SMAC 444 - AI patch updated [p]

[Nevill]

There were several annoying bugs that were fixed only in SMAX.

Not true.
SMAC was patched to 4.0 version alongside SMAX release and it is relatively bug free (or, should I say, scient made it so).

I'll have to check if these specific bugs persist in scient's patch, but they were not fixed as of SMAC 4.0.

 

[blamzooie]

Go kyrub! Much respect for patching SMAC.

 

[kyrub]

Description: New release of AI patch for SMAC - 17/5/2014

http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?action=downloads;sa=view;down=260

Features

AI Terraforming
- AI got a basic lesson in advanced terraforming (boreholes, condensers, less raising terrain)
- it builds no more bunkers
- it builds denser sensor array network

AI crawlers
- AI now tends to build crawlers earlier and slightly more of them
- AI crawls more intelligently its resources

AI Social Engineering
- the patch includes an emergency fix of the worst parts of social engineering code
- AI now understands that pacifist drones are a major problem

AI buidling units
- AI spreads quicklier on oceans
- Morgan has got new incentive to spread quickly
- AIs build less of probes, bar Miriam
- a lot more AAA defense
- AI now likes rovers and choppers

 

[Cassidy]

Description: New release of AI patch for SMAC - 17/5/2014

http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?action=downloads;sa=view;down=260

Features

AI Terraforming
- AI got a basic lesson in advanced terraforming (boreholes, condensers, less raising terrain)
- it builds no more bunkers
- it builds denser sensor array network

AI crawlers
- AI builds now tends to build crawlers earlier and slightly more of them
- AI crawls more intelligently its resources

AI Social Engineering
- the patch includes an emergency fix of the worst parts of social engineering code
- AI now understands that pacifist drones are a major problem

AI buidling units
- AI spreads quicklier on oceans
- Morgan has got new incentive to spread quickly
- AIs build less of probes, bar Miriam
- a lot more AAA defense
- AI now likes rovers and choppers

Can I safely use a save game using the previous version after updating to this one?

 

[kyrub]

Can I safely use a save game using the previous version after updating to this one?

Yes, you should be able to, with no problems.


A few reactions to the previous version of the patch from elsewhere

Spoiler

Seriously, great work on this patch. Really improves the game. [...]
I actually had to use combined arms, and it was only a joint force of Hovertanks, Needlejets, Copters, Infantry, and Cruisers that won the day.

And another:

Sparta is not the best faction for huge maps, but even taking all that into account, I was still pleasantly surprised by what the AI is able to do. Usually playing a lazy game still nets me most Projects (I do use crawlers), this time I managed to grab only PTS and MCC. I've just came first with pop after a short boom and got elected, but still lagging tech-wise behind Morgan, who can be a real powerhouse with his regular Demo/FM/(either Knowledge or Wealth).

Also, anybody who wants to discuss in-depth the changes, it is being done in this thread on the AC2 forums.
Let's enjoy this great game!

 

[DakaSha]

Kyrub the only problem I see with your patch (I'm not really sure if it was a vanilla problem), is that the AI doesnt defend their cities worth a shit. 1, 2 and at the very most 4 units per city (Which isnt horrible but its reserved for capitals etc). Some with no defense at all.

I did a lot of testing by letting the AI duke it out on their own for about 200+ turns, and it seems to be a problem every game.

I havent tested this newest version, but unless the AI builds more units based on a better economy, I doubt it would change much

edit: And I have no idea how I missed the part about buying less probes. Maybe that will have an effect. Testing now

edit2: seemed a bit better after running about 3 games. Capitals were sometimes fully stocked. Still, it seemed like the cities were way to weak, in some cases being garrisoned by a single 1-1-1 scout unit at year 2300.

Not really sure whether you are even able to change this

 

[kyrub]

Dakasha, this is very valuable info for me. I had a few people making remarks about it, but nobody was this concrete. That is surely unwanted.

That must be some problem with the patch. I am not aware about its origin at all. To me it seems, this should be a bug, rather than anything I did intentionally.
Another interesting question would be: what did the AI build at the time of (having no garrison). If it is formers or colony pod, it may be caused directly by the patch. If it is a building, for instance, that would be most strange.

I havent tested this newest version, but unless the AI builds more units based on a better economy, I doubt it would change much

Can you tell me in which version exactly did you notice the problem? Again, that could help me a lot to locate the problem.

 

[DakaSha]

Dakasha, this is very valuable info for me. I had a few people making remarks about it, but nobody was this concrete. That is surely unwanted.

That must be some problem with the patch. I am not aware about its origin at all. To me it seems, this should be a bug, rather than anything I did intentionally.
Another interesting question would be: what did the AI build at the time of (having no garrison). If it is formers or colony pod, it may be caused directly by the patch. If it is a building, for instance, that would be most strange.

