Automated Units..Who needs 'em?

[Scipio Centaurus]

...Air Units. The choppers were the worst! They patrolled wildly, landing in the field even though they were On-Alert and not set to patrol! Noodles looped in crazed patrols. Only the Gravship seemed determined to take action in a meaningful way. My conclusion is that On-Alert-Air is really a throughback to TWA air-traffic-control methods.

Were they strike choppers or tactical (SAM... actually AAM equipped) choppers. I'm at a disadvantage here, because like for my missiles, whenever I build a chopper it's off after a specific target immediately... even my tactical choppers often wind up on strike missions against ground and sea targets due to their multiple attack capability?! I never get a chance to set choppers on alert. I have placed many needlejets on alert though, and I'm guessing the following for the choppers based on the needlejets behaviour.

Strike choppers should attack a specific target I would think, but unlike a strike needlejet, the chopper may have movement points leftover after killing its target. I think it must use 'em all up before its turn can end. I have seen the AI attack multiple targets at different locations with choppers (in the same turn), so an alert chopper should be able to do that too. AAM tactical choppers might not go after a target of opportunity. They might be trying to fly CAP (close air patrol) to protect friendly ground or sea units. Did you notice if the chopper's flight paths passed over one or more friendly units? I think they could get caught in a situation where their last movement point leaves them all alone in an open square. Happens to my interceptor NJs all the time.

I'm having difficulty seeing the utility of OA units in the base...

I suspect alert units get to 'see' with the AI's eyes, if you know what I mean.

...why do OA units send out little 'feelers' for movement and not take them? What are they for anyways?

If you are talking about the green proposed movement path indicator, I suspect the pathfinder routine may just be 'thinking out loud' as it tries to decide what to do with a given unit. ignore all but the last path shown for a unit.

- Scipio

[Avenoct]

Hrm...

More on 'On Alert':

I don't know why I tested the arty..it performed as expected....Arty rover units wouldn't move to engage a target (I had sensors everywhere), but all arty units would attack any unit in range on-turn and defend as usual off-turn. I don't think that if arty gets an AI attack mod for being On Alert that it's much different than manually controlled Artillery.

I ended up doing an almost scientific 1 on 1 scout test. I placed a bunch of OA Spartan scouts on a big battlefield. On Lals turn I magically popped in a bunch of Lals scouts next to each Spartan scout. Then I let Lal's troops have at the Spartans. I was technically the Spartans, so if there was an AI advantage to MY troops, it should have played out about evenly, which it did. 9 or 16 Spartan scouts were killed to Lal's 7. Does that make any sense? What I'm saying is that AI vs. AI, the odds are of course even. AI vs. Human controlled unit, the AI has an advantage. My conclusion is that that advantage is nullified by OA. This obviously needs LOTS more testing to hold up. Here's a few ideas for tests.

1. Human Controlled vs. Human Controlled (hotseat) with one being OA, the other just attacking.

2. Human vs. Human non OA

3. AI attacks Human, Human OA

4. AI attacks Human, Human just sitting there

5. Ai attacks Human, unit on full auto..

What we need to compare are the percentages of survivors in OA and just sitting there (JST) units. If on alert units gain an advantage, it'll tell us two things...One, the AI probably has that advantage all the time. Two, OA is a valuable combat tactic.

I'm just thinking outloud here while I wait for my PBEM game to arrive

I also did some Air Unit tests. I found that Air units will sit in the base as often as not, but one thing that seemed to encourage them to go out was if they were 'backed up' by more air cover in the base. In other words a single air unit seemed to head for base and stay there. When I had stacked a few, one would go out to attack a unit (up to 7 squares away!) while the rest remained behind, even if there were multiple enemies in range. This is just a suspiscion.

About the Funny Green Movement Lines: I think that OA units 'consider' what moves they'd make if they were on full auto. They then only take those moves if a unit is a direct threat to their position. For example, Rover artillery in base would go ahead and fire upon any unit in range, but would only show movement lines to units out of direct range of the base square. Rover attack units wouldn't advance toward the enemy in the field...don't think they will in the base either...so basically OA is an active Hold Position for ground troops as far as I can tell. Adjacent units are always attacked.

