[DISCUSS]Bot Plannets

[Karmulian]

Bot planets are something we are currently considering.. mist has been assigned to look into it.. so please continue to discuss

[Kal]

the biggest headache i can see with them is coding them in the first place and then balenceing them, but the idea itslef is interesting

[Gerbie]

There's no need to have bot planets. I don't want to play against bots I want to play the evil ... alliance.

Bots are a tool to get a steady flow of roids into the game. With more attracktive free planets you can do that as well. Or give every planet 1 free extra roid/10 ticks. Send over the easterbunny/santa claus each week.

[mist]

Originally Posted by KalVirtus

the biggest headache i can see with them is coding them in the first place and then balenceing them, but the idea itslef is interesting

the biggest headache is making them learn from their mistakes :/ the second biggest is making sure they can function at a range of skill levels and still mimic humans adequatley

-mist

[Leshy]

No to bot planets for now.

Feel free to experiment, and possibly run them in speedgames and for testing purposes. But please - there is not nearly enough time to draw them up, test them extensively and discover all the implications. By all means develop them, but do not work to get them ready for R11. A dramatic game change such as this can not be anything less than perfect and needs a lot of live action testing - more than a single beta period.

[Qdeathstar]

wow, i thought PA team had disregard this...

Im not going to comment further really, accept to say that i, as a non-allied player of PA am for Bots. Read my posts above for further information :-). (tired, maybe later) I agree with leshy though, not for round 11 unless you've already been working them. They need to get a good solid testing in first :-).

Once you get bots, your only a hop-skitch away from being able to distribute PA off line as a demo, and increase your name recognition by giveing it to sites such as www.gamehippo.com, ect ect :-)

[mist]

Originally Posted by Leshy

No to bot planets for now.

Feel free to experiment, and possibly run them in speedgames and for testing purposes. But please - there is not nearly enough time to draw them up, test them extensively and discover all the implications. By all means develop them, but do not work to get them ready for R11. A dramatic game change such as this can not be anything less than perfect and needs a lot of live action testing - more than a single beta period.

realistically, you may have a point. just from the initial scribblings i can see that bots are going to be hugely complicated - particularly as they have to be able to deal with all the game's admin options, not just what the players are seeing for the current game setup. also, obviously, they're going to need a lot of testing, and untill they're at least designed there's no way of knowing how fast they'll be able to tick - ie how fast they can even be tested...

however, i think bots are something that needs to be done. not sure about qdeathstar's idea of marketing a paol type game, as i think the bots will be self contained, rather than allying with humans - and being on your own against an alliance of bots wouldn't do you good :P upshot of that being that they need to be started, so a start is being made

-mist

[Qdeathstar]

Yeah, mist, its not going to be anything special, but a way to get PA out to the masses again would be beneficial. That would be one way..

[Gerbie]

There is an off line version of PA that uses automated planets bots. You always win that game, eventhough you have effectively no alliance, while the bots do. Unless you mimic being online 24/7, they will lose. For bots to work they will need to work effectively together in alliances/groups, and be able to attack like that as well. Which will be hard to code. Especially if you want to reward skilled playing. Because you'll have to add all the skill people build up in years into a bunch of bots.

BTW: If I get bashed by a bot I will quit.

[Leshy]

So you want bots to be skilled, but you don't want them to take down your planet.

[Kal]

i'm sure they could be programmed to roid ratehr than purposefully kill - of course killing can;t allways be avoided

[Isambard]

I have often thought of Bot planets, and having them serve as a source of roids for lower ranked players.

PA is a viscious game, to grow you must take from others, normally those smaller than yourself. This filters down the food chain to the n00bs, he keep getting hit. But it is the n00bs we need to turn into regular players to keep the game alive.

My idea is that many smaller bot planets could exist. They dont even need to be run properly, each tick they could get free 1 random roid and a random ship for thier race (with FI coming more often than BS class).

These planets would be kept too small for most players to attack, but would supply roids to smaller players, give them good targets to attack and so on.

[Paul_Atreides]

sience you are allk concerd about one person/group desining the bots, hold a contest 4 ppl who want to participate, have them desin it, then combine the desins, so it cant b 1 group/persondesining them, thn have the pa team check it, then do a beta, or I have a friend who is really good with this kind of thing, and he's never heard of the game, so if we can get some ppl like him to desine it, it cant b biest, they have nothing to gain, just give them a copy of the basic game to test it, then the PA team can do there own testin, and then if they approve, they can implamentent in the next roynd.

so what do u think

PS,
sorry for anney misspells, it is almost midnight, and i have 2 wear an eye pacth, don't ask.

