiple ships to a single order)

Although this doesn't help if a bunch of ships need to retreat at different times, and it's annoying having to spend a CP again if you forgot to issue an order before closing the map.
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Deshara

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #4 on: June 01, 2021, 02:06:32 AM »

Post the save before the battle, if you still have it. (Both for Alex to have an easy repro case, and because I want to try this battle myself out of idle curiosity)

(If the issue turns out to be that the AI breaks if it doesn't have any hard flux sources, I will be simultaneously annoyed and amused)

i dont have it -- autosave ate it, but I'm having the exact same issue with an ambush on a mercantile convoy thats passing by. Just turn off sustained burn & head to the nearby jump point & attack it when it comes to u & you'll see. I've compressed my save file & mods to a 7zip, & just double checked in the game that thats the right save. Now I just have to figure out how to get it onto your hard drive, as this site wont let me upload it (too big) & any file sharing site that doesn't want my social security card is giving me an error. Media fire is working but it's ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssslow, so Im gonna leave it uploading & go to bed. Its at 10% rn, just gonna drop the link now https://www.mediafire.com/file/3vlygjsmghowj0p/test_save.7z/file

On a whim, I took ur advice & not only did I put high scatter amp on all my beam ships but also stripped their missiles (& eccm), and while taking the salamanders off of my brawler turned it into a steely-eyed murderer that hard-burned into the face of the nearest enemy and then held the trigger down until he or they were dead (as he should), the cruiser paired off with a lone Mule & sat in its mauler range outside of its own gun range & ate shells until it was half-dead & the destroyer did the same thing with a hound.
Which doesnt surprise me. As I said in my OP, I had the same issue when I was being wingman'd by a brawler with HVD's, and I had the same issue in 8.0 year(s?) ago when I wasnt trying to run high tech like I am now
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Snrasha

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #5 on: June 01, 2021, 02:09:53 AM »

Weird, because for my part, the AI work properly. A aggressive or reckless will never go 1 v 10, this is logic. But often i got some reckless ship which go very far of the battle for take 5/6 ships with him for than my battle is more easy.
Depends often of the ship too. A ship with low range weapon and a shipsystem for engage will be more aggressive but never if the ennemi got thunder wing and some rocket.
And i do not talk about fearless AI, they are very aggressive and ignore the danger.

Maybe Starsector lack of a wiki which explain what do each AI and what they will really do for some case. My Reckless Tempest will always focus on easy target or attack capital when i attack on the other side. Maybe they work less if you do not play with them. (Also i never give orders to them except when the battle is near the end and i need some focus)

I play Vanilla.


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I am pretty bad on english. So, sorry in advance.

Gladiator Society
Add battle options on Com Relay/ Framework for modders for add their own bounty.

Sanguinary Autonomist Defectors A fan-mod of Shadowyard.

Drazan

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #6 on: June 01, 2021, 02:10:24 AM »

I secound what is in the post about the AI. They always too timid during fleet battles, and you really dont have enough CP to manually order eliminate for every enemy ship.
In the case of station fights its the opposite every one of them, even frigates, decide that they can 1v1 a module so they get up to its face, literraly, even my dominators with hellbore cannons get up to 0 range thus blocking eachother and getting into danger, instead of firing from a safer distance.
Please please change the AI, or give more direct control to the player and more CP.
Or if none of these is possible at least incorporate a more advanced tutorial that tells you in depht about commands and what they do, how to use them.
« Last Edit: June 01, 2021, 02:16:07 AM by Drazan »
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michail

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #7 on: June 01, 2021, 04:03:54 AM »

This might be just a bias on my part, because I've played much more in this update than the previous and have simply seen more battles, but the AI does seem too conservative at times (I swear I've never yelled "Move you worthless cowards" at my fleet, nonono). It's somewhat consistent, the latest episode I remember was a dozen of my frigates with a few destroyers pursuing a cruiser with virtually no escort by maintaining a perfect semicircle of 1000+ radius around it. The only way to convince them that we do indeed outnumber and outgun the enemy was soloing the thing by yolo driving into it on my enforcer and unloading remaining reapers into its face. THEN they finally decided to attack and mopped up the remaining 3 frigates or so.

OTOH, the AI can also be actively suicidal on occasion and attempt to ram a station.
« Last Edit: June 01, 2021, 04:17:15 AM by michail »
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Megas

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #8 on: June 01, 2021, 04:20:25 AM »

Ah, the cowardly AI that has scourged the game since 0.8a.  While the OP references the player side, having the enemy kite until heat death is annoying too.

Make AI macho (like in pre-0.8a releases) again!
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Linnis

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #9 on: June 01, 2021, 04:33:51 AM »

Yes, they are more timid then before, but I have yet to come into one situation where I felt my ships were too timid outside of destroyers not wanting to fight Ventures, even then in that case its understandable because its classified as Cruiser. Overall the AI aggressiveness really is more focused on opportunistic behaviors.

In you case in the second screen shot, I bet you that ship your fighting is moving away from the rest of your fleet at 75su/s right? Add on top of its current zero hard flux. Then add on top that its back is not facing your AI ships. All those together means that your allies with make an cautious approach but not being able to engage because of the cruiser's kiting behaviour.