By the way..Lal found an Ancient Artifact about 7 squares from my Spartan base. A turn passed and then one of my 20-10-air Needlejets zoomed in and attacked and captured the artifact, in Lal's territory?!?! I truly don't understand how advancing into enemy territory to capture an 'objective' is an 'On Alert' action. Air units simply don't follow the same rules as the ground about 'I'll just stay here unless someone comes knocking'. My choppers performed much better this time, staying in base unless I stacked them with other choppers.

-Smack

[Scipio Centaurus]

I set up 30 very green PK scouts in clear terrain and then faced each one off against an identical very green Morgan scout unit. The PK scouts had no orders, I played the Morgan factions and had each scout attack its PK counterpart. The odds for every combat were always 6:7 (Morgan STR = .75; PK STR = .87). Only 6 Morgan scouts were left standing when the dust settled.

[Scipio Centaurus]

More on 'On Alert':
....Arty rover units wouldn't move to engage a target (I had sensors everywhere), but all arty units would attack any unit in range on-turn and defend as usual off-turn...

But that's realistic. You would probably want to retain control of the deployment of your artillery. A battery commander who led his unescorted artillery out of a fortified position to chase down targets of opportunity would certainly face loss of command and possible courts-martial in the real military. I rarely place artillery on alert in the field so I'm not sure what kind of behaviour to expect there.

I ended up doing an almost scientific 1 on 1 scout test. I placed a bunch of OA Spartan scouts on a big battlefield.

Don't the Spartan combat units enjoy a morale advantage as a faction bonus? Should probably test using identical units.

On Lals turn I magically popped in a bunch of Lals scouts next to each Spartan scout. Then I let Lal's troops have at the Spartans. I was technically the Spartans, so if there was an AI advantage to MY troops, it should have played out about evenly, which it did. 9 of 16 Spartan scouts were killed to Lal's 7. Does that make any sense?

Yes, but only if the results are statistically reliable (need 30+ data points) and only if the same Spartan troops under human control, but w/o orders are consistently overrun by Lal's forces under AI control. Then we would have something to hang our hats on.

I found that Air units will sit in the base as often as not, but one thing that seemed to encourage them to go out was if they were 'backed up' by more air cover in the base. In other words a single air unit seemed to head for base and stay there. When I had stacked a few, one would go out to attack a unit (up to 7 squares away!) while the rest remained behind, even if there were multiple enemies in range...

Hmmm. Didn't know that. Also try replacing hardened targets of opportunity with creampuff targets like formers and transports. My pet theory is the AI seeks high combat odds for its alert strike units.

Rover attack units wouldn't advance toward the enemy in the field...don't think they will in the base either...so basically OA is an active Hold Position for ground troops as far as I can tell. Adjacent units are always attacked.

Sounds right (and reasonable) from what I've seen in my games. If you're bored you might try scattering a few alien artifacts near a base with some rovers and infantry just to see if anbody'll take the bait!

..Lal found an Ancient Artifact about 7 squares from my Spartan base. A turn passed and then one of my 20-10-air Needlejets zoomed in and attacked and captured the artifact, in Lal's territory?!?! I truly don't understand how advancing into enemy territory to capture an 'objective' is an 'On Alert' action.

Huhhh? How could an airborne NJ capture an alien artifact? Oh well... never look a gift alien artifact in the mouth as my gammer used to say! Wouldn't that be great if you could pull it off in a MP PBEM?

- Scipio

[Avenoct]

Yawn...ah, morning..well before I head into the field to shake up the scout Division and further terrorize them, I thought I'd respond briefly.

Morale can be edited in the SE, along with some interesting other unit attributes for scenario play. So I set up the scouts to all be hardened, figuring that was about middle of the road and if there were any kind of hidden bonuses/tweaks that Firaxis added to Morale, it wouldn't be in the middle of the scale. I probably should use a Lal vs. Lal type thing, loading 2 identical factions...not a bad idea.

