[SOURCEMOD] Brutal-OXCE 7.12.1

[Xilmi]

Here's my benchmarking-results for 6.4.0:

UFO:
Aggressiveness 1: 3.5
Aggressiveness 2: 4.67
Aggressiveness 3: 2.34
Aggressiveness 4: 1.2

TFTD:
Aggressiveness 1: 3.5
Aggressiveness 2: 3.5
Aggressiveness 3: 4.67
Aggressiveness 4: 4.67

The value is the KDR from the perspective of the aliens against Autoplay set to Aggressiveness 4.

So the new faster aggressiveness-level 3 still showed decent results in my benchmark in UFO.
In TFTD it even scored a better result than the default-option of 2.

[eagles980]

Boom. Downloading the update right away. Appreciate the quick turnaround.

Edit: Can confirm Brutal AI has officially been woken up with inherited aggression on. Turn two blaster bomb killed at least 3 guys despite only one of them being left out in the open (concealed in smoke but intially in full view of a floater that survived the turn before). Turn 3 had a second blaster bomb annihilate the rest of my bunkers once the exposed aliens from the previous turn were dealt with. Queue the panic spiral. LMFAO.
Have to note that the floater I talked about on the first turn DID move to trigger the mine I left in front of him. In my initial post wasn't exactly sure if I had left it just out of his movement range or directly in front of him since I hadn't taken a screenshot, but now I'm leaning towards thinking it was directly in front of him, leaving no escape.

Edit 2: Second brief test went similar to the first only no alien was visible to me this go around. Mine wasn't triggered from the placement the third screenshot shows but the blaster bomb wiping the area clear that same turn might have something to do with that. I assume the scouts go first before the launcher is fired. 1 death on both sides as a result, theirs being friendly fire of course, several injuries on mine. All in all pleased to have base defenses be appropriately terrifying as well as get an early warning that my usual base design philosophy needs serious readjustment. Might finally have a reason to turn the 'limit explosives use to turn 3' option on.

[Solarius Scorch]

Umm... The whole point of a mine is that it is hidden. Why would the aliens see your mines? That doesn't make sense.

In Piratez, you can't see enemy mines either (they're invisible on the minimap).

[Xilmi]

Umm... The whole point of a mine is that it is hidden. Why would the aliens see your mines? That doesn't make sense.

In Piratez, you can't see enemy mines either (they're invisible on the minimap).

When it comes to real-life-logic, a mine that was dug under the ground would be hidden. If you just throw a grenade-like-object on the ground it won't be hidden because it's not dug in. There is nothing about proximity-grenades that implies they'd dig themselves in or that they'd otherwise become invisible. This is also indicated by their sprite being displayed on the battlescape as well as an icon on the minimap.

I figured out that the mines in Piratez you are referring to likely have a "hiddenOnMinimap"-flag set to achieve their invisibility on the minimap. I wasn't aware of the existence of that flag, so I couldn't have taken it into account. Now that I was made aware, I can take it into account in my AI. This will, of course, only impact items with that flag set, which is not the case for vanilla Proximity-grenades.

However, the main-reason as for why I made the AI notice and react to the presence of primed proximity-grenades is their massive exploit-potential that was presented to me by Trauson. Using them to their maximum effect completely trivialized the mission he was playing. They still retain usefullness as a tool for crowd-control that allows you to temporarily lock in enemies to deal with them later.

So both from a realism and a game-design-perspective it seems to make sense to me that an AI that is meant to provide a greater challenge would be capable of seeing proximity-grenades.

[Solarius Scorch]

When it comes to real-life-logic, a mine that was dug under the ground would be hidden. If you just throw a grenade-like-object on the ground it won't be hidden because it's not dug in. There is nothing about proximity-grenades that implies they'd dig themselves in or that they'd otherwise become invisible. This is also indicated by their sprite being displayed on the battlescape as well as an icon on the minimap.

Yes, but we're discussing mines, not proxy grenades.

I figured out that the mines in Piratez you are referring to likely have a "hiddenOnMinimap"-flag set to achieve their invisibility on the minimap. I wasn't aware of the existence of that flag, so I couldn't have taken it into account. Now that I was made aware, I can take it into account in my AI. This will, of course, only impact items with that flag set, which is not the case for vanilla Proximity-grenades.

Appreciated, but mines planted by the player are not the same mines as the ones enemies plant and can be seen on the minimap.

However, the main-reason as for why I made the AI notice and react to the presence of primed proximity-grenades is their massive exploit-potential that was presented to me by Trauson. Using them to their maximum effect completely trivialized the mission he was playing. They still retain usefullness as a tool for crowd-control that allows you to temporarily lock in enemies to deal with them later.

Yes, mines are an exploit. That's their entire damn point since the age of buried spike.
But we call it "a tool of war".

So both from a realism and a game-design-perspective it seems to make sense to me that an AI that is meant to provide a greater challenge would be capable of seeing proximity-grenades.

