If the Fast AI was removed who would miss it?
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As hardware is getting faster there is less need for the Fast AI ?
Do people still use it and if so on which scenario maps and why?
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@thedog well i do think its a different algorithm that may have different weaknesses
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@ubernaut The algorithm is relatively similar. Battle calculations are done in a slightly faster way. The heart of the question is how many use it and how many could use the regular AI without noticing a difference?
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@lafayette why did i think redrums improvements were only made to hard?
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@ubernaut Hard AI and Fast AI are the two AIs I was referring to. Improvements to one carry to the other, they are the same except 'fast' AI uses a slightly abridged battle calc algorithm (which given some other performance improvements etc, might no longer be that significant)
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@lafayette ah gotcha
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The hard to measure part is that the people most likely to be using it are ones who don't use the forum or the lobby at all, but only play offline. Such people exist, but by their very nature almost never contact the community, so we can't readily measure their numbers or how they'd react.
For my own experience, when playing some of the larger maps, the hard ai does start taking quite awhile in later turns, and I could easily see people using fast ai in preference to that, even if it makes more mistakes.
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Since the main focus for "Hard AI" is to be, well, "hard" (It is not.), it is needed to have a decent and fast alternative ("Easy AI" is not decent.).
If "Fast AI" is scarcely faster than "Hard AI", this likely means that either "Hard AI" can be made slower and better or "Fast AI" should be made faster and worse.
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@cernel Fast AI is a lot faster when there are many units on the map. I often use it for large scenarios.
Easy AI should be reworked. It is the original game AI, which just marches toward the enemy capital without regards to counterattacks. It would be more useful without the targeting of enemy capitals, then it could be used for powers without central organization like zombies or barbarians.
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@zlefin I resemble this comment! I have always assumed there were differences in the AI types and actually set the maps based on this assumption. So for instance while fighting the Axis I might set the Italians to Fast and Minor Axis to Easy with Germany as Hard.
Since it is allowing a level accessibility via a drop down menu where the top says Easy and the Bottom says hard, the middle option which says Fast naturally would invoke a user type of intuition to think these are level settings and this is the medium setting in between the two. It's designed in such a way for the end user to think this way. If that's not the intent then change it, because there have to be dozens of us still out there playing! =p
Background.
Been playing the game for years on my old 17" MBP which is locked into OS 10.6.8. I stopped playing TripleA last couple years because the engine was so old and only one or two maps worked. Fast forward to the future (Feb 2021) and I get a new 16" MBP and download all the latest from TripleA. -
@lafayette I kind of like the Fast AI when I want things to go faster.
