AI Improvements?

[=FI=Nellip42]

Having not flown offline for some time, having read about the AI improvements, and having an hour of free time available, I started a new career.  An IL2 pilot on the Kuban map.  I decided to fly as a Junior Lieutenant - let someone else navigate to target ?

 

Took off as number 4 in my flight, and proceeded to watch my flight leader and 2 other flight buddies fly in to the side of a hill less than 5 minutes after take off.  Not terribly impressed with that aspect of the AI behaviour.  Did manage to find the target, hit it, and return to base, minus my rudder and half my elevator, and enjoyed it, but the AI is still a work in progress!

[jollyjack]

Yeah, we need in the air repair, a flying AA, or ADAC if you're on Gerry stuff ...

[FTC_ChilliBalls]

Just AI pilots who are able to hold a course and not crash en route would be nice for a change.

Also, I´d really like some more interesting manoeuvers than a mild turn

[Goffik]

4 minutes ago, So_ein_Feuerball said:

Just AI pilots who are able to hold a course and not crash en route would be nice for a change.

Also, I´d really like some more interesting manoeuvers than a mild turn

 

I often wonder if I'm playing a completely different game when people post things like this. While the AI is certainly far from perfect, I have yet to see planes just fall out of the sky en route to a target, and even rookie AI does a lot more than "mild turns" when I start shooting at them.

 

Exaggerating to try and make a point just looks stupid, to be honest.

[Jade_Monkey]

Ai improvements (especially in dogfighting) are coming in the next patch based on the DD.

 

I have not seen them crash into a hill in a long time, the most recent quirk i can remember was some ai crashing into the ground when diving.

 

Yes, it's a work in progress but it's been making huge strides, and i hope to see even more.

[Taxman]

Are you talking about BOX or Il2 1946?  In Il2 1946 there has been a bug where planes do crash into hills after take off, best way to avoid that is to be the flight leader and fly over the hills with enough altitude that you easily clear and your flight will follow.

[dburne]

2 hours ago, Jade_Monkey said:

Ai improvements (especially in dogfighting) are coming in the next patch based on the DD.

 

I have not seen them crash into a hill in a long time, the most recent quirk i can remember was some ai crashing into the ground when diving.

 

Yes, it's a work in progress but it's been making huge strides, and i hope to see even more.

 

Yes this has been my experience as well. AI crashing into the hill or ground at this point I would consider a very rare occurrence.

[LukeFF]

3 hours ago, So_ein_Feuerball said:

Also, I´d really like some more interesting manoeuvers than a mild turn

 

There already are.

[40plus]

This thread appears to be out of phase with AI improvements. Was it posted in 2018 and stuck in the iternet-tubes only to come out now?

 

It's been a long while since I've experienced AI that daft.

[Avimimus]

3 hours ago, LukeFF said:

There already are.

 

True... they do tend to fall into it still sometimes and don't break when under attack... but I do wonder if that sometimes happened historically.

 

At least it is significantly improved over the old days... and for that I'm grateful... same thing with the crashing behaviours (I could trick a dozen fighters into crashing in RoF without having to fire a shot)! There is still a way to go.

 

IMHO, the ideal thing would be to have a modular AI: One which picked different maneuvers picked after assessing the skill level, relative performance of the opponent, current height, and the year of the war.

 

Such a modular design might be easier to debug and would allow more diverse behaviours to be tested and added gradually (without them interacting with all of the other behaviours). It'd also allow some randomisation of the choices made (i.e. the AI wouldn't always pick the same choices).

 

Finally, It'd create the possibility of modelling AI skill levels differently: Less skilled AI would be picking worse choices for their maneuvers (relative to their opponent's strengths). Currently AI skill level is too reliant on spotting, marksmanship, and ability to pull high AOA (which is a fairly limited set of variables to play with and tends to lead to utter incompetence or excessive robotic skill).

[Lusekofte]

I fly scripted campaigns at the moment. 
over looking some minor stuff I find ai to be pretty disiplined and behave like a pilot under orders and purpose. 
A refreshing break from point collecting vulchers on mp servers. 
Yes I would like a more expensive ai. Higher budget on engine complexity. And I personally are willing to pay for it. 
But reading complains on prices for packs I doubt there are many. 
In my country we do not expect quality to come cheap, this game proven that wrong. But it come at a price, like patience. We simply have to wait if not willing to pay 

[Gretsch_Man]

13 hours ago, Jade_Monkey said:

the most recent quirk i can remember was some ai crashing into the ground when diving.