OK, so you're against the idea of landmines in X-Com. Fair enough, but I don't expect this to receive much support from either modders or players.

What's next, no waypoints on the Blaster Launcher, because it's "cheesy"?

[Yankes]

However, the main-reason as for why I made the AI notice and react to the presence of primed proximity-grenades is their massive exploit-potential that was presented to me by Trauson. Using them to their maximum effect completely trivialized the mission he was playing. They still retain usefullness as a tool for crowd-control that allows you to temporarily lock in enemies to deal with them later.

There are other tools to nerf weapons and prevent exploits, you could make turn limit on activations or make trigger random.
if proxy work only 5 turns and have 20% trigger chance than you will need 20 more items to cover same areana.

Another solution but on AI side could be that aliens become aware of mines when at least one is triggered in given area.
Like when one alien trigger proxy then based on his intelligent some area around him is check for mines and they will use your logic for this area.

This will allows all zombies to die in minefields but cosmic brain aliens will sacrifice only one member to ignore all other mines.

[Abyss]

OK, so you're against the idea of landmines in X-Com. Fair enough, but I don't expect this to receive much support from either modders or players.

FOA, concealed mine is not a weightless essence, it is the tool which weights 4,5 kg and takes 30% of inventory capacity of the newbie soldier, giving only one single explosion in exchange.
Second, For anyone who had been somehow touched/hurt/nuised by me - don't get it personally, that's just my way of attracting views to the issue. Nothing more.   

In reply to me, a month ago or so, Xilmi agreed that mines and sensor grenades are tools of victory and it's a point of reconsider towards AI shouldn't avoid it. Now I can't get what is happening.

The point I writing here over and over again: the game itself is a mechanic-solving puzzle for human brain. If the conditions of victory are too punishing in contrary to joy, no one will ever play this game, except for a tiny piece of people who think themselves privileged over others, aka snobs. Once you get the mechanics, you can win. You don't get the mechanics - you lose over time with some percentage each XCOM-earth month.
Getting the mechanics is synonymous to understanding the most possible exploits and abuse mechanics to get to victory condition on battlefield or globe.
 
Most of the players of vanilla AI understood these exploits very well, but them were compensated by enemy numbers, inventory slot and weight caps, etc.

What is the point of nerfing players tools of getting to victory condition? The initial request was to make AI more competitive by itself, not by cheating mechanics. Clear/slight/none avoiding of any hidden primed explosives (and any, depending on modder, hidden things like beartraps in grass or stealthsuits, or camo or whatever) by enemies should be decided by a modder. And OpenXCOM project has only five and a half teams of these who create content for mods.

Now, what I can understand, Xilmi's approach to design means separate global mod similar to XCF or XPZ to implement the radical changes. 
Aka, mod, when you combat 10 aliens with army tanks or 100 unit squads, etc.

That one comment "my squad was blaster-lanched on turn two-three, giving the infinite panic loop" is purely out of tamagochi approach of mission-by-mission raising elite squad of guys who will assault the Cydonia chambers (36 ppl, in all, vs 200-300 top aliens).

There must be something that will equalize global mods with novel AI model, because the AI change was somehow desired for a long time.

And, Xilmi, do you ignore my question? Have you ever took your time to just relax and play XCF with base AI? It purely joyful experience in terms of story and mechanics.

[Abyss]

Another solution but on AI side could be that aliens become aware of mines when at least one is triggered in given area.

And what? Enemies running around and covering, making a meant-to-be trivial mission infinite?
It will take few real-life years to end the campaign in average mod.

[Xilmi]

OK, so you're against the idea of landmines in X-Com. Fair enough, but I don't expect this to receive much support from either modders or players.

What's next, no waypoints on the Blaster Launcher, because it's "cheesy"?

I was talking about proximity-grenades. You were talking about actual mines. I get it now. I wasn't fully aware of their existence as separate entities before your clarification in this post. Please don't assume that I know everything that is possible and being used in Mods. If anyone is aware of the existence of non-vanilla-stuff that is not properly supported by my AI, they should just tell me.

The proper solution would be to provide a separate flag for them. Something like: "invisibleToAI", that can then deliberately be set by modders. That way we could have it both ways, depending on what we want and wouldn't have to decide for one or the other.

I mean it is valid constructive criticism afterall but I still think that it could have been provided in a way that doesn't just preemtively assume that my sole intention is to ruin the fun for everyone. 

Edit: I think an even easier and better solution would be to add it to the AI-options, of whether mines and proximity-grenades should be ignored or not. That way each player can decide that individually or the mod-creator can also use the suggested- or forced-option for it.

[Xilmi]

There are other tools to nerf weapons and prevent exploits, you could make turn limit on activations or make trigger random.
if proxy work only 5 turns and have 20% trigger chance than you will need 20 more items to cover same areana.