I havent tested this newest version, but unless the AI builds more units based on a better economy, I doubt it would change much

Can you tell me in which version exactly did you notice the problem? Again, that could help me a lot to locate the problem.

I noticed it about 3 or 4 patches ago, but can not say that it originated at that time. It has persisted up until this last patch (although, as said, it seems a tad bit better. Maybe). I can't say exactly what the AI was building in place of defense (yet) but I can let you in on how to test this stuff incredibly quickly. You probably already know, but just in case:

Start a new game, open the scenario editor, delete your faction, close the scenario editor. Hold down enter. 200 turns should pass in under 20 seconds. Open the editor at any time to see what the AI has been doing.

I will of course do some more testing when I have time and let you know what I find.

 

[kyrub]

Thanks, Dakasha. I know the quick "testing", use it all the time.
I thought about the problem and there are 2 places that could cause it:
- I tried to strengthen the rover chassis creation, but since all defenders are infantry, it must have downgraded their production.
- I tried to avoid the "too many supported units per base" situation, by making small bases a bit more reluctant to build more units. Again, especially in the case of small bases or bases low on minerals (like ocean one), this must have been negative when creating defensive cover.

The worst possibility is a bug that I introduced somehow, hopefully, that is not the case, since it is the hardest thing to find own bugs.

 

[DakaSha]

Thanks, Dakasha. I know the quick "testing", use it all the time.
I thought about the problem and there are 2 places that could cause it:
- I tried to strengthen the rover chassis creation, but since all defenders are infantry, it must have downgraded their production.
- I tried to avoid the "too many supported units per base" situation, by making small bases a bit more reluctant to build more units. Again, especially in the case of small bases or bases low on minerals (like ocean one), this must have been negative when creating defensive cover.

The worst possibility is a bug that I introduced somehow, hopefully, that is not the case, since it is the hardest thing to find own bugs.

The two possibilities you listed actually sound really plausible, judging by what I was seeing. Small bases (and especially water bases) were the worst offenders by far, and often when bases had defense it was either some kind of rover, or in some cases formers and transports.

It should also be noted that the AI has lots and lots of units. Its just that they are wandering around instead of defending. This is actually a good thing, as it makes to harder to even get to the bases in the first place, and makes pillaging much harder. The thing is that the ai is doing this early game which makes rushing much easier (As the ai will not have enough units to defend their whole territory, making it easy to slip past and take a base guarded by a single unit)

I think most people turtle and research in these game so it may not be noticed. But if you try to rush the ai you will see that its early game is really really bad at defense

 

[Shadenuat]

Why do I capture bases late game and AI still did not build recycling tanks or other important stuff (no children creches, wat)? They just blob like hell. I hoped they'll learn to grow vertically too.
My god, does Deirdre blob. I think AI fix turned her into a monster. Even Miriam got eaten. All those 20 sized cities everywhere, EVERYWHERE--

And it's impossible to take them, all stuffed with AA trans armored infantry (at least important ones). Help me--

 

[non]

I've barely played SMAC at all before, which intend to do something about now. From a glance, it seems Kyrubs patch is a huge improvement. I should use this immediately right? No need to start with vanilla patches only or something?

What about those AI bugs(?) that DakaSha found. Is that something I should worry about? Or is it just a minor thing for an otherwise totally awesome set of improvements?

 

[DakaSha]

Only play with kyrubs patch and dont worry about the 'bugs'. They AI is still better with the patch

 

[non]

Only play with kyrubs patch and dont worry about the 'bugs'. They AI is still better with the patch

Cool thanks!

 

[CootKeeper]

kyrub , could you make the patch compliable with SMACX or is it too much asking? I'm used to mix and match factions from the expansion, and there are a couple things I like from the expansion too (I don't think it's all rubbish like the others).

 

[Johannes]

How's the AI decide whether to build navy/transports? I played a game as Morgan, a small map with the lowest setting of water and low erosion - in order to get everything more or less on one continent which happened, a kinda snaky shape continent. But when I'm on one side of the main continent and most AI's have a very short (1 turn travel) distance across the water to get to me (but very long land travel distance), I'm with war with everyone except my only real close land neighbor Miriam. But the hostile AIs mostly don't do anything, but just move fucking huge stacks of units they've built on their side of the shore, kinda back and forth between tiles, with absolutely zero navy in action most of the time that'd help them reach me. Which lets me get an easy lead as I just build away with a very minimal army while the AI's can eventually do hardly anything with all the weight given by their huge armies maintenance.

I'm guessing it looks at the map, sees it has a very low water % of the surface, and takes that as a sign that navy is not to be built?

 

[hoverdog]

halp

I've reinstalled SMAC recently. However, the game has completely fucked up colors every time I open it. I tried the solution written on GOG forums: disabling opening movie, running it in 256 colors and forcing directdraw=0 in the config file. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. Any other solutions?