That chap most likely did that because he either passed out before the dive or will trying to get out of the dive. I wouldn't call that a quirk.

 

Oh, and I haven't seen any AI pilots flying into hills. I have been flying many career missions on the southern part of the BoBP map which is very hilly (and beautiful) country. Many of these missions were fighter bomber intercept missions, were the whole flight is staying very low (max. 500m). The AI pilots have no problems flying these missions.

[dburne]

46 minutes ago, Gretsch_Man said:

That chap most likely did that because he either passed out before the dive or will trying to get out of the dive. I wouldn't call that a quirk.

 

Oh, and I haven't seen any AI pilots flying into hills. I have been flying many career missions on the southern part of the BoBP map which is very hilly (and beautiful) country. Many of these missions were fighter bomber intercept missions, were the whole flight is staying very low (max. 500m). The AI pilots have no problems flying these missions.

 

That has been my experience as well.

[=FI=Nellip42]

11 hours ago, pfrances said:

This thread appears to be out of phase with AI improvements. Was it posted in 2018 and stuck in the iternet-tubes only to come out now?

 

It's been a long while since I've experienced AI that daft.

Definitely not, I posted yesterday.

 

Just to add insult to injury, I flew a second career mission on the same map, later yesterday.  Almost the identical thing happened.  Flight of 4 IL2’s, and this time 2 of them flew into the ground when circling waiting for escorts to arrive.  The escorts never did turn up, perhaps they were also intercepted by the terrain ?

 

Maybe I am just unlucky, or perhaps it is a feature of this part of the Kuban map.  I will see what results I get flying from a different field.

[sniperton]

14 hours ago, Goffik said:

I often wonder if I'm playing a completely different game when people post things like this.

 

It's probably because there's no such thing as a "pure AI", what people encounter is an AI in a given mission situation, where mission design (good or bad) and mission logic (appropriate or inappropriate) plays a huge role.

 

The AI is less prone to do silly things in human-made and human-tested missions and scripted campaigns than in auto-generated career missions.

 

Even among career missions, there might be huge differences depending on which map, which airfield, which squadron, which type of mission is concerned actually.

 

13 minutes ago, =FI=Nellip42 said:

Maybe I am just unlucky, or perhaps it is a feature of this part of the Kuban map.  I will see what results I get flying from a different field.

 

Ground attacker units seem to be more affected. I'm some 30 missions into the Kuban campaign from Geleznik airfield in a fighter unit, frequently tasked with air cover for attacking Sturmoviks, and haven't seen yet what you describe. One time two A-20s collided when the formation made a sharp turn, but it was probably due to mission design (waypoints placed too close to each other).

[Yogiflight]

1 hour ago, =FI=Nellip42 said:

 Flight of 4 IL2’s, and this time 2 of them flew into the ground when circling waiting for escorts to arrive.  The escorts never did turn up, perhaps they were also intercepted by the terrain ?

Did you fly the game's career mode or Patrick Wilson's Campaign Generator? I am asking, because first, in my ground attack career missions, I never had my flight circling, waiting for escort. Either our escort started from their airfield, when we approached, or they were already in the air and started escorting us, but we always just were flying our flight path to the target, no circling. Second, I eventually remember having read from someone, who was flying IL-2 career, there was no escort for them, in no mission, like it is on german side for the 109 E7, 190 A5, or the 110 E2. When you fly fighter career, you often have escort missions for those ground attack aircrafts, but when you fly the same ground attack aircraft, you don't have an escort. So if you were flying missions from the ingame career, did the briefing say, you will meet escort at waypoint 2?

[zdog0331]

What difficulty are you flying?  I mean the AI has gotten crazy good (combat wise)  Though wingman behavior needs work still.  But just set the AI to ace and fly a QMB to experince what I am talking about. You may just be unlucky with the missions and mission settings you are using, but don't use anything below medium difficulty wise or else they willl just turn on easy difficulty.  Ai behavior is different at each difficulty level.