In this case you should use your head instead of your anger.

The best Strat that always works is to make your own ship's hard flux high to bait the enemy AI in trying to get killing blows on you. This works even in late game against much harder targets like redacted battleships.

The second way is to try to flank them so that their engine faces your teammates. When flanked, the AI really poops out trying to kite. And sometimes spin in circles being indecisive and ultimately taking hull damage even when no where near high flux. 1 phase/teleport frigate and 2 destroyers can kill an redacted battleship this way easily.

The 4th way is to have all your ships sit still, usually escort command is best. Then when the enemy gets far enough with zero flux they will turn to approach you, you fly PAST the enemy and and their inability to change their direction fast enough will force a fight with your ships on escort. Then you can cancel the order and your opportunistic allies will go ham on the enemy.


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In your first case its simple because your ships don't want to engage into escort formations. Try putting your own ships into escort formations as well and you will see them grow some balls as well.

Overall I like the AI now much better than before. Yes, they are more cautious now, but their behaviors are now more controllable. To me that's an overall improvement.




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Drazan

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #10 on: June 01, 2021, 05:10:11 AM »

In this case you should use your head instead of your anger.

The best Strat that always works is...

I really really had enough with this kind of comments. NO. JUST. NO. It is so infuriating seeing people trying to justify the unreasonable behavior of the AI. And its even more infuriating that they are trying to blame the player for it. That they just dont play "right", they "jUsT neEd tO UsE a BeTtEr sTrAt". NO. It should not be the players job to play according to specific rules, just to make the AI usefull, this is madness.
Stop pretending that the AI is flawless. It is not. This is an in development game. Things needs to be changed, and the most frquent complains is about the AI. It does stupid things We all know that the are reasons for that, but it needs to be changed regardless. There are countless examples of it. Is it timid? Yes, you agreed on it yourself. Does it have to be? NO. The AI should act reasonably regardless of player input! (and if this is impossible then give full contorl to the player, like in an RTS)

Quote
Yes, they are more cautious now, but their behaviors are now more controllable.

The second half of this statement is just a blatant lie. I never found it harder to make my ships obey my orders, and there are many many complains about the same thing all over the forum and on discord. Ships nowadays even disregard eliminate orders, and usually simply let enemy take control points.
Does it makes it better for you to pretend that everything is perfect, and give condescending replies to those who point out the problems?
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Grievous69

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #11 on: June 01, 2021, 05:28:15 AM »

I mean the flipside of this is AI taking risks and going in and then you'd get this exact same thread but with the opposite problem. I don't play this game because the AI is suicidal and keeps rushing in for no reason, somebody will always complain no matter what's the AI's "usual behaviour". I agree that passive AI is boring and annoying to fight against but it's even more annoying to lose half of your fleet because AI misjudged a scenario or two.

Before anyone says "hey can't we just have a middle ground?", I assure you that it's impossible to achieve that in a game which has sooooo many different factors in combat. One fight the AI plays like a coward, the other it's going nuts. Trying to "fix" this by making the AI just overall more aggressive won't really solve anything.

And btw you can set the default ship personality under doctrine settings, so your whole fleet can be aggressive or reckless if you want (apart from ships which have officers of course). Lots of people miss this so it's worth mentioning.
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Megas

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #12 on: June 01, 2021, 05:40:22 AM »

... and usually simply let enemy take control points.
Yes.  I can tell my whole fleet to defend a single point, and they let the enemy fleet steal it.  My fleet is incapable of defending a point when it matters.  Makes the whole bonus DP when capturing points a farce.  It is a farce because in non-trivial fights that cannot be steamrolled, the enemy will steal those points and hold them for the remainder of the fight.  There is only a small window when player will be at 60% map size, then will be sent back down to 40%.  Makes reinforcements impossible.

Any fight when player can hold the points is easy enough that victory has been a foregone conclusion, and the only challenge is whether the fight is a flawless victory or if player loses enough ships (perhaps a single big ship) due to AI stupidity to eat all of the bounty reward and then some.
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Drazan

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #13 on: June 01, 2021, 06:00:02 AM »

Before anyone says "hey can't we just have a middle ground?", I assure you that it's impossible to achieve that in a game which has sooooo many different factors in combat. One fight the AI plays like a coward, the other it's going nuts. Trying to "fix" this by making the AI just overall more aggressive won't really solve anything.

There can definitely be a middle ground. It is again what i mentioned that you try to make it look like that its already perfect and cannot be improved. It can be.
Also, no one wants generally more agressive AI. People want AI that knows when it is safe to attack and when it is not safe. This is of course again not a binary scale. What we have now is that ships refuse to attack a frigate and take a controll point, but they feel like it is good idea to ram a station.
Please dont ever tell that this is normal and can not be any better.
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Grievous69

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Re: the #1 reason I don't play this game
« Reply #14 on: June 01, 2021, 06:04:31 AM »

Why is anyone even arguing about station combat? Like what is AI supposed to do, kite the station which has 3x the range? No, the only option is to go in and shot all at once. If AI didn't do this you'd need 20 minutes to destroy a single orbital station.

Also I'm definitely not saying it can't be improved, I'm saying I don't see a way of improving it without causing another problem instead. You know, one step forward but another back, hello square one.
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