M28AI Devlog (v142)

In the last few weeks or so, we've had a number of games with M28AI result in a complete sim freeze - the UI remains responsive but the game world is completely frozen, with no obvious error messages, Lua debugger windows, etc. I will upload a couple of game.log from sessions where this happened in case helpful.

[1] https://privatebin.net/?4afc224e8d84212e#5JABUWLuMgQvPQkZS6oXxZ8W5bhVG4oVnaeM94xin2Ls

[2] https://privatebin.net/?718c7a544a249cc0#9PC3zqM9osZyA8o4KGs5SeCFh7W44Q43ba8UndPXBPEg

@sparky222b Thanks for the report, do you have the replay IDs for the games?

@maudlin27 Sure, take a look at https://replay.faforever.com/21241916, https://replay.faforever.com/21232383, https://replay.faforever.com/21247517

@sparky222b Thanks, found the cause of the crash (if an M28 T2 arti tries targeting a mobile unit), will fix it in the next update

v55 Update
Aside from fixing a couple of major bugs introduced in recent versions, this update was around tweaks to the early-game logic based on Radde's trophy winning replays.

• 21233524 - 11 changes, including slight improvements to early build order to try and reduce the tendency of M28 to stall power, and a fix to the logic for building an early bomber (that meant it was built when M28 had low power, instead of when it didnt have low power)
• 21233818 - 14 changes, mostly focused around getting more MML sooner if the enemy setups up a T2 arti firebase near M28's base
• 2 other fixes (fixing a crash caused when T2 arti tried to attack a fatboy, and a bug when M28 would consider building T3 mass fabs)

Trophy awards

• Winner of the Radde and Sladow trophies – Radde – in record time Radde beat M28 with a 1.4 resource mod on a large land map, and then crushed it on winter duel at 1.5 AiX. Will the latest changes prove enough to combat a ‘winter duel T2 arti’ attack, or is M28 doomed to failure?

The current trophy holder will also be recognised in the original post of this forum thread.

Other Acknowledgements

• Fearghal – logs highlighting error when M28 considers building mass fabs.
• sparky222b – logs/replays with M28 crashes

Wow, that was really fast! Thank you @maudlin27!

https://replay.faforever.com/21253409

The AI M28 just stood still on the map Twin Rivers - Happen twice in a row; do you have an idea why this is happening?

@magge Based on the game log M28AI wasn't loaded. Can you recall how the game was setup?

For example I've seen this error before where you click on the Load presets option in the game lobby (before the game started), or click on a rehost game option, in which case it would load the AI and use the default/easy AI, so it looks like a similar thing.

If you just created a new game from the FAF client, didn't load any presets, enabled the M28AI mod and selected the AI though then I don't know what caused it.

Thanks for the info - I will forward it to the host player Bash1990 and hopefully he can redo his hosting settings, maybe there was something faulty.

Edit: @maudlin27 He has reinstalled the AI mod and made his lobby settings default - And it is working now.

Thanks for confirming!

v56 release
More replay focused changes, mainly for dealing with nearby enemy firebases and naval production

• 18 Changes relating to winter duel replays to try and get MML faster and attack more aggressively with them
• 9 Changes mostly relating to navy from a mixed mapgen map to try and increase the build power assigned to navy when it's contested, including building torp launchers and subs
• Refinements to T2 arti targeting so they choose their target a couple of seconds before firing (instead of 20 seconds)
• 4 other fixes, including an infinite loop that could happen in some late-game scenarios

Trophy awards
Radde was lightnig fast again with replays securing the two trophies:

• Radde Trophy - Radde
• Sladow Trophy - Radde (beating a 1.7 AiX M28 on winter duel)

I'll adjust the trophy awards slightly going forward - the trophy will now to go the highest AI modifier beaten under the trophy requirements for the latest release of the AI (AiX for Sladow trophy, Resource modifier for Radde trophy); where multiple people beat it at the same modifier, it will go to the first person to beat it at that modifier.

I'll also try to keep the original post updated with the current trophy holder (i.e. ahead of the next version release)

Acknowledgements

• Radde - for providing numerous replays in addition to the trophy winning ones
• Fearghal - Replays/posts highlgithing several errors and a crash
• Triangleleaf - Honourable mention for a replay beating a 2.0 AiX M28

v57 release
Campaign and replay related changes

• Added a new 'no rush' type feature to the hostile campaign AI if it 's using M28 - you can now specify in game options how long it will be before M28 applies most of its logic (including attacking). This is to help make some of the missions where the AI starts with a huge army no longer impossible:
  

• 3 fixes for Aeon M3 so M28 works as a hostile or allied AI

• 9 changes based on Radde's trophy entry (beating M28 1.4 on a naval map), including reduced ecoing so that more resources can be spent defending against navy

• 2 changes on Winter Duel (Sladow trophy entry) so more T1 arti get built and tanks should wait longer before attacking the enemy ACU

• 3 other changes, including adding a threshold for torpedo bombers to be built so the enemy doesn't trigger an emergency response when sending a single engineer across the water

Trophy awards

• Radde trophy - Radde and KuhwaKlimakleber - 1.4 resource 2v2, naval mapgen map
• Sladow trophy - Triangleleaf - 1.8 AiX Winter Duel

Played 2 matches on Adaptive Ben's Turtle, AI played much better the first time despite bumping the build/resource mulitplier to 1.5 from 1.4 for the 2nd match.

