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Author Topic: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator  (Read 860 times)

Baqar79

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Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« on: December 07, 2021, 04:20:03 PM »

I'm not sure if It is worth reporting, but it just seemed a little odd that a Paragon build I had would vent prematurely taking a decent amount of Thermal Pulse Canon shots without having any need to do so.

I'm sending the save in question so you can check it out (with the same title).  The Paragon I tested is the only one in the fleet (ISS Agelaus); just run the simulation with the SIM Tonatiuh Onslaught to hopefully see the same odd behaviour I'm seeing (I think you will see this behaviour with other ships, but this one I tested myself to see the odd behaviour).
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Alex

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #1 on: December 07, 2021, 04:49:17 PM »

Thank you for the report, and for the save - I appreciate you taking the time; that makes it so much easier to see what's going on.

In this case, it isn't a bug. The AI is deciding that the incoming TPC fire isn't enough to worry about, given its current armor levels. The venting may not be strictly necessary, but this is the sort of thing where either there'll be a few spots where it takes unnecessary (but also fairly meaningless - in this case, it even wins the fight with 100% hull, though in some situations that would not be the case) damage, or it won't be able to armor-tank at all; this behavior comes with the logic that allows it to do that to the extent that it's able to.
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Baqar79

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #2 on: December 07, 2021, 05:14:53 PM »

Thanks for the feedback and explanation there,

Just out of curiosity; does this behaviour also take into account potential crew losses as well as the current armour and hull?  I normally have blast doors installed, so the hull needs to take a bit of damage even for a fairly big crew on the Paragon, but I'm wondering if without blast doors it would be more particular with taking armour damage.
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Alex

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #3 on: December 07, 2021, 05:34:46 PM »

It does not take that into account, no. All combat stuff is purely tactical considerations, not out-of-combat ones.
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Baqar79

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #4 on: December 15, 2021, 12:17:17 AM »

I just ran into a problem where this behaviour caused the death of my Paragon despite being 100% preventable (I think this is the most I've been frustrated at the AI since I started playing).

I just watched as a Brilliant destroyed my Paragon from full health by this weird behavior where my Paragon would drop the shields to vent flux at ~20% or so (I was 100% health and armor at this point), during this time the Brilliant took the opportunity to fire off their plasma canon while my Paragon AI just sat there thinking about putting up the shields (at near zero flux at this point), finally decides to turn them on; shield slowly wraps around the Paragon (still taking more damage from the Plasma), looking good..and then vents at something like 10% flux, takes more plasma damage thinks about putting up the shields again, finally does, and it repeats in this pattern until death. 

At this point in the battle I was isolated, so only needed to deal with the one Brilliant, which kept itself behind me with it's superior mobility.  This isn't really too much of a problem since the medium mounts on my Paragon are filled with Phase Lances, so I should of been fine if the shields were kept up (even if it was just to wait for more help).

I thought it might take the armor and hull into account with this dangerous behaviour, but it didn't let up until it was destroyed.  I've sent the save, though not being able to generate the exact conditions to cause the behaviour probably isn't all that helpful, but if I can find something more solid, I'll update.
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Alex

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #5 on: December 15, 2021, 01:14:38 PM »

Hmm - I think I might understand what happened here, actually. Though I'm not sure how the Brilliant managed to get and stay behind the Paragon in that case, that seems difficult to manage given that none of those Brilliants have SO.

But, basically: if a larger ship has an enemy ship behind it and can't turn quickly enough to bear on it, it will vent flux in an attempt to get the zero-flux boost - and will stop firing/using shields for a few seconds - so that it can take advantage of its improved mobility to face the attacker. I think that's what might've been happening here?

I can't for the life of me reproduce this behavior vs one of those Brilliants, though (basically, by deploy only the Paragon, then using dev commands to blow up every other enemy ship except for that Brilliant, to get a 1-1). But even when I turn the Paragon around so the Brilliant is behind it, when I turn on autopilot, the Paragon manages to turn to face the Brilliant in fairly short order, well before it has anything one might call a problem.

So, I'm not sure whether this possible diagnosis is correct.
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Baqar79

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #6 on: December 15, 2021, 02:19:07 PM »

Perhaps the brilliant managed to knock out my engines each time?  It was pretty much right up against my Paragon when this behaviour happened. 

I don't think I gave enough information and my memory is like a sieve.  There were still ships on the field (mine and the AI's), so while it appeared that my Paragon was on it's own with this Brilliant, perhaps another ship was off in the distance keeping it's attention?  I just focused on the behaviour since it was so maddening so I probably blinded myself to other things happening at the time that would help. 

Sorry about that (not clarifying that there were still other ships, not just the Paragon & Brilliant).
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Alex

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #7 on: December 15, 2021, 03:52:49 PM »

Thank you for the added info! I'll keep an eye out for this; not sure how much I can, at least in the immediate future, without being able to readily observe this, unfortunately.
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Baqar79

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #8 on: December 15, 2021, 04:33:58 PM »

Yeah, I'm sorry that I added work that didn't give you a solution.  I'll update here if I run into the same problem again (hopefully with some more useful information).  I don't have any video recording software which would of helped immensely when I first started seeing this, rather then going all "Happy Gilmore" at the AI :D
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Alex

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #9 on: December 15, 2021, 04:35:27 PM »

No worries, I genuinely appreciate you letting me know it happened - it's good to be aware of these types of things, thank you!
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TaLaR

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Re: Early venting on AI Paragon against AI Onslaught in simulator
« Reply #10 on: December 15, 2021, 11:10:41 PM »

But Paragon doesn't need to turn to target smaller than a capital. Enough of it's weapons align in a sweetspot exactly behind it. Paragon's weak arcs are actually sides.
« Last Edit: December 15, 2021, 11:12:16 PM by TaLaR »
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