Red AI Adapting - Blue & Green AI Nearly Useless

[MHDriver]

So I have noticed the Xeno AI program has the ability to adapt. Case in point: I placed a heavy defense platform in front of the gate from Inanamus Zura to Bright Promise when the Xenos are streaming in. For several days the K's were popping in and running right into the station guns and getting shredded. Usually 4-5 hulks floating around at any point in time. Then their behavior changed, the K's came through the gate, stopped, turned and went around to the back of the gate and back into IZ. Today their behavior changed again in that now they come through the gate, stop, point their nose straight down and pass under my defense station guns ranges and off to pillage and plunder. Clearly and adaptation that the Green and Blue AI were not given. They still do the dumb azz things like running off on their own several systems away, doing the Leroy Jenkins charge when set to hold position and so on and so on.

I guess modern game Devs think adding the tension of incompetent AI makes the game more interesting in some way or something. At any rate, this game is an early access build without question and certainly not worth $60.00 USD as is.

[Falcrack]

I think you are giving too much credit to the red AI. More than likely neither enemy nor friendly AI are adapting to anything.

[SPiDER]

I agree with the op had the same thing in HAT1 sometimes they come through the gate and just hit travel drive immediatly ( all sizes and variety ) very very rarely now do they just fly into where the defenses are.

Also riddle me this ...when Xenon ships are on recon they disengage feom combat when taken some damage..retreat to get repaired and resupplied then come back for more..if the Xenon can do this why cant mine?

And if the ARG capital ship and its subordiantes that are assigned to the Defense station in HAT 1 break off comabt and DONT follow the retreating Xenon why the hell dont my ships.

As op said its unbalanced...if its intended gameplay at least have the decency to stand up and say so....The vast collective silence from all posts of this type of bug/imbalance from Devs is frustrating.

And what about the damned sound issue?????? intoduced in 2.0 and not even acknowledged.

[pref]

Xenon ships execute the same scripts the rest do. They just respawn all the time and so based on big numbers they have more chance to pick a seemingly smarter behaviour. Would be about the same if you did not care for your own assets, a couple in a hundred would seem more smart then the rest.

Also your own ship seem to be more stupid in cases because ES implemented extra logic here and there for player owned ships so they seem more smart in cases but that might backfire.

[Nafensoriel]

It's not the movies. You don't make 12 scripts for 12 enemies. You just need 1.

There are only so many ways to tell something to go from x to y and shoot z.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

Right, dock at a Cerberus. With mark II software. If you are flying you get within a certain distance and hey presto. The docking happens automatically and is very smooth.

Go to the cockpit of the same ship, order the S ship to undock, then ask it to redock. The ship goes through some very convoluted manoeveurs before landing back on the Cerberus.

What the .... is going on. It comes in upside down, through the hull and spins over before finally settling on the deck. ? ? ? ?

Maybe that is just the difference between a 0 star pilot and myself (a six star genius pilot.) However since the genius docking software should take over clearly there is something wrong here.
All ships when they are in a certain position should be docked using the same routine.

[Imperial Good]

The Xenon use the same scripts as all other factions, however they are fed different parameters to them and there are special case logic for them in some as well.

Ironically in my game the Xenon are doing badly. They have killed their own economy and the only place where K/Is exist is the Faulty Logic branch, with all others being effectively dead (no XL ships). They need to treat each branch of their separately, rather than trying to send resources from one to the other since such shipments will not make it.

[pref]

The Xenon use the same scripts as all other factions, however they are fed different parameters to them and there are special case logic for them in some as well.

Nothing that influences how they evade obstructions, or what route they will use when attacking anything.

[SPiDER]

And yet MY Ai controlled ship WONT break off combat and go and repair themselves or NOT go through TWO jumpgates AND an accelerator following an enemey so CLEARLY there ARE other parameters in play.

as OP first stated IMBALANCE.

If Xenon and Sector FAction Patrol ships dont then I ask again why do my AI ships????

What may be better would be to clealy Label the Protect Station command .

"Protect Station with a 90% chance of suicide by Xenon Wharf"...then at least we know we are throwing ships and cr away...

[pref]

And yet MY Ai controlled ship WONT break off combat and go and repair themselves or NOT go through TWO jumpgates AND an accelerator following an enemey so CLEARLY there ARE other parameters in play.

Your ships won't go resupply because they are yours to command, guess ES didn't find it reasonable to just make your ships leave you alone with 10 Ks and go buy 10 missiles.

AI ships will also chase enemies to the other end of the universe, it's just not painful because your aren't controlling them. Especially with xenon - those ships are supposed to attack anything that moves so that behaviour is satisfactory in their case.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

Something I have noticed since X2. Repetitive ship scripts with gate limits always seemed to have an override that sent them off into dangerous areas to be destroyed.
When playing the game I would save frequently. Now and again I would get a ship under attack message. I would find the ship in say, Presidents End.
The ship would then be destroyed. I would reload and then watch this ship. I found that it made a bee-line to a sector, trying to stop it from carrying out this order was difficult.
It was if something had decided that this ship must die. This behaviour would occur even if the ship had a limit on the gates it could fly through.

