The Rise of the Machines
trying to harass Barbie is like poking a wasps nest: (Thunder in red vs green and yellow barbarians, my own town just got a beating) view animation here: http://postimg.org/image/tz8fs4hyl/
Since my friend and i started playing vs AI early 2014 i have collected about 450 records of these great and entertaining games. Of these about 120 are posted in the thread "Brainless beating Barbie". All wins of course. (http://www.aoczone.net/viewtopic.php?f=634&t=101709)
But there have also been losses. I went through all of them and found about 90 records of us loosing vs AI, mostly barbie.
So, it was about time i would start posting them. It will give a more realistic image of what you can expect when playing vs barbie.
I gathered the complete set, edited naming and put them all in a cloud folder. You can download it from there, so i will not have to overload AocZone server with my trash.
You can find them all here:
DOWNLOAD RECS: https://copy.com/6xDMShqYeGbq9jQw
These games, as i mentioned before, were collected during 1,5 years of playing. Watching the old games back, i feel pain to see how bad we played. So, if you feel the same, yes, we were not that experienced in those settings. So for, the better games, look more downward in the list.
On the other hand, barbie (and other AI's) have improved too. We started vs barbie 2.14, and now we play 2.16c, which is a significant improvement. We used to play 2v3, 2v4 before, and won those. Versus 2,16 we play 2v2 3v3, and sometimes 3v4. A sign of how much better this AI became by the hand of its creator, TheMax. Or i am just getting old. Or maybe both. Anyway, i dont take it so serious anymore.
We play for fun anyway. Try a map 3 or 4 times then go on to the next. I love improvising, finding creative ways to win. Taking opportunities, playing risky. Not drilling myself the shortest way to victory. So you will not see thight builds from my hand. You will see daring stuff that would never work vs human, and you will see things going bad.
Set Difficulty
There are many ways to set difficulty in these AI games. You can alter number of players (2v3,3v4,2v4), pop limit, set civs, change map size, choose map, play with reveal on/off. Etc. We tried all these things, and now we got a pretty good feeling about when AI is strong, and how to approach it. Most of our games we play with pop limit 300 or 400, just to make it harder, and because 200 is not enough in our play. Lag is not an issue anyway (we play over IP, ping varies from 20-30)
Lately, we dont have much losses any more. We rush more effectivly (not too much, or it spoils our game) So i didnt post any records lately, they all look so obvious. I might add a few, but i do not expect to go on much longer on that thread.
I might however collect a few records which i am especially proud of and publish a "Best of Brainless"
Stay tuned! (maybe i will go streaming someday)
Notes:
- to prevent errors in watching the records, use the latest userpatch: http://userpatch.aiscripters.net/
- Barbarian AI is created by TheMax. You can find the latest version here: http://aok.heavengames.com/blacksmith/showfile.php?fileid=11085
- Promi AI is created by Promiskuitiv. You can find the latest version here: http://aok.heavengames.com/blacksmith/showfile.php?fileid=11119
- Juggermaut AI is created by UnfairestEel. You can find the latest version here:
http://aok.heavengames.com/blacksmith/showfile.php?fileid=11953
- The Horde AI is created by Zergs. You can find the latest version here:
http://aok.heavengames.com/blacksmith/showfile.php?fileid=10116
- You can find the continious AI ladder rating here: http://aok.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=28,40898,,30
It also gives the latest versions of all the AI's and their file locations. Note that the rating is defined by AI's playing vs each other. This result does not always reflect how they compare to play vs human player.
- As far as i know, those AI's only work in AOC with userpatch. If you are using another version of the game, or HD version, and you like a real fight vs computer players, i would seriously consider to get your own original AOC version and get that userpatch. Because it is just a brilliant game.
playing over IP
- Playing vs AI with other people, using Voobly or Gameranger will slow your game down, and will finally freeze it. Because the number of commands given by the AI's, the system can overload, in about 15-30 mins in game.
Sadly, the only way to solve this is by playing over IP. Playing over IP allows you a direct peer-to-peer connection without any client or service in between. All you need is the hosts IP adress to find and enter his game.
To do this, start the game outside Voobly or gameranger, in the main menu pick "MULTIPLAYER" > Internet TCP/IP connection for directplay > [ CREATE ]. Then pass on your IP adress to your buddy's, so they can join your game, in the same way, but then using the button [ JOIN ].
IP games offer very smooth play, especially if you have good connection. More important, i gives you a very stable connection, which hardly never drops. Play on slow speed to compensate the increased gamespeed.
If ever you experience slower/sloppy game handling it can be wise to reset your router. (many routers have a tiny hidden button to do this). However i must say, we did not need to do this in the last half year, whereas we used to do this 1/month before
Some people have trouble connecting to a host over IP. It is like the NAT problem in Voobly or "being italic" in gameranger. The cause of this is mostly that your router is not yet setup. To solve this it requires certain ports being forwarded on Routers that don't support the UPnP port forwarding support provided by Userpatch. Those ports are 2300-2400 TCP, 2300-2400 UDP and 47624 TCP. (And 53754 TCP if you want to allow people to spectate your game.)
It is a small technical step, that anyone will be able to do with the right guide .http://portforward.com/help/portforwarding.htm
GL HF
Map previews: