"Programming" Chars + AI Panel

[PnzrNorm]

The detailed AI panel sounds like an amazing resource.
However, my mind goes to the AI panel of Dragon Age (however annoying that got after 5 hours, its still a resource). It was entirely possible to "program" your chars down to the letter to be able to fight in a general sense, but it also got entirely too tiresome having to re-program all your chars every single fight in order to handle a different threat or to play different roles. And that was only 3 chars each fight to "program". Kenshi doesn't have as many threats yet, but I believe its better to design with the future in mind.
Currently when a char has a Permanent Job to do and is sent out of the outpost on an adventure, expedition, trade mission, what have you, the moment they are not being controlled by the player, they will run the hundreds of miles all the way back to base to do that Job.
I believe that in order to make "programming" your chars in Kenshi better than any game has tried previously, one of two things needs to happen with the currently available amount of "programming". Each command/Job should come with a toggleable on/off button, and/or it should be possible to "create a role", or a saved list of commands, that can be assigned to any members of your squad. This will cut down the amount of time spent "programming" and will allow large amounts of chars to be given the same task, such as combat tactics, escorting, medic, or whatever the player wants.

I will continue to update this post as I come up with more ideas for the detailed AI panel to throw at you Chris. Keep up the good work!

[anduin_lothar1]

I think people have posted something similar before but I have to say this would make things simpler so like I have people out in the desert that were once farmers and still are instead of deleting the orders I can just switch to another role or toggle farming off. It's genius I must say.

[PnzrNorm]

Going to copy/pasta quotes from other posts that are relevant to this topic, just to gather more info. for Chris's sake.

for combat preparation why not be able to "program" what the units should do in combat in the form of a few "IF" "THEN" statements.

such as...
EX.

IF _____ THEN _____
IF any limb is below 25% THEN enable block

this way you can efficiently fight any battle.
we could also expand on THAT idea and use it for basic actions as well

EX.

IF unit enters town THEN go to the doctor

but on this you could add more to it buy being able to place AND statements where needed.

EX.

IF unit enters town AND any limb under 50% THEN go to doctor AND purchase service

in terms of combat there most likely will need to be a check to the order of how these tactics are applied as well

so follow 1st IF THEN statement then go to the next and so on.

EX. (final product will look like...)


1) UNIT Zaxes IF combat starts THEN flank target to the right
2) UNIT Zaxes IF any limb lower than 25% THEN Toggle Block
3) UNIT Zaxes IF target dies AND ally has block toggled THEN Attack allies target

in essence that what i was thinking it would look like in a simple line of commands as an example of what a player could string together

just have a series of actions to almost bring your units to life in a way.

just a thought

The basics as to how "programming" a character would work.

I was wondering if it was at all possible to get a type of grouping system for say my 5 worrier or my 5 miners, then that group could be colour coded to jazz it up

I would also like the ability to move the order in which they are situated in the panel. This would make it easier for selecting and organisation.

Over all it would just make life easier, as when you get up to 21 guys it gets a little annoying trying to remember who is doing what.

The addition of color-coding your "roles" or "groupings" would be pretty cool. Maybe even a color palette/wheel to allow for any hexadecimal code.

Ok i hope i can explain this well and not get it so confusing as some of mine longer posts , till now i didn´t saw any post or anywhere with something like this, tho i think might be a bit "basic" still i decided to post, feel free to lock/delete if a double tho and my apologies if so.

This would rather be a thing helpful with more characters than currently tho.

I was thinking other day and then reminded about an older game i played which had a helpful panel on it, so i thought a bit and then kinda came with this, the panel i am thinking is not a replacement to the rooster but rather a supportive one for this and what not.

This panel would be a tog gable option unlike the main one, which would simply show, this is some of the ones i thought, because it can also show much more or even be chosen what to show, Name/current action/main job assigned, something like this, tho the part which made me think most at this was the availability to order by what they do.

As so lets give the exemple, we have X number of characters, and we wish to send a free one to town to buy something, however looking around in the ma we see no one free, instead of go in the rooster 1 by 1 to look for a free, you could go to the list and look only "idle" characters and find him easier and faster, same applies for a job, if you want to look for some "unemployed" guy.

Hope it was well explained, shoot any questions if you want at will and what you think?

Automatically putting all Idle workers into a group that will have a separate "quick-button" to select the entire group of Idlers would be an amazing addition by itself. This would be a lot easier to implement than an entire AI Panel from scratch.

[wobbleyheadedbob]

Sounds like you want an editor to build a Finite State Machine (FSM).

You can use the syntax of acceptance criteria borrowed from behaviour driven development to achieve this:

Code: Select all

GIVEN {precondition}
WHEN {trigger}
THEN {action}

You can supplement any one of these with an AND to add additional clauses e.g.

Code: Select all

GIVEN {precondition}
  AND {another precondition}
WHEN {trigger}
THEN {action}
  AND {another action}

This way you can create a closed-loop set of behaviours. You could call this a 'Role' or a 'Job description' and assign it to one of your characters and they will begin behaving as the FSM dictates.

Just a thought...