[BlueDemon]

I know this is old news, but I'm cruisin the forums and need something to do anyways.
Seems to me that if your have those willing to pay for a bots account, maybe it's not a bad idea. set up a seperate game, not sure how difficult this would be, for bots only and enter at your own risk. As long as everybody that plays knows up front they more than likely are dealing with bots.........
Would mean an increase in funds for PA, just some thoughts, now you can bash me for commenting on an old thread

[Nadar]

I don't hope they get a huge bug or something so they all launch on one planet

[Robsch]

guess you have to change the user agreement then:
If PA-Crew uses bots then there is no point in disallowing bots to be used by other users - haha you fight bots for years now and suddenly you change your mind and see them as enrichment of the game? *lol*

[Phil^]

Originally Posted by BlueDemon

I know this is old news, but I'm cruisin the forums and need something to do anyways.
Seems to me that if your have those willing to pay for a bots account, maybe it's not a bad idea. set up a seperate game, not sure how difficult this would be, for bots only and enter at your own risk. As long as everybody that plays knows up front they more than likely are dealing with bots.........
Would mean an increase in funds for PA, just some thoughts, now you can bash me for commenting on an old thread

its more then just old, its two years old

[Makhil]

The bot planets as I see them:
- Located in unexplored outer space, +2 eta to reach them
- Unknown race, but apparently not advanced enough to launch attacks with the usual ships. However as in Starship Troopers, they could launch asteroids (killing structures) only to planets that have stolen from them.
- They defend themselves with PDS
- On the galaxy screen they appear only with name and coords (need a scan to find the number of roids they have).

[furball]

Originally Posted by Robsch

guess you have to change the user agreement then:
If PA-Crew uses bots then there is no point in disallowing bots to be used by other users - haha you fight bots for years now and suddenly you change your mind and see them as enrichment of the game? *lol*

I don't see how that works.

Bots which control planets in order to enlarge the universe would be a very different aspect of the universe as opposed to players cheating in order to further their position.


Are you Killmark's brother? Sister? Or just his goldfish?

[The Real Arfy]

I can actually see his point - imagine being roided by bots, or even worse, piggied. You'd be pretty p*ssed off if you stayed up to launch and defend yourself, and then a bot joins in and effectively steals your roids.

However, I do think that bot planets would be very nice, perhaps just as roid initiators and fleet builders perhaps. Let noobies get the roids from trial and error on bot fleets.

[Qdeathstar]

Originally Posted by BlueDemon

I know this is old news, but I'm cruisin the forums and need something to do anyways.
Seems to me that if your have those willing to pay for a bots account, maybe it's not a bad idea. set up a seperate game, not sure how difficult this would be, for bots only and enter at your own risk. As long as everybody that plays knows up front they more than likely are dealing with bots.........
Would mean an increase in funds for PA, just some thoughts, now you can bash me for commenting on an old thread

Not only is this two years old, but your missing the point of the post. The bot planets would be just like any other planet. 2 years ago there was hardly anyone playing. This would artificially increase the ammount of players, they wouldnt behave like slave planets, but instead just like any other planet...

[Pilatus]

Don't like the idea of bot-planets myself. See the point in'em though, and would like bot-planets if it helped new planets with draining attacks away from them. If bot-planets would help against new planets getting targetting by everyone looking for easy roids, then i would say yes. If it could make it possible for top 100 planets or top 10 alliances to expoit bot planets for their victory, i would vote no against them.

[Assassin]

Originally Posted by Qdeathstar

Being that we are facing dwindling numbers.. and bot planets have existed in the past.. .why not bring them back, although under new managment OFC..

As a way to make the game funner, both with more targets/attackers... why not add bot planets which attack/defend/build in our universe. As these are bot-planets, not real planets, they will have no fear of attacking bigger planets. Infact, the bigger you are, the more chance of getting attacked.

Additionaly there ticks could be 1/2 as much as normal planets..

This would add a challange to the game, as well as give the foundation for a playable-single-player demo that would spread the word. Instead of having to use Jolt's suver to give people a game, instead give them the demo they can play on there computer.

I really think this a good idea, although i does change what planetarion is (ofc) but, i mean, as PAteam has said.. a change is indeed needed

If its successfull enough, the demo, perhaps you may eventually be able to make it an addon to PA.. so people can play pa even when they are way from there internet connection..

THe biggest benifit would be that you would be able to submit it to places like fileplanet and gameshippo... ect

But the bots would be in game as well, to make the whole game more fun, and cut down on power blocking.. i think

I like this idea ^^

[robban1]

isnt the whole idea of bots some kind of lifesupport for the game?

oh if you guys do bots do them stupid enough so they can mimic the stupidity of the ppl playing the game otherwhise there is a risk that [BOTS] might win

[Ramihyn]

Originally Posted by robban1

isnt the whole idea of bots some kind of lifesupport for the game?

oh if you guys do bots do them stupid enough so they can mimic the stupidity of the ppl playing the game otherwhise there is a risk that [BOTS] might win

By now its completely impossible to make bots without having people yelling that they ruin the game and they said so in advance. Basically they should do contradicting things and on top of all - not affect the game

They should be a challenge to the top, but not really affect them. They should be cheap targets for low-score players, but they should never be abusable as "farms" or even seriously harm low-score players.

The burden on bots by now is higher than the burden on any player, its completely silly.

