AI Turret random laser deviation

[Cody38]

So long ago, when AI were controlling turrets they would have random inaccuracy for balancing purpose I suppose, but this year that was removed and it saw a major increase in the usefulness of turrets and AI fighters. AI could manage to hit moving targets and other fighters, but as of yesterday's patch, this random deviation was re-added.

Now not only is every weapon system majorly changed (Very difficult to get good fire rate as well as DPS with AMCs), the AI can't hit anything at all since the random inaccuracy is back. On top of this, AI can't use half the new weapons or weapons which have been linked up with other weapons (Which I assume this will be fixed).

So, opinions on the random inaccuracy? The AI was pinpoint accurate and effective before and now it's back to it's state where it can't hit a moving target, and depending on size, can't hit a stationary target. I for one think the AI shouldn't have this deviation to counterbalance the fact they don't know how to target key points, high threats, or know how to get out of the way of large ships' cannons.

 

[TwoNiner]

I agree entirely, upon using AIs to test various aspects of the new update I have also found them to be completely obsolete with their inability to hit moving targets. Note that this maybe due to the reduced projectile speed of the AMCs and the AI's inability to predict movement " leading their targets" as I like to refer to it as. Either the projectile speed has to be increases or the AI has to be better programmed.

 

[0ldSkull]

Are you sure it's an aspect of the AI? When I was fighting tonight I had a heck of a time hitting anything manually because much of the time the bullets weren't going where I was aiming, like the sights were randomly off.

 

[TwoNiner]

Are you sure it's an aspect of the AI? When I was fighting tonight I had a heck of a time hitting anything manually because much of the time the bullets weren't going where I was aiming, like the sights were randomly off.

Well then I suggest you learn to lead your targets like in a shooter

 

[Aecetym]

I somewhat like the randomness of the turrets firing, looks so much better imo. No longer do you see every single turret firing on a single burning point (aka the core) with 100% accuracy.

Pretty much came to the point that you would need only a strip of armor on the side of your ship if that would be the only place the enemy would hit you. (Realisticly impossible to predict but is a possibility with this system) From all the fights, taking or dealing damage, the damage would always be in a straight line to the core, while the rest of the ship barely got hit at all.

But I do agree with the fact that if they can't hit anything they are pretty useless.

 

[Malacodor]

AI could manage to hit moving targets and other fighters, but as of yesterday's patch, this random deviation was re-added.

Is your PROJECTILES_ADDITIVE_VELOCITY true or false? Does anybody know if AI can handle both options equally well?

 

[0ldSkull]

Well then I suggest you learn to lead your targets like in a shooter

Read much? I'm not the best shot, but good aim doesn't matter much when the gun doesn't shoot where the reticle is pointing. With my painfully slow rate of fire (need to rebuild the weapons since the update) it eventually became pretty obvious. I'd lead to the left (for instance) and see the projectiles go several degrees above or below even when stopped or barely moving.

It was a cool fight in its own way, with several Trading Guild ships also engaging the pirates I could actually join in without having reoptimized everything yet.

 

[Keptick]

I think that AI should be 100% accurate like it used to. Reason being that it's very easy to dodge projectiles with the speed they currently have.

 

[jorgekorke]

I'd rather increase the projectile general speed and reprogram the AI to attempt predicting of target, but still with the innacuracy. Fighters should remain with chances

 

[Lecic]

The accuracy isn't bad enough that they can't hit a large ship with the deviations. However, they are horrible against small ships. So, I think a simple solution to this is to use tracking missiles (or flak guns, when added) to counteract small ships.

AI being able to core ships with ease was a huge problem with this game, so I like this change.

 

[TwoNiner]

Actually regarding accuracy, here's an intresting concept. As we starmade veterans may know, fighters are close to useless fighting capital ships with powerful turrets simply because the turrets designed to be used against other capital ships would kill your fighter almost instantly due to the damage of those big turrets and the AI's high accuracy.

Well how about this, have the AI's accuracy scale against the size of the turret but only to a small extent to say...10-20 blocks off the target's core, making it so AIs controlling large turrets have less accuracy compared to AIs controlling smaller turrets. That would not only make fighters useful again due to their lower chance of being hit by anti capital ship weaponry, but also give a reason to build small point defence turrets to fend off fighters which would be fair due to the limited amount of damage a small turret could output.