While we continue to have a look under the hood of SMAC, I wonder what other moving parts are in here to fiddle with? Hehe, feels like we're a couple of blind mechanics with a baseball bat and a Chevy 'No Va'.

Not to be touchy, just to indicate my intentions, about the Arty...I like to report anything I find, as thin as the evidence is, to help create more topics for inquiry. I wasn't making the implication that they should move about...just noting what I observed. I like your court-martial eg.. Arty on the fly is not a good idea, eh? Similarily, I'm not claiming to have run a T-Test on the data, though I think if I had the time I would run an Anova across the board. Some tasty P < .05 values would be nice to have, but it's such a pain to set up the tests! (I'm lazy in this regard).

Going to have to try the Creampuff and AA ideas...I think that'll balance out the tedium of endless 1:1 scout battles....poor troops!

Just one more thing on rovers or any multi-movement unit. I do wonder why a rover doesn't leap out of base to attach a unit 2 squares away. Air units do it, monkeys do it, why not rovers too? I'm not saying that I wish they did, but it seems like if a rover sees a rover, it's position is threatened, just as much as if the rover is right adjacent. The difference is that the watching OA unit has to leave it's fortified position to make a pre-emptive strike, and that's a big difference, but why air units and not ground units? why go out to grab an AA (almost always counts as an objective I believe..see the SE), and not to protect your hide? Perhaps the air units go out assuming that they'll be terrible defenders if they just laze about in the hangar. Perhaps it has to do with how uneven the odds (ie creampuff) will be if a unit does attack. Perhaps, like the air unit, units leap out when they see there's no use to them defending.???

-Smack

[Fitz]

What's this about a hidden AI combat bonus? I've won lots of times when the combat odds are displayed as 2:2!

What you probably fail to do is look down at the real odds further down in the combat display. When the odds say 2:2, but the combat power says 2.81 : 2.75, I usually win. If I attack for some wierd reason when it says 2.75 : 2.81, I usually lose.

Don't trust the odds that pop up. Look at the combat strenths & hits. Especially in native life combat.

[Scipio Centaurus]

Sorry it took me so long to answer. I took some time out to play a SMAC game this weekend. I played MORGANs on transcend difficulty - managed to win by transcendance in MY2476. Scored 1760 points (165%). That's my first outright solo victory at transcend difficulty level, and my second highest percent rating ever.

My only serious opposition was Sister Miriam, though I finished the game vendettaed with all of the surviving factions. Miriam scored at least twice my level on the faction dominance chart and waged a ceaseless 150+ year war against me to finish out the game. I held my own militarily, but I could never have taken her out.

I attribute the win to my complete dominance of space. I was cranking out a couple of satellites per turn in the last 20 years of the game and my orbital defense pods had cleared the heavens of all other factions satellites.

Oh another key factor was my effort to learn how to buy my SPs with supply crawlers instead of having bases muck about for decades doing SP research. I've still got plenty of room for improvement in my game there.

I did notice a few things about units 'on alert'. This was my first game having enough copters & choppers to place some of each type on alert in my forward bases. They responded very much like I thought they would (see a previous post). The alert copters (equivalent to NJ penetrators) occaisionally flew strike missions against the weakest bases and ground and sea units - sometimes hitting multiple targets in a single turn. They usually waited until they were fully repaired before sortying, but if an enemy got too close they might fly out with some damage. And like you noticed, they rarely (I did not say never!) flew out and left their home base completely unguarded. There were not many creampuff targets, but I'm certain the helos would have taken them out first.

The alert choppers (NJ interceptor equivalent) flew interdiction missions against needlejets, choppers and locusts (i.e. airborne targets). They rarely flew CAP missions. Alert interceptor NJs fly a lot of CAP, as I recall. Maybe it was because I usually have several interceptor NJs in a base, due to their lower relative cost.

