Commander (A AI Based Game)

[rover2341]

I need help with the Balance. Do you think what i have looks balanced?
Does this game look fun?
Does it look like it could be made?
Do you see any pit falls?

50 units per team 3v3.

Game play:
People can only tell there hole army to go to 1-15 points, telling them to move or attack to that point. (Army = up to 50 units)

Balance ing Units:
The cost, there hp, gold drop, and dmg.

Buffs:
G-Buffs only apply to everyone near unit, of the same class (Melee,range,Artillery)
The only buffs i feel are adjustable are.
Knight (how long stun/Percent) for Buff
S-Archer (How many it can it Spread shot, and percent of it happening)

What is Commander

Command your army into battle, buy more troops, upgrade there weapons and armor, teach them to fight wisely, and win the war!

Commander is a game a 3v3 game. In commander you command your army, but you can’t control any of them individually. You can send your army to fifteen points on the map, and tell them to attack towards that point or to move to that point. There are three types of classes are melee, range and artillery. Also there are different armor types and attack types for each class of unit. All that can be upgraded ten times. Also each unit has a ranking system, one being the worst and five being the best. The higher the rank the more value that player is worth (with aqua’s or a strong buff). You can teach your army to focus fire, finish almost dead units, to attack the units they do most damage against, to attack the higher ranking units, and to run back to base and heal before they die.

So build your army, and teach them well because the battle is coming to you!

Plan for Commander - Step by Step

Currently on step: 3

1) Basic Terrain (.0-.1)
• 15 Points
• 2 sides start spots


2) Every unit build able (.1-.2)
• Buildings to make units (5 melle,5 range,3 artillery)
Melee
o Footmen
o Captain
o Bear Cap
o Knight
o Major Melee

Range
o Archer
o Riflemen
o Range Captain
o Super Archer
o Major Range

Artillery
o Catapult
o S – Shooter
o Major Artillery

• Upgrade centers
• Healing Pool


3) Send Army units to points, (attack or Move) (.2-.3)


4) Fill Data in (.4-.5)
• All units stats (a)
Melee
o Footmen
o Captain
o Bear Cap
o Knight
o Major Melee

Range
o Archer
o Riflemen
o Range Captain
o Super Archer
o Major Range

Artillery
o Catapult
o S – Shooter
o Major Artillery

• All units upgrades (b)
Melee
o 10 Attack upgrades
o 10 armor upgrades

Range
o 10 Attack upgrades
o 10 armor upgrades

Artillery
o 10 Attack upgrades
o 10 armor upgrades


5) Build AI Upgrades (.3-.4)
• Focus Fire (a)
• Kill Low Hp(b)
• Attack Best Target (c)
• Heal at hp percent (d)
• Possible (Smart Tanks) (e)


6) Alpha (.5-.75)
• Run 10-100 games for balance testing
• Add in sound effects
• Add in icons
• Loading screen
• Mini screen
• Terrain cleaned up


7) Beta (.75-.99)
• Release game


8) Release game (1.0-ect)
• Release game

The AI Parts

• Focus Fire (a)
First Upgrade: Will command up too 2 units to focus fire (On one unit) if there in range.
Second Upgrade: Will command up too 3 units to focus fire (On one unit) if there in range.
Third Upgrade: Will command up too 4 units to focus fire (On one unit) if there in range.
Fourth Upgrade: Will command up too 5 units to focus fire (On one unit) if there in range.
5th Upgrade: Will command up too 6 units to focus fire (On one unit) if there in range.

Note: Apply s to hole army, For First for example you can focus fire one many targets, but each target it will only put 2 guys focusing fire on it.

• Kill Low Hp(b)
First Upgrade: Attacks the person with the lowest hp that is in range, you can tell the difference of there hp from 100%-75%.
Second Upgrade: Attacks the person with the lowest hp that is in range, you can tell the difference of there hp from 100%-50%.
Third Upgrade: Attacks the person with the lowest hp that is in range, you can tell the difference of there hp from 100%-25%.
Fourth Upgrade: Attacks the person with the lowest hp that is in range, you can tell the difference of there hp from 100%-15%.
5th Upgrade: Attacks the person with the lowest hp that is in range, you can tell the difference of there hp from 100%-5%.

• Attack Best Target (c)
First Upgrade: This will have them on there first upgrade, att people that you do most dmg to, armor types.
Second Upgrade: Attacks higher ranking officers if there near (first checks for the best armor type to att, then out of those people it atts the highest ranking offer)
Third Upgrade: will have the target look just outside its range by + 50.
Fourth Upgrade: will have the target look just outside its range by + 75.
5th Upgrade: will have the target look just outside its range by + 100.

• Heal at hp percent (d)
First Upgrade: When ever a unit gets = or less then 1% of there hp, they run back to base till they are healed. And then rejoin the army.
Second Upgrade: When ever a unit gets = or less then 2% of there hp, they run back to base till they are healed. And then rejoin the army.
Third Upgrade: When ever a unit gets = or less then 3% of there hp, they run back to base till they are healed. And then rejoin the army.
Fourth Upgrade: When ever a unit gets = or less then 4% of there hp, they run back to base till they are healed. And then rejoin the army.
5th Upgrade: When ever a unit gets = or less then 5% of there hp, they run back to base till they are healed. And then rejoin the army.

