Mystery AI and Lore question

[Vid]

These have been bugging me a bit, but I wasn't sure if I should ask about them as they aren't very important.
I am very curious about how BZ2 handles its AI.  It seems to be very different for enemy units and your own units.  With the exception of some units(mostly treaded units or stationary units), alot of my own units seem to have very poor AI.  Sabres that seem to keep bouncing back and forth in a battle trying to dodge or get a better position rather than firing.  Warriors that also seem to do the same thing.

It could be that its just because there are 3+ units and they keep getting in each other's firing range, but I'm doubtful that is the sole cause.  It seems the slower a unit is, the better battle/firing AI it has, and the faster a unit is, the more the unit wants to bounce around the battlefield and not actually fire its weapon, thus leading to its destruction.  I've had cases where 5 deflection warriors very nearly got beat(2 warriors in red zone left standing) by 2 AT stab sabres.  It's not a huge problem, as I do most of the critical strikes myself to cripple a base defense or an enemy attack.  However its just sad seeing one warrior come in and take out a turret, wound your wingman sabre critically, and easily destroy a scout all in the same run.while you're off somewhere away from them.

The second question is more of a lore question with BZ2 vs BZ.  In BZ2 they claim Braddock started project pedigree and was the first to do so.  If my bad memory serves me, the CCA were the first to awaken the power of the fury relic and use it on the battlefield, not Braddock.  That may be me having a bad memory though, but I'm pretty sure there was never a mention of the fury being used by the NSDF before it was used by the CCA.

Just some random questions that were eating at my brain that I thought someone might know more about.

[Zero Angel]

It depends on your version of bz2. Nearly all AI's in 1.2 are terrible, you can create a half decent ship which uses MorphTankFriend/Enemy and RocketTankFriend/Enemy and give it some tweaks such as accelThrust, omegaSpin, etc which make them fight a little better but its very difficult to make an AI in 1.2 that will give a veteran any sort of challenge.

In 1.3 AIs are improved so that they can be more accurate -- I suppose you can tweak it so that the AI is more accurate than a human is and dodges nearly as well -- but I think this is kind of a cheap cop out since its more fun fighting a very difficult to kill ship (because its good at dodging) that doesnt hit you with every shot.

I always found mortar bikes were hard to kill, I did a lot of AI testing a long time ago, but I don't think I tested that AI very well.

This is a guide i made a few years ago about the different AI types in BZ2.

[Axeminister]

My bad memory tells me the CCA "awakened" an enemy called the Furies using an artifact, and Braddock fused bio-metal with a human (Burns)and that created a fury that quickly made more furies out of the Black Squadron soldiers and Braddock chased them off of earth. I believe it's unclear whether Braddock fused bio-metal into the entire Black Squadron or not because Burns is the only one that looks human still in the bz2 story line.
The story's sort of have both happening at same time I think.
  BZ2 's story line is only haphazardly connected to BZ1 story line.

[AHadley]

I think the Scions in BZ2 wear armour, whilst Burns doesn't... his voice still sounds Scion.

[Nielk1]

My bad memory tells me the CCA "awakened" an enemy called the Furies using an artifact, and Braddock fused bio-metal with a human (Burns)and that created a fury that quickly made more furies out of the Black Squadron soldiers and Braddock chased them off of earth. I believe it's unclear whether Braddock fused bio-metal into the entire Black Squadron or not because Burns is the only one that looks human still in the bz2 story line.
The story's sort of have both happening at same time I think.
  BZ2 's story line is only haphazardly connected to BZ1 story line.

The CCA make furies using tech derived from artifacts.
Braddock does the same but adds biometal to humans instead of humans to biometal.

[Vid]

It depends on your version of bz2. Nearly all AI's in 1.2 are terrible, you can create a half decent ship which uses MorphTankFriend/Enemy and RocketTankFriend/Enemy and give it some tweaks such as accelThrust, omegaSpin, etc which make them fight a little better but its very difficult to make an AI in 1.2 that will give a veteran any sort of challenge.

In 1.3 AIs are improved so that they can be more accurate -- I suppose you can tweak it so that the AI is more accurate than a human is and dodges nearly as well -- but I think this is kind of a cheap cop out since its more fun fighting a very difficult to kill ship (because its good at dodging) that doesnt hit you with every shot.

Well it was more of AI vs AI than AI vs player, as player will destroy the stock AIs after a while(although titans, rocket tanks, turrets, and to a lesser extent isdf walkers are still a challenge because of their good accuracy or turn rate.