The DW did not offer armor on its strike copter designs but it did propose armor on the defensive choppers and I usually took it. The armor turned out to be precious little help against swarming aggressors when the choppers were caught on the ground. And the amount of minerals (time) to produce them was grossly out of proportion with any other mainline combat unit of similar armor levels past plasma armor. I eventually obsoleted the heavier armor choppers and downgrade my front line defensive choppers to plasma armor. You could probably get away with no armor on your chopper defenders. At some later stage of the game (maybe at quantum/singularity) a single copter design when placed on alert, begins automatically performing both strike and interdiction missions - attacking land, sea and air targets with equal vigor.

The choppers made multiple attacks at differrent locations as long as they had movement points remaining. And yes they sometimes crashed and burned before they could get back to base. This was because they took heavier than expected damage in combat and ran out of fuel afterwards. Remember that a chopper uses 30% of its fuel each turn that it flys and fuel consumption is treated just like damage. I suppose the AI trys to 'guess' how much damage it will take prior to each attack, and if it calculates that it will have enough fuel remaing to get back to base, it will go ahead and make the attack. Needlejets use up all remaining movement points when they attack, so they never have multiple attacks in a turn.

Morale can be edited in the SE, along with some interesting other unit attributes for scenario play. So I set up the scouts to all be hardened...

That sound right.

I wasn't making the implication that they [artillery] should move about...just noting what I observed.

Fair enough.

Just one more thing on rovers or any multi-movement unit. I do wonder why a rover doesn't leap out of base to attack a unit 2 squares away. Air units do it, monkeys do it, why not rovers too?

As you have alluded, I believe this comes down to a balancing act of whether a unit should sorty out of its fortified position to strike at targets of opportunity or whether the unit should be cautious and defend the citizenry.

The best units for strike/interdiction missions are fast long-range reusable (or relatively cheap disposable) heavy weapon/payload delivery platforms. That winds up being needlejests, copters and missiles for the most part.

- Scipio

[Avenoct]

Congrats on your game Scipio. I've, for the most part, abandoned testing OA at this point in favor of working on a completely revamped Smac..maybe a Smac.veteran type of thing. One thing that's included is a vastly improved artillery. The AI seems to handle arty pretty well, it's just that they are far too weak in the original version. I did have a few attempts to prove the 'hidden bonus' to OA units over the weekend, but though I still feel they gain an advantage, was unable to prove it numerically.

-Smack

[Avenoct]

BTW Fitz, I did mean a hidden AI bonus. Yes, I'm talking about totally even odds. I think it should have it's own cult: The mystery of AI bonuses. I still firmly believe that OA units (not Arty though) get some kind of bonus, on par with AI units. They both seem to do better at 2:2 than they should...and now, I'll truly let this thread die.

-Smack

[Nadexander]

Originally posted by Smack
BTW Fitz, I did mean a hidden AI bonus. Yes, I'm talking about totally even odds. I think it should have it's own cult: The mystery of AI bonuses. I still firmly believe that OA units (not Arty though) get some kind of bonus, on par with AI units. They both seem to do better at 2:2 than they should...and now, I'll truly let this thread die.
-Smack

Ah! The AI has a big hidden bonus (at least +25%) when defending its HQ! Im sure of it!

Ah well. Its not like its ever saved them in the long run

-Nadexander

[hubcat]

I've been running tests in Single player and Hot seat mode and I can't get a unit (infantry, rover, probe, etc.) to even attack another unit of the same type (on the off-turn) if it comes right next to it. I see planes attacking other planes on the off-turn, but not other unit types.

What am I doing wrong?

Thanks,
Hubcat

[Scipio Centaurus]

Originally posted by hubcat
I've been running tests in Single player and Hot seat mode and I can't get a unit (infantry, rover, probe, etc.) to even attack another unit of the same type (on the off-turn) if it comes right next to it. I see planes attacking other planes on the off-turn, but not other unit types.

What am I doing wrong?