[ADorante]

17 hours ago, =FI=Nellip42 said:

Just to add insult to injury, I flew a second career mission on the same map, later yesterday.  Almost the identical thing happened.  Flight of 4 IL2’s, and this time 2 of them flew into the ground when circling waiting for escorts to arrive.  The escorts never did turn up, perhaps they were also intercepted by the terrain ?

 

Maybe I am just unlucky, or perhaps it is a feature of this part of the Kuban map.  I will see what results I get flying from a different field.

 

Track or it didn't happen

[HerrBree]

Has anyone else noticed how terrible the AI is at shooting? Also their ability to prioritize targets i.e. not all focusing on the player has gotten worse. Neither of these things were happening two patches ago and the AI seemed quite competent and quite deadly. Now since the last AI update all my wingmen just waste all their ammo shooting inches away from the enemy as if their trigger gets stuck and I have to do everything and then get chased by however many Russians survive. In 16 sorties I have over 45 kills and only a single wingman in all those 16 flights has gotten one too, and he died during the same mission. 

 

Additionally there havent been any other pilots in my entire unit that have gotten kills even in missions that I dont fly and have simulated so there might actually be something odd going on there 

[Rjel]

On 3/15/2020 at 10:13 PM, Avimimus said:

IMHO, the ideal thing would be to have a modular AI: One which picked different maneuvers picked after assessing the skill level, relative performance of the opponent, current height, and the year of the war.

 

I’ve mentioned that previously too. I guess my thoughts went more to plane specific AI. A P-47 AI Pilot would fly and fight differently than one in a Spitfire as an example. I’ve no idea how daunting a task it would be or if it’s even possible but it certainly would mimic reality more closely. 
 

I do think the AI we have now is much improved. I’m looking forward to further developments. 

[Gretsch_Man]

4 hours ago, HerrBree said:

Has anyone else noticed how terrible the AI is at shooting?

No, not always. Especially in career missions when your own side has the superior numbers of planes, your own AI pilots often just blow the enemy aircraft out of the sky in no time. On some of those missions, I couldn't even get any kills because the friendly AI chaps were faster.

[HerrBree]

5 hours ago, Gretsch_Man said:

No, not always. Especially in career missions when your own side has the superior numbers of planes, your own AI pilots often just blow the enemy aircraft out of the sky in no time. On some of those missions, I couldn't even get any kills because the friendly AI chaps were faster.

I play as the Germans so I never have numerical superiority, i should have clarified that earlier. My experiences are on hardest difficulty in the fw190 campaign over Stalingrad although this does happen just as frequently in QMB and also in my Bf109 campaign over Kuban.

[Livai]

Not sure why "ace skilled" fighter planes lose against "average skilled" bombers. Why ace - skilled Ai always attack from the six in train manner every enemy bomber. 

Edited March 17, 2020 by Livai

[Gretsch_Man]

18 hours ago, HerrBree said:

I play as the Germans so I never have numerical superiority, i should have clarified that earlier.

I play as the Germans too. Playing fighter careers on BoBP map on medium difficulty and flying free hunting missions with 6 planes (instead of the 4 as proposed by the game), I sometime run into only one flight of 3 enemy planes. When that happens, my own AI pilots have them for breakfast.

Edited March 18, 2020 by Gretsch_Man

[nickj123]

Doesn't increasing the difficulty just make your wingmen worse and the opposition better? This would explain that when it's on hard difficulty why your wingmen can't hit a barn door.

[Yogiflight]

2 hours ago, nickj123 said:

Doesn't increasing the difficulty just make your wingmen worse and the opposition better? This would explain that when it's on hard difficulty why your wingmen can't hit a barn door.

IIRC the difficulty setting doesn't change your wingmen, but the AI of the AI only flights, making one side better and the other side worse.