1st match: https://replay.faforever.com/21295565 4H vs 2AI (Aeon/Seraphim, 1.4x)
2nd match: https://replay.faforever.com/21307459 4H vs 2AI (UEF/Cybran, 1.5x) <- expected this race combination to be much harder.

@ender06 Thanks, unfortunately both replays desync for me the moment the game starts, but if you play any further games let me know as there's a chance the replay for them won't desync.

v58 Update

• 21301510 Mapgen replay - 6 changes, including making M28 slightly harder to snipe with air
• 21301625 – Winter duel - 7 changes, including making better use of very high resource modifiers
• 21305751 Mapgen - 5 changes, including fixing some issues with fatboys and T2 arti. T2 arti should now be built across the map in some cases (which will likely make things a bit worse and need toning down in a future release)
• 21306326 Mapgen - 4 changes focused on improving MML use against enemy firebases
• 21306893 Naval mapgen - 3 changes, mostly improving how M28 handles HARMs
• 21310805 Mapgen - 2 changes to increase engineer production and mex assistance where multiple mexes are upgrading
• 8 other changes, including having M28 eco less; then having M28 eco more; and stopping M28 trying to get adjacency from non-M28 teammates

Trophy awards

• Radde trophy - awarded to Triangleleaf for beating M28 with a 2.8 resource modifier
• Sladow trophy - awarded to Triangleleaf for beating a 2.2 AiX M28

Acknowledgements

• Radde for feedback on M28 shortcomings in addition to some replays
• (Ender06 - replays although I wasn't able to get them to work)
• Albert C – Highlighting how M28 tries building adjacent to a human player’s hydro

Had a few games crash today and yesterday. This is the most recent replay: https://replay.faforever.com/21332089

@ender06 Unfortunately it still desyncs for me from the start of each of your replays. However, the replay still crashed for me and after only a short time, with the following message in the log:
info: Sim crashed hard in DoSimBeat(): Invalid blueprint ID in CDecoder::DecodeIssueCommand()/DecodeCommandData()
Given the number of sim mods enabled, it may well be one of these that is contributing to the crash.
Another possible cause (given the actual replay went on for a long time and it appeared to be a high mass map so presumably went late game with lots of units) is memory - if the memory used by FAF exceeds 2GB then it becomes very prone to crashing.

Unit mods are a significant contributor towards high memory usage, particularly with AI in the game (as the memory used increases for each different type of unit built, so if you have 3 factions and a bunch of new units in addition to core FAF units, you'll get to 2GB much faster).

If playing with M28 I'd therefore suggest turning off all but one of the other mods and seeing if you get a crash, and also keeping an eye periodically on the memory used (via taskmanager) to see if it is almost at 2gb (in which case more measures may be needed, such as a lower unit cap, smaller map, more restricted faction choice, unit mods that add fewer units, etc.)

Hi maudlin27

We realy love your M28 AI, its so far the best AI we fought. Up to x2.0 and 2000 units its a beast of an enemy. I just want to say thank you for your hard work.

But if its possible we want to know with wich Mods this AI is compatible.

We play most of the time survival or hardcore 5 vs 1 cheat multi AI with this list of mods:

UI:
NoShake + Redux ACU Icons

SIM:

• Marlo's mod Compilation (working)
• 2x Resources, Storage, BuildRate, BuildRange (working)
• Advanced ACU (working)
• Some of the BlackOps Mods / BlackOps FAF EXUnits / BlackOps FAF Unleashed (working) BlackOps FAF ACU's (not working, so we dont use them)
• Hive Enginnering Stations For All (working)
• Nuclear Repulso Shields (working, but we ban all the stronger shields execept the simple "t4")
• Quantum Resource Generators (working)

Working means the M28 AI is using it, we needed to ban some single units because there is no logik for the AI but still very playable with some simple bans. Sometimes there are random crashes and on some maps there is a desync. But i would say from 10 Games so far we can play 7/10 till the end atm. Hope you can untestand what i wrote here, english is not my native language.

@cyberdyne_skynet No shake is now integrated into faf under shake intensity slider in the game options

@cyberdyne_skynet I wouldn't expect UI mods to have any impact.
For SIM mods, I'm not (as yet) aware of a mod that M28 is incompatible with (in that it breaks M28 if its used), while M28 should also make use of custom units for most unit mods, and ought to also make use of custom ACU upgrades e.g. from BlackOps where the default upgrades are overwritten (but I last tested this pre-v1 release).

However due to the difficulty in figuring out the cause of issues where there are lots of mods (e.g. it may not even be M28 that is the cause, but an interaction between those two mods, and it could just be that M28 makes such an interaction more likely) my focus would be on games with just 1 other SIM mod where M28 is crashing/suffering major issues.