Thanks,
Hubcat

I'm not sure you're doing anything wrong. We were all confused about the 'off-turn' aspect of on alert units. It turns out that your alert strike air units conduct their business during your own turn just like any other unit. Alert defender air units will scramble during the AI's turn, but that's about it. All alert unit's actions should be based on enemy activity during the off-turn. Presumably, if there is a pause in action during your game turn, you could click on any of your alert units that have not yet moved and change their orders.

My experience placing short range ground units (infantry and speeder chassis) on alert, is that they will not MOVE out of their base (or whatever square they happen to be in) to attack enemy targets of opportunity - though they should still ATTACK automatically if the enemy has moved to within weapon's range. I have seen a synthmetal sentinel unit move out of a base to escort an alien artifact I was attempting to move into the base. Apparantly ANY unit placed on alert may elect to move to capture and/or escort an alien artifact.

We are undecided if short range ground units receive any benefit for being on alert. They apparantly don't move, so it's difficult to say whether an alert scout unit uses its conventional weapons to 'attack' the mindworm that just moved next to it or simply 'defends' against the mindworm's PSI attack. I believe those combat odds are different and favor the attacker in either case.

I have never had the opportunity to place hovertank or gravship chassis units 'on alert' so I can't comment on their behaviour. With their longer range, they might be able to move and attack targets of opportunity.

Somebody else said that missile units on alert will fly out and attack the first target of opportunity...

The needlejest and copter units fly various types of alert missions based on whether they are equipped with air-to-air capability (AAM missiles). Those aircraft without AAM are classified as strike aircraft (penetrators/assault/bombers/etc) and will fly strike missions attacking ground and sea targets of opportunity (incl. bases) pretty much starting with the weakest targets they can find. Strike NJs can hit 1 target this way and then their turn is over. Alert strike copters can potentially attack multiple targets, but I forget whether they attack the extra targets automatically or whether you must takeover and fly it by hand after it kills its first target...

Alert aircraft with AAM capability are classified as tactical aircraft (interceptors/air superiority/fighters/etc) and will fly interdiction or CAP missions instead of strike missions. Interdiction missions are defensive missions intended to intercept incoming airborne attackers. These are the missions that happen during the off turn and trigger the 'faction air defenses scramble at base' messages. I see this mainly when the incoming penetrators are targeting ground or sea targets in the open - within the interceptor's flight range. For reasons unknown to me, I rarely see my alert air units scramble when bases (even their own!?) are the target of the incoming bombers. Anybody else notice that? Usually my alert interceptors are sitting ducks, if the enemy chooses to bomb my airbases. That works the other way too. Send 1 strike copter to attack an enemy airbase and you could easily wipe out half their air force!

CAP missions are close air patrol missions. There is no specific enemy target, but the alert tactical air unit flys a precautionary mission to protect friendly forces (the penetrator can't attack your crawler if there is an interceptor flying CAP in the same square) or to deny access to key terrain. I have seen my alert NJs fly tons of these, but I can't remember seeing my tactical choppers fly any. I have seen Yang's interceptors park themselves in the open squares around one of my recently de-garrisoned bases in a deliberate effort to deny me access to the base by my reinforcing forces. I have also (rarely) seen AI controlled air units fly long range missions to attempt to block air/land/sea access from point-to-point within an enemy's empire... forcing enemy units to lose time moving around the interdicting air units.

[Avenoct]

Hubcat,

No, we were confused about that in the beginning, but somewhere we agree that OA units really don't aggressvily go after targets in the off-turn very much. Rather, it's the apparent bonus to their off-turn defense, and on-turn offense that we were seeking to uncover there at the end.

As you said, air units are an exception.


-Smack

[hubcat]

Scipio/Smack,

Thank you both for the reply. I assume the "no off-turn aggression" for "on-alert" is a bug since they give a description in the manual of being just that - aggressive. Oh well, as long as I'm not missing out on anything, I'll play on the same field as everyone else.

Take care and thanks again!

Forever learning,
Hubcat