Battlezone Universe

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.

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 (http://zeroangel.overminddl1.com/reference/bz2ai.php) is a guide i made a few years ago about the different AI types in BZ2.

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.

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

Quote from: Axeminister on March 31, 2009, 02:35:14 PM
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.

Quote from: Zero Angel on March 31, 2009, 01:26:11 PM
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.

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

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.

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.

Quote from: Axeminister on March 31, 2009, 02:35:14 PM
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-

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.

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

Quote from: Axeminister on April 03, 2009, 05:10:45 AM
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?

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.

QuoteAre all scions human bonded with biometal

Just the first ones.

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

They were born Scions.

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

They were dying... just not dead yet.

QuoteWhen 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.

Very astute and to the point, BBB.

lol

The Scions escaped from Braddock during the events of TRO (Avatar has not given out the beautify written details about this yet). I say that knowing most consider Avatar and authority, much as I do.

Is there not just the chance the Scions live a darn long time?

I blame the Scion deaths on either a fallacy in Braddock's procedure of a fail safe he built in. The Scions however, find Core, a terraformed biometaloid, which can filter and cleanse their biometal forms (as in my theories this is what the Core form does to the Biometaloid itself). Theoretically, Furies might not exist on Core if this effect is automatic from just living there. It depends...

I got some opinions from Avatar about Core and found he thought the same on key aspects as I did, so I wrote a story about it on my wiki (it should be noted unlike 'official' wikis, my Wiki is more holder for original research).

http://www.bzcomplex.com/wiki/index.php?title=The_Core_Project
The end is a big vague, I will fix that some time.

EDIT: This was written well before the above and might need some tweaks: http://www.bzcomplex.com/wiki/index.php?title=Scion_dialysis

A male and a female Scion get recycled by their Forge then make love inside the computer and the one million eggs that get launched into her become born as fully grown Scions once the Forge reforms them, just as in the Single player mission Transformation.
Boy the humans sure waste a lot of semen.
lol

Quote from: Axeminister on April 03, 2009, 03:50:46 PM
A male and a female Scion get recycled by their Forge then make love inside the computer and the one million eggs that get launched into her become born as fully grown Scions once the Forge reforms them, just as in the Single player mission Transformation.
Boy the humans sure waste a lot of semen.
lol

...OK, if you say so...

If all Scion women look like Shabby...  well...  there'd be a population explosion.   :)

And yes, I'd say infusion with biometal greatly extends your lifespan, but as far as proof goes don't forget that Braddock and Burns were both there at the end of the first biometal war... as evidenced by Burns being one of Braddock's test subjects.   I mean, it's not like he's a hundred years old or anything.  Braddock is old, but not so old that you're wondering why he's still alive, or attributing it to biometal...

No, the whole thing could only have taken 20 or so years, if the key players were anywhere around 20 at the time of BZ1.  Remember also that most of the time our Military forces are very young, especially the front line soldiers.  So, figure Burns a 20-ish Lieutenant in the BDogs and Braddock a young Scientist working under Arkin...  Now throw in another 20 years with the Scions left pretty much alone and you'd very probably have a whole new generation of Scions born naturally.

I think that these 'Scions thru and thru' were those that had never known Earth, and didn't consider themselves humans at all.  They weren't even so much rebels as just normal, teenage and young adults, asserting themselves for the first time much as their human counterparts were doing in college back on Earth.

:)

-Av-

nice logo Ahadley.

anywhoo, back on topic.

Quote from: Avatar on April 03, 2009, 06:24:23 PM
If all Scion women look like Shabby...  well...  there'd be a population explosion.   :)

-Av-

Never knew there were any pictures of shabby, or is it just implied?

And I understand the logic now, just wondered if it was still possible for them to reproduce after being fused with biometal, and if the biometal would inherit into the young ones, or if they had to fuse the young ones after they were born, or whatever they did.  BZ2 seems to leave questions unanswered.

We have head shots:

Actually, I think there are some body shots in the BZ2 Demo.

(http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa79/Axeminister2001/Braddock.jpg)

(http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa79/Axeminister2001/Manson.jpg)

(http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa79/Axeminister2001/Shabayev.jpg)

That's odd, I only ever saw the last one when I was playing. I presume they are random?

Pity there are no pictures of a Scion on there.


OT: Thanks, TJ... it's amazing what you can do with MS Publisher and five minutes  :-P

Quote from: Nielk1 on April 03, 2009, 07:35:36 PM
(http://www.bzcomplex.com/gallery/albums/batchadds/BZ2Pictures/Concept%20Art/BZ2Concept/burns.jpg)

What the hell is that thing on the side of Burns' head?

The prototype for the Hearing Aid :P

a sweet headphone

He looks scarier than I imagined. Maybe it's the dead-looking zombie eyes and creepy hearing aid/headphone system probably intertwined into his brain through his ear.

Lovely.

Quote from: Axeminister on April 03, 2009, 05:10:45 AM
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

Well time in the universe isn't constant so if the Scions' solar system was in a place where time travelled faster, then a hundred years or more could have passed there whilst only thirty on Earth.... boy, this time stuff messed with your head.

Quote from: bigbadbogie on April 03, 2009, 09:54:34 PM
What the hell is that thing on the side of Burns' head?

One word.

"Scorpius"

:)

-Av-

Quote from: Darkplanet01 on April 05, 2009, 11:19:37 AM
Well time in the universe isn't constant so if the Scions' solar system was in a place where time travelled faster, then a hundred years or more could have passed there whilst only thirty on Earth.... boy, this time stuff messed with your head.

Even that wouldn't be enough time.  :-P

There must have been thousands of original Scions.
Braddock was creating an Army of them anyhow.

MAN!
those screenies bring back serious memories.

they were such teasers!