[Lοki]

I wouldn't like the idea of bots in the game. If I attack I want some person out there to think "sheet, my roids are gone" or it's not fun anymore... it's the people that I play this game for, not the so wonderful game mechanics

[mist]

the largest problem that faced bot planets when this thread was young seemed to be that noone could decide what they should really do.

[Phil^]

Originally Posted by mist

the largest problem that faced bot planets when this thread was young seemed to be that noone could decide what they should really do.

iirc you drew up a possible design for one, not sure if its still on the pateam forums but it would be a suggestion to dig the thread up if so as it was rather good.

[The_Tyrant]

was anything ever done? do we have skripts or whatever that run an account's to any level? I remember seeing something way back but it was pretty simple. How far did people get?

oh, and was the server load issue ever tested on a beta server or anything?

[Phil^]

the server load i dont think would be a problem unless they plan to have the bot script running at the same time as the ticker
it might be troublesome for speedgames, dependant on the number of bots ofc.
as far as im aware, one was never coded - but a design document was drawn up and discussed in pateam while i was there. Whats happened to it since I left pateam i have no idea.

[Veil05]

The problem i can see with this is that each bot would need to adopt its own tactic. If alliances can see a flaw in the way the bot planets play such as If u attack so many terrans with x amount of ships, the bots dont defend. people will abuse this system, just like every other system they abuse in this game that wont get them closed. however.. 50k extra planets would be sweet targets. lets hope its not a matrix-a-like movie, and they take over :O

[Ultimate Newbie]

Personally, i'd like to see a massive human v bot conflict for universal domination. It'd be like the Borg trying to take over - though humans would try and take potshots at other humans too, and the b0ts would smell fear and weakness and take advantage .

It could be made quite challenging; something different for PA anyway.


Regarding tactics, bottom-feeding Bots would only need to have standardised fleets that were scaleable. Eg, Terran Type 1 would have 30% of resources into Harpies, 20% Dreadnaughts, 10% Pegs, 10% Pho, 25% Behemoth and 5% Leviathian, whereas Terran Type 2 would have 10% of everything or whatever. Then, you could have a Terran Type 1 with 200 roids would have a fleet twice the size of a Terran Type 1 with 100 roids, however on a resource basis they would be of the same composition. Similarly for Terran Type 2's.

[pablissimo]

During MrBrick's temporary incumbency in the hot-seat the pair of us came up with something similar to that. It wasn't an alliance of bots per se, more like a single, distrubuted player. The bot network didn't just decide to randomly attack other players at all. The concept was that the whole universe would be classified by certain characteristics and then behaviours towards the classes of planets could be devised.

For instance, if multiple planets from a single alliance focussed their attacks on one or two bot planets, the network would become more hostile towards that alliance (exhibited in revenge attacks, or an increased propensity to defend more heavily when attacked by that alliance). So the more force an alliance put into attacking the bot network, the more force the bot network would respond with next time (like an escalation of hostilities). If a single planet attacked a bot planet then whilst the network may not respond immediately, it'd make a note of the source of the attack and perhaps retalliate later on in the round when it had the resources to do so, or when that planet had made enough of a nuisance of itself to overcome some internal threshold (for instance, if the planet's galaxy was generally attacking bot-planets then by becoming more hostile towards that galaxy, the bot network also becomes more hostile towards the planet from ages back)

Effectively they'd be like the borg in that scenario, they wouldn't actively do anything except built fleet until provoked. Could have been implemented either by having the bot network control proportions of races of planets equal to those prevalent in the universe at round-start, or by having a separate bot race that was tuned towards EMP and roid theft (for retalliation) rather than structure- and ship-destroying. It does allow for a huge humans-vs-bots conflict, but only should the human players decide to play the round that way.

Technologically whilst it would be a challenge to implement it's far from impossible, the underlying algorithms for creating this kind of simple target classification exist and are readily implementible. I'm however not sure that because it can be done, it should.

[Thefoundation]

or instead of wasting time and money into bot planets, just make PA free. ( = twice as many players)

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by pablissimo

If a single planet attacked a bot planet then whilst the network may not respond immediately, it'd make a note of the source of the attack and perhaps retalliate later on in the round when it had the resources to do so, or when that planet had made enough of a nuisance of itself to overcome some internal threshold (for instance, if the planet's galaxy was generally attacking bot-planets then by becoming more hostile towards that galaxy, the bot network also becomes more hostile towards the planet from ages back).

That's an interesting approach, but if Bots exist in the PA universe in order to be the bottom tier of planets for new and inexperienced and inactive players to feed upon, then the planets who get hit the most by the bots are those least able to defend themselves. Yes, i know you said that there was a time factor involved, but a week for active players is a really long time, but if you are a casual weekend only player, then a week isnt very long before retaliation.

If its a whole human vs bot type war, then that situation would be excellent.

Originally Posted by Thefoundation

or instead of wasting time and money into bot planets, just make PA free. ( = twice as many players)

If that was a practical solution, it would have been implemented already. Clearly, PA will be P2P for the forseeable future, and even doubling the playerbase is still prolly insufficient.