• Possible (Smart Tanks) (e)
First Upgrade: Checks 2 random targets in range, and estimates how much dmg it will do overall (its aoe to everyone near by), and then fires at the best target.
Second Upgrade: Checks 3 random targets in range, and estimates how much dmg it will do overall (its aoe to everyone near by), and then fires at the best target.
Third Upgrade: Checks 4 random targets in range, and estimates how much dmg it will do overall (its aoe to everyone near by), and then fires at the best target.
Fourth Upgrade: Checks 5 random targets in range, and estimates how much dmg it will do overall (its aoe to everyone near by), and then fires at the best target.
5th Upgrade: Checks 6 random targets in range, and estimates how much dmg it will do overall (its aoe to everyone near by), and then fires at the best target.

The order of if two things conflict, for the AI part, i will hammer out soon. Not sure if i will force one order, or allow it to be changeable, most likely force 1.
For example if you have all upgardes, you will it focus fire or hit the unit with lowest hp, or the one thats best to att becasuce of armor type.
I will most likely list the order of them (what overrides the others) and not allow it to be changeable

 

[Dr Super Good]

So you are saying 140 units * 6?

That will never work, WC3 can not support that many units well. Basically pathing lag would occur a lot resulting in units moving a hell of a lot slower than the provided movement speed (like 1/30th). Also it would mean melee units would be sitting ducks to range units until the army sizes reduce.

This is due to WC3's crappy pathing system where it updates 1 unit's pathing every Xth of a second with a short movement buffer. If too many units move at once, then the buffer runs out by the time the unit's pathing is updated. During this delay between buffer end and update the unit comes to a complete stop and sits there even if under attack. This means that moving once in combat is impossiable and so a lot of your AI (like the retreat one) would fail to work.

The retreat AI seems pointless. 1% is too low for it to possiably survive, especially with pathing lag and so is not at all worth investing in. Only at the end the 5% is ok but still chances of surviving are near 0 and will only mean they get 1-2 less attacks in before dying.

A better one would be that it estimates the damage decrease rate and attempts to flee if it will become critically wounded in X time. The level bonous could then influence the time estimation (would not recomend as it would mean that it might become worse by levels), the definition of critically wounded (what the HP must be less than after the estimation time), or even the number of estimations occuring. This should also be stacked appon your current AI plan so that wounded units flea to reheal. Basically this will mean that units that will die in a short time will try and run with enough time that they will make it out of combat before they die which is important as remember that range units will be firing appont them for a certain retreat period.

Remember that this is only a sujestion and so you do not have to folow it.

 

[rover2341]

About the % of hp before they run, Hmm I like your idea...you did mean in addition to? right? like have if there getting hurt fairly quickly in a small amount of time then have them run or if there low hp.
Ok, Is this game possible...

What would you say is the max amount of units before the game starts to lag. (Around) 300 units ok? i see that 6 x 140 (600 + 240 = 840) way too many.

This is a good point you brought out. If 300 units is the max size, then maybe 1v1 would be the only good option. or 2v2 but allow teams to have 75 units or so each max, (in other words i got to rework this a bit).

I am very happy you had a chance to look at this, i would not have foreseen it till too late.

Edit: Rover considers dropping the game...till star craft 2 comes..... Eh your right. 10 Rep for you.

Hmm..I did some testing of my own. At 50 its noticeable, 60 units per team seems like a max to me. (i hope your right that i can have 60 units per team and it still run decent, i fear that haveing 60x6 = 360 units. the game will lag...only way to test this i guess is to log on to 6 computers. Hmm...i will test. and i understand that some computers may be slower then mine (mine is 4-5 years old P4).

Hmm...More reason to stop mapping till then. most of my ideas just don't fan out in warcraft 3 world editor. and at least i got hope in the starcraft 2 editor.

 

[Dr Super Good]

You can have 24 units moving happily at the same time with no problems. 48 is where it starts to become noticable, 100 starts to crawl and 200 is just a mess. I think though that pathing is separate for each player so having like 48 units moving per player makes no difference.

Sadly WC3 was not made for lots of unit support. SC2 will on the other hand.

 

[rover2341]

After Re Looking at the game. after your insight.

I found that. 50 units per player, the game runs decent. (50 x 6 = 300) Not 100% but i hope that runs decent.
If i bought the units down to 40...that would really be pushing it for this game..The fact that its suppose too be a full army. But i would do that if i had too. (I might cry)

I found that 500 gold per min. + the gold you get from killing units. should be about right. the upgrades look about balanced.

close to 7000 for upgrades (6900) 7000 for (All AI) and about 6000 for a full army with some of everything. best possible army would cost closer to 9500k (for just cost of units)

so 42 min into the game. you could have everything maxed with a full army. if you were to just sit there for that long.
But the fact you will be battling you shouldn't be able to max out at 40 min. it would be closer to 70 min.
And the game should end 5-40 min. for most games i would think. (My goal is for this to happen)

(Thus you should t have time to be able to upgrade everything fully, (This way you have to pick a start or be balanced but not max on any one thing.))

I think this can still work and be a decent fun game.

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And of course the game will be balanced after its made in beta testing. But trying to make it as balanced as possible by hand before only helps.