[Burdokva]

On 3/16/2020 at 2:04 PM, Yogiflight said:

Did you fly the game's career mode or Patrick Wilson's Campaign Generator? I am asking, because first, in my ground attack career missions, I never had my flight circling, waiting for escort. Either our escort started from their airfield, when we approached, or they were already in the air and started escorting us, but we always just were flying our flight path to the target, no circling. Second, I eventually remember having read from someone, who was flying IL-2 career, there was no escort for them, in no mission, like it is on german side for the 109 E7, 190 A5, or the 110 E2. When you fly fighter career, you often have escort missions for those ground attack aircrafts, but when you fly the same ground attack aircraft, you don't have an escort. So if you were flying missions from the ingame career, did the briefing say, you will meet escort at waypoint 2?

 

Not to derail the thread but is there a reason for the odd "never having escorting fighters" when playing on the German side? Bugs? Design decision?

 

I was wondering the same myself as I've restarted a BoS Bf 109E7 Jabo career several times and there hasn't been a single instance where our group has escorts. Survivable, if not entirely realistic, against La-5s and MiG-3s, but as soon as a bunch of I-16s appear, it's career over time (iron man) - even if I survive, everyone else has been shot down and killed over target.

Edited March 18, 2020 by Burdokva

[Yogiflight]

AFAIK, they usually were flying their own escort, as german fighters were busy flying escort for bombers and Stuka, additionally to other missions. And IIRC on Russian side the IL-2 were also usually flying without escort, at least at the beginning of the war.

[PatrickAWlson]

On 3/16/2020 at 11:48 PM, HerrBree said:

Has anyone else noticed how terrible the AI is at shooting?

 

They generally should be awful at shooting.  Most real pilots were.  Aces were rare, and that would go doubly for an early war Russian unit.  

[HerrBree]

11 minutes ago, PatrickAWlson said:

They generally should be awful at shooting.  Most real pilots were.  Aces were rare, and that would go doubly for an early war Russian unit. 

I agree with that, but the thing is I have 16 flown sorties which means that maybe 40 sorties have been flown by my unit since i started the career. Out of my 16 sorties i have gotten 45 kills, and only one other person in my unit has gotten one. This includes the 16 sorties Ive flown AND the ~40 sorties not flown by me. To me thats beyond "generally pilots werent that good at shooting", its a problem with the AI.

5 minutes ago, HerrBree said:

 

I also want to add that Im not trying to get down on the game or whoever is making the AI, I know that its a constant development and has been improved miles beyond what it was 3 or 4 years ago, but I do think something went wrong in the last patch that fixed ground attackers that is causing this, my bet is on the change that made pilots open fire at greater distances.

Edited March 18, 2020 by HerrBree

[RedeyeStorm]

This is not my experience @HerrBree. I usually get more kills then the AI but every flight my squad mates get at least one or more kills on fighter missions that is. On ground attack missions they focus more on attacking ground targets then defending themselves is my experience and those flights do not see many air kills.

[PatrickAWlson]

1 hour ago, HerrBree said:

I agree with that, but the thing is I have 16 flown sorties which means that maybe 40 sorties have been flown by my unit since i started the career. Out of my 16 sorties i have gotten 45 kills, and only one other person in my unit has gotten one. This includes the 16 sorties Ive flown AND the ~40 sorties not flown by me. To me thats beyond "generally pilots werent that good at shooting", its a problem with the AI.

I also want to add that Im not trying to get down on the game or whoever is making the AI, I know that its a constant development and has been improved miles beyond what it was 3 or 4 years ago, but I do think something went wrong in the last patch that fixed ground attackers that is causing this, my bet is on the change that made pilots open fire at greater distances.

 

40 victories in 16 missions?  To me the AI problem that you are describing is not a lack of shooting skill but rather a lack of survival instinct.  Hartmann got 1 kill every 4 mission while you are effectively reversing that ratio.  So the AI improvement that I want to see is the AI bugging out, or at least trying to:

1. when slightly damaged

2. when outnumbered

3. when they have lost the initiative

 

That is not easy to code because the AI has to be smart enough to not just try and fly away straight and level.  They have to have escape as a goal with multiple ways to get there, and stand and fight as a last option.  IMHO it would be great to see improvements in that direction, but then people would probably complain that the AI is "boring".

 

WWII was deadly but nowhere near as deadly as this sim would have you believe.  Losing multiple pilots on a daily basis did not happen.  There are some books out there with info on losses on a per unit level. Your odds over time were not great, but average life span of a pilot was not 4 missions.