 

[Shadenuat]

Wanted to play a relaxed building game, chosen Morganites and some medium difficulty, standard Map of the Planet. Got a whole middle continent all for myself, Lal on north, Believers&Spartans east, Yang south. Deirdre got eaten in first turns by Yang.

Was playing all nice, got a pact with Lal and was slowly taking Believers bases using marines, when suddenly Yang shows up. I stare for a minute on a screen as he moves his 120 shard penetrators. "Well," I think, "I have like, a bunch of infantry, rovers, aa troops and jets in my every base. I can handle that".
All my garrisons get destroyed, Yang uses drop units in a turn STEEL REHNN and a few get taken instantly.
"Well shit" I think and reload.
Try to find out why I am so shitty at playing Morganites even on noob difficulty and with continent all for myself.
One guide says you have to run Police State for them (and Green+Wealth). Corporations lol.

So I fixed my 2 most important mistakes:
1) Switched to Police State. Got truce with Yang. Lal slowly started to hate me. Miriam too.
So now I casually take 1-2 of their bases, they ask for peace, we have peace, they backstab me then instantly. I take 1-2 bases again, they ask peace, backstab me again... and they also fight each other.
And yeah Miriam do loves them planet busters with patch.
Yang asks bribes all the time.
2) My main mistake was that I had 4 times less units that Yang. So I fixed that. Now we both have ~200 troops.
I also started to place my bases tighter. Made place for ~5 more bases.

But my morale is still total shit. In the beginning I managed to take bases with infantry but now Lal builds tachyon fields and such. I lead in science and gain hundreds of energy per turn. I just upgraded my banal sam troops to Chaos/Neutronium AAA for 2700 credits. Cause why not. It's not that my troops can win any other way and I don't have enything else to spend money on.
I have to rely on worms because I can't take bases any other way. I was able to in the beginning but now my Shard troops can't take some outdated enemy infantry behind Tachyon fields. And I have command nexus and cyborg factory.
Gaians are a lot better at worms. I lack +50% psi attack wonder. So I just spam spam spam clean reactor troops everywhere to be as good as Yang. I ran out of things to build so I spam +energy satellites. And to wage wars I just buy +worms buildings and worms every turn and then buy tachyon fields and clean armored units in conquered bases.
I have dozen clean elite formers with neutronium armor just chilling around. I am to lazy to exchange them for something else. I wish I could put shard missiles on them too.
Obviously I just buy all wonders that come around.

So that's Morgan for you. That Police State really helped me with drones and support to actually invest my money in something.

edit. won game - bought AtT
Fucked Lal with blink tanks and drop troops. Yang tried to talk to me all the time but got interrupted by some bug. Oh well.
I think I won a SMAC game with Morgan for the first time lol.

 

[Shadenuat]

Played a game with Santiago on one of the higher difficulties (not Transcendent yet though), medium random map. At first I had good advantage because of my tight building and exploration, but eventually I lost to builder factions (Deirdre) who out-teched me greatly (sungularity jets with 24 cannons and drop infantry... tech stagnation, right). Deirdre out-teched everyone and started building AtT, and when she saw me building it too - stomped me. Here I thought I'd be able to play hybrid/exploration Sparta because of their great Police and Support options, but then I started having trouble with cash. So I re-loaded and fixed my mistakes:
- Priority on Conquer in tech forever
- Rover rush on anyone who seems to be gathering advantage on me. Deirdre was the first choice.

I got pact with Zak, he gave me jets, I forced Deirdre to surrender. Then got pact with Morgan if I destroy Miriam so I rushed poor girl, and then finished 2 Hive bases - Miriam did most of the job for me. Lal landed at Monoliths, fungus everywhere, struggled to get his bases bigger than 7-8, so I made him surrender with ease.
Thought I'm ok and winning this, Zak backstabs me in league with Morgan. At first I was a bit careful with Zak, he had tech advantage and took one of my bases, but turned out that was it - chronical researcher did not have an actual good standing army, just a bunch of kewl high tech artillery, few planes. Morgan had good defensive standing army, but not good enough, so after Zak I captured his headquarters that were on a coast almost unprotected (???), then tank-rushed him.

In the beginning of the game AI does not prioritize units and base defences well enough. Later when AI gets jets, at that nasty point when everyone has plasma armor but 10-strength guns, it becomes a chore to win. Nobody can win anyone. And later AI really loves rapid jet rushes with drop infantry. Deirdre even built a planet buster. Wtf.
Still no copters though. Never seen AI use a copter even once.
Tanks become very important late in game, when AI stacks his bases with AA units and trance units. Thankfully Command Nexus+Spartans means you always have an option to rush enemy with infantry or tanks. Noone is going to stop you.