Another solution but on AI side could be that aliens become aware of mines when at least one is triggered in given area.
Like when one alien trigger proxy then based on his intelligent some area around him is check for mines and they will use your logic for this area.

This will allows all zombies to die in minefields but cosmic brain aliens will sacrifice only one member to ignore all other mines.

Keep in mind, that I'm not a modder in the traditional sense but someone who codes AI. The AI is meant to work with a multitude of mods. So me changing the properties of items is not really a feasable solution for such problems.

And about the zombies: I think that units with the "isLeeroyJenkins"-flag set should probably ignore proxies and mines alltogether. Let me check if that's already the case because I already use that flag in my AI for units to behave in a dumb way. Nope, but I just changed it. In the next version units with that flag set should no longer avoid proxies/mines.

And also the solution to make it possible to flag the items for whether they should be ignored, like it is possible for units, seems like something I could attempt.

[Xilmi]

And, Xilmi, do you ignore my question? Have you ever took your time to just relax and play XCF with base AI? It purely joyful experience in terms of story and mechanics.

Your previous post was so full of sarcasm that I felt discouraged from wanting to engage with it.

No. I haven't played anything but vanilla with base-AI.

So you're saying playing XCF against base-AI is a purely joyful and relaxing experience. That's great! And in a sense of "don't fix what's not broken", it seems like the best way to keep enjoying these mods is to leave the AI at the level these mods were designed for. At least I don't see a lot of incentive to somehow make my AI more compatible with the way these mods were meant to be played, when the base-AI already provides exactly that experience.

And when it comes to what "the initial request" was:

I'm not working on the AI because of any request. I'm working on it because I wanted to. This is very different from doing commissional work in the sense that customer-satisfaction has a rather low priority for me. Or better yet: I myself am my primary customer so I wouldn't do anything that I wouldn't like.
I'm happy to share the results of my work with others, if they want. But that doesn't mean that I let them control what I do.

As I probably said before: It's open-source. Everyone can feel free to use my code and modify it however they want, just as I've done with the code that existed before I picked it up. I absolutely love the concept of open-source. For anyone who can code it's so much better than any commercial-product where you are stuck with what you get and can't do anything about it and then have to keep buying new games in the vague hopes of getting something that's close to what you want. With open-source you can actively work towards getting the game to be exactly like you want it to be without any time-pressure.

[eagles980]

That one comment "my squad was blaster-lanched on turn two-three, giving the infinite panic loop" is purely out of tamagochi approach of mission-by-mission raising elite squad of guys who will assault the Cydonia chambers (36 ppl, in all, vs 200-300 top aliens).

'Your AI is too hard.'
'Why?'
'You can pick a a whole bunch of options to make it that way! See, I'm going to cite someone who's having fun trying to figure out how the AI works when given every opportunity to mess you up.'
'...'

For the record, I didn't mean a true panic spiral nor does the AI do this every time. Next two tests (me vs AI for ~6 turns, AI vs AI for 16 until XCom was done) didn't trigger blaster launchers at all.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Xilmi]

As of 6.4.1 the AI's ability to avoid stepping on proxy-grenades can be disabled. So for those who enjoy exploiting them, they can now do that against Brutal-AI too.

[Xilmi]

'You can pick a a whole bunch of options to make it that way!

Also a point that cannot be emphasized enough.

There is a vast difference between Brutal AI with Targeting 1 + Aggressiveness 3 or 4, the default settings, and Targeting 4 + Bug Hunt Mode for AI.

[Solarius Scorch]

I was talking about proximity-grenades. You were talking about actual mines. I get it now. I wasn't fully aware of their existence as separate entities before your clarification in this post. Please don't assume that I know everything that is possible and being used in Mods. If anyone is aware of the existence of non-vanilla-stuff that is not properly supported by my AI, they should just tell me.

I apologize for assuming that the question was clear; I honestly thought it was, as everyone repeatedly said "mines" and provided context. But without knowing the modding scene, apparently it wasn't that obvious.

The proper solution would be to provide a separate flag for them. Something like: "invisibleToAI", that can then deliberately be set by modders. That way we could have it both ways, depending on what we want and wouldn't have to decide for one or the other.

Yes, I think it would work. Not sure if the modders will be interested, though.

I mean it is valid constructive criticism afterall but I still think that it could have been provided in a way that doesn't just preemtively assume that my sole intention is to ruin the fun for everyone. 

Again, sorry, I honestly did not expect this misunderstanding to arise. It hasn't crossed my head that I need to explain mines, it's such a staple for pretty much all X-Com mods.

Edit: I think an even easier and better solution would be to add it to the AI-options, of whether mines and proximity-grenades should be ignored or not. That way each player can decide that individually or the mod-creator can also use the suggested- or forced-option for it.

That would help with the problem with modders being responsible.

So you're saying playing XCF against base-AI is a purely joyful and relaxing experience.

Uh, I personally think it's a bitch, and I MADE this mod!