AI vs AI it just always seems that my units(the ones I control in the campaign) usually perform poorer than the enemy units.  I did not know if this was something I was doing, or if it was part of the game.  I remember hearing at one time that BZ2 would use some sort of "veteran" system where the AI for units would get better the longer they were out on the field.  If this is true, it seems like all enemy craft are flagged full veteran status, and my guys are flagged new fledgling recruit idiot status

Turrets, assault tanks, titans(somewhat), maulers, and rocket tanks seem to work good under any condition, but tanks, scouts, and isdf walkers have issue killing much smaller forces.  When 10 warriors haven't killed an isdf walker after 5minutes and they keep circling the walker occasionally firing, and the walker has picked off 4 of them....  well it just seems strange.  They also don't come back to me when I tell them to when they are in combat sometimes as well. 

At the moment i'm playing both 1.0 and 1.3PB4, but I've mostly been playing 1.0 since it seems more stable for the scion missions and hole in one.  I'll try to test more on 1.3PB4 and see if the AI still have issue, although the scion missions are unplayable on 1.3PB4 for me.

[Zero Angel]

I think the human team gets Vet2 units by default whereas the ai team gets Vet3 units

[TheJamsh]

yep, same is true in instant missions as well. its only in MP that you can set the difficulty.

Rmember, 'Mission Difficulty' in the general options menu sets the enemy skiil level between 1-2-3 (i think), the same way difficulty in IA does.

[Vid]

I started playing 1.2 instead of 1.0 to see if the AI was better.

AI seems much better in 1.2, but it nerfs the splinter mortar and nerfs build cancel scrap generating.
Splinters range also seems to have dropped about 40m, and the drop in damage against buildings is about 80% drop.

Re-did the same scenario with 2 walkers, and sending 10 warriors against them.   Warriors won this time 6 warriors left standing, vs last time when it was like 2 left standing and the walkers were out of ammo/missing, but still 50% or more life.

[Avatar]

My bad memory tells me the CCA "awakened" an enemy called the Furies using an artifact, and Braddock fused bio-metal with a human (Burns)and that created a fury that quickly made more furies out of the Black Squadron soldiers and Braddock chased them off of earth. I believe it's unclear whether Braddock fused bio-metal into the entire Black Squadron or not because Burns is the only one that looks human still in the bz2 story line.
The story's sort of have both happening at same time I think.
  BZ2 's story line is only haphazardly connected to BZ1 story line.

Burns was just the first Black Dog member to survive the process, and as the 'prototype' so to speak he's in rougher shape than the later Scions...  and as Braddock 'perfected' the technique the Scions produced were stronger and better formed.

I, too, would love to see what Pandemic envisioned the Scions looked like under their armor...  I wish they'd done at least one decent artist's rendition.

I also think biometal 'helps out' when bonding with a new form, be it ship or creature, as there seem to be similar attributes showing up when modern forms are compared with ancient ones.  This seems to imply some sort of 'memory' at work...  and after all, biometal is alive...

-Av-

[Vid]

when the rebel scions say they are scion through and through, what do they mean?(after burns asks them if they were not at one time human)

Did burns not have access to human bodies on core, and need to use something else to make new scions?  I'm assuming that the black dogs weren't THAT numerous to be able to fill out the population of an entire planet.  So he had to find new hosts somewhere.

[Axeminister]

Scions breed like bunnies if they can populate a planet in thirty years. I've always laughed at that, but hey, we're talking Science Fiction here.lol

[Nielk1]

Scions breed like bunnies if they can populate a planet in thirty years. I've always laughed at that, but hey, we're talking Science Fiction here.lol

I thought the scions were always low in number?

[Vid]

Basically,

Are all scions human bonded with biometal
Why do the rebels say they are scion thru and thru(a pure scion not bonded to human?)
Why did the scions start dying, but burns(the oldest) and the key figures not die?

When the scions fled from braddock back in the 60s, they supposedly never messed with earth or pluto again until now.  How did they build their numbers(if they did) without human hosts to bond biometal to.

[bigbadbogie]

Are all scions human bonded with biometal

Just the first ones.

Why do the rebels say they are scion thru and thru(a pure scion not bonded to human?)

They were born Scions.

Why did the scions start dying, but burns(the oldest) and the key figures not die?

They were dying... just not dead yet.

When the scions fled from braddock back in the 60s, they supposedly never messed with earth or pluto again until now.  How did they build their numbers(if they did) without human hosts to bond biometal to.

They had babies.