Some general observations
On smaller map if Yang lands near Miriam, he has a good chance to be totally pressed into a corner, but Miriam with her tech stagnation will fall if there's anyone else around.
The tech penalty of Believers is harder than I remember it. Miriam lands are always weak and underdeveloped.
Builders with patch became a lot stronger, but they still rely on solitude too much. They also don't build enough units. Morgan landed on a jungle in that game, developed all his bases way above 10, yet had an army that was weaker than he could have had.

Overall game became more random. Factions I never seen before after midgame can become fairly powerful. But it still depends a lot on geography.
My next game would probably be with Deirdre on Thinker with another random map. Gotta try all out from that fungusfood blobbing like AI does

 

[laclongquan]

Location, location LOCATION!

Sing it!

 

[Shadenuat]

Man I suck at playing my favorite faction (Deirdre, standard map, Thinker). I blobbed and tried police state/green/knowledge. I ate morgan and then struggled with Santiago who was on same continent and rolled into my territory demanding doritos. Worm-rushing didn't work that well so I felt back on cheap eco terrorists (best gun naked infantry) and probes to remove perimeter defences. When I made Santiago surrender I got Miriam fanatics going through little piece of land between 2 continents trying to destroy me (yes she ate Yang again and now she was powerful as hell). We fought for many turns until she demanded truce and... and she instantly traded me all her best tech (plasma shards) for some of my outdated tech (???).
I only managed to stop Miriam because of Command Nexus + Pholus Mutagen. Fungus roads are very stronk.
Running Knowledge without Hunter-Seeker is so bad, Miriam once chewed through 3 of my probe teams and still stole my tech. Bitch.

Meanwhile Lal basically became superpower, he ate Zak, and was waiting to backstab me. Game ended with me trying to figure out how not to die to both of them and then with bunch of corrupted saves.

Gotta try again, but man that worm advantage just ain't cutting it even at midgame...
Also fucking drones. I never had so many drones as when playing Deirdre. When I played Morgan my bases just were not that large, and with Santiago I could use 4 police units. I hate when I need to build recreational commons everywhere.

 

[Wizfall]

I find the game much more difficult now.
I always play with the same setting : iron man, random large map, few ocean and tech stagnation (with an ini edit to slow tech progress even more for a final tech progression total of 35% of normal)
Before on transcendent level if my starting point is good i was usually able to win.
Now i got my ass kicked if i don't start in a good spot and even if i do there are always one faction vastly more powerful than mine (and usually another of the same level).

 

[Irenaeus]

This patch sounds just like what I was looking for. Time to install SMAC again and give this baby a try!

 

[Shadenuat]

AI still can't use crawlers well. And spamming armored tractors gives you a lot of time because they add up to your military score.
And yeah even with tech stagnation, even on a medium map, military campaign ends with high end weaponry, copters and hovertanks for me, always.

Today I won a Deirdre game on Thinker. On turn 2 I meet Morgan and he instantly goes vendetta on me. So I ate him with worms. Then I quickly harassed Miriam off my island. Then I got pact with Zak and we were building stuff while Santiago was kicking Hive on another landmass. She killed Yang and became as strong as me, but she did not touch me until I got either air power or some space tech, after that she asked that as bribe, I denied, and a military campaign began. I captured some with marines, then raised small landbridge and unleashed mighty Gaian's industrial power on her, but only started to win when I built only commando units with upgrades.
The bitch constantly was bribing my units and her own captured bases away from me. But I managed to make her surrender eventually.

Then Miriam from little island showed back with jets and impact rovers I made 2 armored transports and went all D day on her with elite infantry and rovers who just destroyed spartans. Crazy fanatic didn't last more than 5 turns.

so tl;dr
1. kill all AI opponents near your land while they are weak cause they don't protect their cities well
2. instead combat units spam armored crawlers, harvest forests
3. blob blob blob until there is only sea around you and no AI in sight
3.???
4. profit

 

[Wizfall]

Finally beat the game (setting : iron man, random large map, few ocean and tech stagnation with an ini edit to slow tech progress even more) playing Morgan.
So :
1. start in a good spot (awesome is not required)
2.blob like a retard, zero army. You should almost always secure enough land to develop.
3.act like a coward and gave everything the others ask even if it hurts (you will catch on them latter...hopefully)
4.help massively and early enough to be helpful any faction that begin to have a disadvantage by giving tech in order not to create a rival superpower faction
5.spam borehole as much as you can with supply crawler units.
6.prey everything work, that nobody attack you and not a truly superpower faction has been created meanwhile
6.win by tech/monopoly

Edit : tech progression is still way too fast toward the middle end (the last third of the game) despite my setting hugely lowering it. However decreasing it even more will make the 1/3 of the game way too slow (it's already borderline right now).
Any way to change the rate of tech progression in order to slow it in the last third without making it a crawl at the beginning ?