 

[Cody38]

I agree entirely, upon using AIs to test various aspects of the new update I have also found them to be completely obsolete with their inability to hit moving targets. Note that this maybe due to the reduced projectile speed of the AMCs and the AI's inability to predict movement " leading their targets" as I like to refer to it as. Either the projectile speed has to be increases or the AI has to be better programmed.

Try making a AMC that fires really fast, and spawn an enemy version of it. You'll notice it doesn't shoot in a straight line, it sprays everywhere.

 

[Cody38]

I somewhat like the randomness of the turrets firing, looks so much better imo. No longer do you see every single turret firing on a single burning point (aka the core) with 100% accuracy.

Pretty much came to the point that you would need only a strip of armor on the side of your ship if that would be the only place the enemy would hit you. (Realisticly impossible to predict but is a possibility with this system) From all the fights, taking or dealing damage, the damage would always be in a straight line to the core, while the rest of the ship barely got hit at all.

But I do agree with the fact that if they can't hit anything they are pretty useless.

This is a good point, but would you rather have cool factor or something that works?

 

[Cody38]

Actually regarding accuracy, here's an intresting concept. As we starmade veterans may know, fighters are close to useless fighting capital ships with powerful turrets simply because the turrets designed to be used against other capital ships would kill your fighter almost instantly due to the damage of those big turrets and the AI's high accuracy.

Well how about this, have the AI's accuracy scale against the size of the turret but only to a small extent to say...10-20 blocks off the target's core, making it so AIs controlling large turrets have less accuracy compared to AIs controlling smaller turrets. That would not only make fighters useful again due to their lower chance of being hit by anti capital ship weaponry, but also give a reason to build small point defence turrets to fend off fighters which would be fair due to the limited amount of damage a small turret could output.

That's a good idea, but an entire new system would have to be made to scale accuracy to the amount of AMCs.

 

[Aecetym]

This is a good point, but would you rather have cool factor or something that works?

My last sentence pretty much agreed on the fact that making a aspect of the game, surely a big one like this, useless isn't the way to go.

In the rest of the post I just pointed out some issues the old system had

 

[Aecetym]

Actually regarding accuracy, here's an intresting concept. As we starmade veterans may know, fighters are close to useless fighting capital ships with powerful turrets simply because the turrets designed to be used against other capital ships would kill your fighter almost instantly due to the damage of those big turrets and the AI's high accuracy.

Well how about this, have the AI's accuracy scale against the size of the turret but only to a small extent to say...10-20 blocks off the target's core, making it so AIs controlling large turrets have less accuracy compared to AIs controlling smaller turrets. That would not only make fighters useful again due to their lower chance of being hit by anti capital ship weaponry, but also give a reason to build small point defence turrets to fend off fighters which would be fair due to the limited amount of damage a small turret could output.

And what for those that build multifunctional turrets? Turrets with long range and short range in 1 turret. It would mean you would only have the option of specialized turrets.

 

[Lecic]

That's a good idea, but an entire new system would have to be made to scale accuracy to the amount of AMCs.

You say that like it would be a difficult thing to do. I'm not much of a coder, but it wouldn't really be hard to do at all. The more blocks of AMCs, the lower the accuracy percentage of AIs.

 

[Lecic]

And what for those that build multifunctional turrets? Turrets with long range and short range in 1 turret. It would mean you would only have the option of specialized turrets.

You can still build a balanced turret, but a jack-of-all-trades is not bad at anything but not great at anything either.

Specialized turrets make people have more diverse and unique ships. With everything being able to fulfill every turret role, there is no need to build many types of special turrets for battling numerous ship classes.

 

[Sven_The_Slayer]

AI_WEAPON_AIMING_ACCURACY = 10 //how accurate the AI aims (the higher the value the more accurate vs distance. 10 = about 99% accuracy at 10m)

I actually set mine up to 1000 for a while and I find the turrets to be more effective at 10. While set to 1000 they are tack drivers but because the enemy AI circle you at 1k out and the random deviation actually scores more hits because they turret AI cannot lead the targets well enough. This may be better now that cannon speeds are twice as fast though but feel free to mess with other settings. I plan on trying 100 and 10000 when I get around to it. Set it to 1 if you want REALLY PATHETIC AI.

 

[Aecetym]

You can still build a balanced turret, but a jack-of-all-trades is not bad at anything but not great at anything either.

Specialized turrets make people have more diverse and unique ships. With everything being able to fulfill every turret role, there is no need to build many types of special turrets for battling numerous ship classes.

I don't agree with u on that point. It's like saying a tank can't have a machinegun mounted next to the turret or on top because that would make it to omnipotent, thus unfair.