Difference in AI skill?

[GC1993]

Does anybody actually know what specifically determines an AI player to be "average", "excellent" etc?

All my singleplayer missions that I've created have my wingman set to "excellent", and the guy is frankly about as useful as a tennis raquet with no strings. For example, there is about 20 or so infantry on the ground - I've armed him with some M-151 rockets, I set a SPI where they are just to make it extra easy for him.

I order him to engage infantry at my SPI with rockets, he says "affirm", and simply flies over them a few times missing his lineup before bugging out and saying "two, rejoin".

 

OR, we're flying near to an SA-8 on our 3 o'clock, but out of launch range, I ask him to engage some armour on OUR 9 0'CLOCK, he says "copy" and breaks off RIGHT to make a nice long clockwise turn well into the launch range of the OSA, get's shot at, can't defend against a missile for s***, and boom I've lost my wingman.

 

What is it that makes an AI excellent over average? Is there a known bug that I'm unaware of where the skill setting is redundant and they are all useless?

[Double_D]

Does anybody actually know what specifically determines an AI player to be "average", "excellent" etc?

All my singleplayer missions that I've created have my wingman set to "excellent", and the guy is frankly about as useful as a tennis raquet with no strings. For example, there is about 20 or so infantry on the ground - I've armed him with some M-151 rockets, I set a SPI where they are just to make it extra easy for him.

I order him to engage infantry at my SPI with rockets, he says "affirm", and simply flies over them a few times missing his lineup before bugging out and saying "two, rejoin".

 

OR, we're flying near to an SA-8 on our 3 o'clock, but out of launch range, I ask him to engage some armour on OUR 9 0'CLOCK, he says "copy" and breaks off RIGHT to make a nice long clockwise turn well into the launch range of the OSA, get's shot at, can't defend against a missile for s***, and boom I've lost my wingman.

 

What is it that makes an AI excellent over average? Is there a known bug that I'm unaware of where the skill setting is redundant and they are all useless?

 

AI have been found not to be the most intelligent..support units so far..in time hopefully all this changes..

[Axion]

More often than not, the AI (particularly the F-15) will dive straight into the sea when going defensive.

 

Extremely frustrating during squad co-op missions.

 

Would be interesting to know how the skill settings affect the behaviour of the AI.

[Double_D]

More often than not, the AI (particularly the F-15) will dive straight into the sea when going defensive.

 

Extremely frustrating during squad co-op missions.

 

Would be interesting to know how the skill settings affect the behaviour of the AI.

 

Even if the skills are set up to Excellent the AI does all the wrong things..this is I would guess low on the priority list..as to lets say getting MP stablity issues addressed first..and fore most..:thumbup:

[esb77]

AI pilots are, inconsistent. In the stock Su-25T campaign the low altitude air defenses are sometimes so thick that a single plane doesn't hold enough ordnance to do both SEAD and the mission.

 

Operating on the theory that I would be able to complete the missions more easily in a air defense free environment I used to assign my "Excellent" wingman to SEAD.

 

On the same mission: most of the time the wingman gets shot down even faster than I can manage when I'm not paying attention, but on rare occasions the wingman will flatten every air defense unit on the map even to the point of killing tanks that fire at him with their machine guns.

 

I am not sure what accounts for this difference.

 

Maybe the Russian AI pilots have a random % vodka variable? :smilewink:

 

If so there's definitely a sweet spot. For example the Hind pilots when they are drunk enough to try using anti-tank missiles for air to air engagements but still sober enough to be very deadly while doing so.

 

The AI's can handle limited air combat situations reliably, and also undefended ground targets. For anything else it's really quite unpredictable.

 

Oh, and keep in mind that the air defense units also have AI's. I'm not sure how good they are, but under the right conditions an average SAM unit might shoot down an excellent attack pilot pretty easily.

[Exorcet]

Yeah, the AI are difficult to work with. I fly more air to air, and you basically need to start positioning them miles away from the point where you're actually going to engage. Either that or fly in first and let all the enemies shoot at you and then your wingmen might be able to get a couple of them.

 

ED added a delay to communications commands and prevents you from issuing a lot of orders at once, but I think given AI current behavior, it's more realistic to just be able to shout everything at the same time and have them react instantly.

[kontiuka]

When I fly the Su-25T instant action SEAD mission, my wingman seems to be very effective. He fires his anti-radar missles then uses his laser guided missles then does multiple passes with his cannon. Maybe if you look at that mission in the mission editor, you'll get some clues as to what makes an effective AI wingman.

[Grim_Smiles]

I've had the same AI issues, apparently being on my side turns them into lushes, while opposing AI has a habit of defeating my incompetent wingman.

 

If so there's definitely a sweet spot. For example the Hind pilots when they are drunk enough to try using anti-tank missiles for air to air engagements but still sober enough to be very deadly while doing so.

 

I do hate the attack chopper AI using the A2G ordinance, they caught me by surprise with that when first starting out on DCS. Was in a Toad and some Apaches were not far from my flight path. I thought "Meh, they don't have any A2A missiles, I'll let those fighters handle it". Don't think I've heard of air-to-ground missiles taking out flying aircraft before in real life, so I didn't think there was a danger.

 

Turns out they shot down both the AI MiGs with their hellfires, then sent one my way. Completely oblivious, my wake-up call was a hellfire taking my tail assembly off, which started the falling leaf routine and I ejected (into the ground unfortunately). At first I was not amused.

Edited August 13, 2013 by TooTall

[Spectre_USA]

I am pretty exclusive to the A-10C, and have noticed that about 15% of the time

wingmen can be bloody brilliant, whilst most often, they are SAM/ZSU magents and

nothing more.

 

There were some patches where that percentage level increased, and others where

it seemed to decrease.

 

If you go up expecting them to actually assist, you will, more often than not, be

disappointed...

[GC1993]

I am pretty exclusive to the A-10C, and have noticed that about 15% of the time

wingmen can be bloody brilliant, whilst most often, they are SAM/ZSU magents and

nothing more.

 

There were some patches where that percentage level increased, and others where

it seemed to decrease.

 

If you go up expecting them to actually assist, you will, more often than not, be

disappointed...

 

Yeah I appreciate they can OCCASIONALLY perform well, and in fact maybe even 25% of the time, mine end up helping. I just don't get why they do stupid things, such as my "excellent" wingman flying right into the launch radius of the SA-8, and doing a pretty half-arsed job of trying to evade the missile (flies in a slight climbing turn whilst popping flares (radar guided missile - nice one wingman :S).

You'd think even the lowest setting of AI wouldn't be stupid enough to do things like that because it wouldn't be realistic, a pilot with that kind of situational strategy IRL wouldn't keep his wings for long.