Whenever one of my ships wanders off into a Xenon sector, I always wonder if this code is still lurking in there somewhere.
Ships on patrol seem to do this most often. Personally, if I set a ship to defend another I expect it to do just that. Watching ship behaviour through the map, this seems to be the very last thing any
defender actually does.

I think the new map just helps to highlight the strange behaviour of ships.

[MHDriver]

Something I have noticed since X2. Repetitive ship scripts with gate limits always seemed to have an override that sent them off into dangerous areas to be destroyed.
When playing the game I would save frequently. Now and again I would get a ship under attack message. I would find the ship in say, Presidents End.
The ship would then be destroyed. I would reload and then watch this ship. I found that it made a bee-line to a sector, trying to stop it from carrying out this order was difficult.
It was if something had decided that this ship must die. This behaviour would occur even if the ship had a limit on the gates it could fly through.

Whenever one of my ships wanders off into a Xenon sector, I always wonder if this code is still lurking in there somewhere.
Ships on patrol seem to do this most often. Personally, if I set a ship to defend another I expect it to do just that. Watching ship behaviour through the map, this seems to be the very last thing any
defender actually does.

I think the new map just helps to highlight the strange behaviour of ships.

Yes, it is also affecting Defense Drones.. I have had station defense drones leave the station and fly off through two gates and into Xeno sector to be destroyed of course. I mean WTF is that about really?

[SPiDER]

If Faction AI ships example ARG Behemoth and subordinates DONT follow enemy ( Xenon ) through the jump gates then why do mine? that is a very very simple question.

as op stated in original post the behaviour difference between Faction, Enemy and Player is Unbalanced.

Only player ships commit suicide in this way not Faction ai ship like ARG.

The Xenon do but thats what they are there for

[pref]

It was if something had decided that this ship must die. This behaviour would occur even if the ship had a limit on the gates it could fly through.

In X3 it was intended, ships moved out of sight to despawn/get destroyed when their tasks were done.
In X4 it's a result of careless coding. Same bad logic was added to nearly all scripts which overrides any player order.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

Just watched yet another battle. I have a Colossus with four Behemoth defenders. Sometimes they are in formation. Good.
When a fight breaks out all bets on the behaviour of the defenders are off.

Here is what I would expect. The defenders should stay near the wing leader. Yes they can engage enemies but they should never get too far away.
What actually happens? One of the defenders spots an S size ships and away it goes. What is most annoying for me is I have no control over this behaviour.
I want to be able to tell the Behemoth that its targets are M sized and above. I want to be able to define a radius for defenders that they do not leave.
That radius is always centred on the ship they are set to defend.

I can issue recall subordinates from the Colossus and most of the time this is just ignored. After the fight I ordered the Colossus to move to a position and wait.
The subordinates are now quite a distance from the ship they are meant to be defending and are ignoring all recall commands. At this point I saved and quit the game.

[Imperial Good]

Something I have noticed since X2. Repetitive ship scripts with gate limits always seemed to have an override that sent them off into dangerous areas to be destroyed.
When playing the game I would save frequently. Now and again I would get a ship under attack message. I would find the ship in say, Presidents End.
The ship would then be destroyed. I would reload and then watch this ship. I found that it made a bee-line to a sector, trying to stop it from carrying out this order was difficult.
It was if something had decided that this ship must die. This behaviour would occur even if the ship had a limit on the gates it could fly through.

Sounds like the ship was accidently selected by an AI script. In X4 1.00 this used to happen with captured pirate ships that could be randomly teleported as an encounter and commanded to attack you. One could order them to stop and they would stop attacking you but they could still start to try to attack you again.

If Faction AI ships example ARG Behemoth and subordinates DONT follow enemy ( Xenon ) through the jump gates then why do mine? that is a very very simple question.

Except they do. Just they have a macro management script that detects these rouge ships or silly chase orders and orders them back. Players do not have such macro management scripts, since there would be no point in playing if they did, meaning that the player has to manually baby sit the ships to stop it happening.

Here is what I would expect. The defenders should stay near the wing leader. Yes they can engage enemies but they should never get too far away.
What actually happens? One of the defenders spots an S size ships and away it goes. What is most annoying for me is I have no control over this behaviour.
I want to be able to tell the Behemoth that its targets are M sized and above. I want to be able to define a radius for defenders that they do not leave.
That radius is always centred on the ship they are set to defend.

It is a known issue/bug that ships set to patrol or protect will chase enemies to other sectors or far away from the area. They are meant to leash back when the target exceeds a certain range or changes sector, but they do not. Apparently this is fixed in 2.20, but they also claimed it was fixed in 1.60 and 2.00 so it might be that just some more cases are fixed so the issue is less likely to occur.