36 réponses à ce sujet

[Shadow_Leech07]

There are similarities between BG and Chess because both are strategy games. The PC obviously correlates with the King piece, and the most powerful NPC with the queen. However the PC can also be a queen as well. Queen=character with the most mobility and positional power which usually translates into some kind of mage class. A knight character would be a rogue as knights can move places where other pieces typically cannot and can usually lead to a fork where a powerful piece(mage) can be captured. The difference between chess and BG is one can pick the pieces. One can have several queens, or one can have several knights. However this kind of comparison is rather simple.

Chess is obviously a "No Reload" challenge, and people like to solo which in chess can be compared to if one player had several pawns and a specialized piece like the queen, rook, knight...etc...the pawns would represent the enhanced experience gain once the piece "queened" but the piece would obviously not always be a queen it would just be more of whatever the specialized piece was as soloing characters gain experience quicker thus having even more mobility then a full party, at least midgame. Well that's all my opinion of course. Just food for thought.

[Ishad Nha]

Also, the position of your individual pieces can mean victory or death. Certain tough fights can be easier if you don't allow the enemy to surround you.

[BelgarathMTH]

@Squiros, thanks for seeing my analogy. I really do have a deeper appreciation of BG after having the sudden insight to look at it as a very ornamented and complexified chess game.

@Morbidest, indeed. I am at heart a "magic user", using your tripartate classification scheme, (always mage, cleric, or bard, or some combo thereof for me, or I wouldn't be having fun.) But learning the "worldviews" of other classes makes me a better team leader and therefore a better player.

@Saint, what's "RRR" and how does it counter SI:Ab? And thanks for taking my organized play idea seriously. It was probably unrealistic, but it was fun to imagine it for awhile. I've never had the pleasure of meeting Saros, so Alecia and Corey are still my favorite "sports heroes" for now.

@ShadowLeech, and Ishad, exactly! You get it. If you use six party members, they become your chess army of king (probably you), queen, knight, bishop and rook, plus a "Sixth Ranger" piece that can be a backup for any of the others.

Modifié par BelgarathMTH, 02 juillet 2011 - 01:10 .

[Saint of Sinners]

RRR stands for Ruby Ray of Reversal. It's an Alteration spell and not an Abjuration one. Granted, Abjuration spells can bring down even Spell Immunity: Abjuration, but as Alesia pointed out, I was making a point about how useful ******-for-tat knowledge is. It is good to know the extent of any piece you field.

Yep, it was a bit unrealistic as it would need my full attention and focus to actually help out with that one. Besides, it's really hard to actually weed out any potential cheating. Otherwise, it's all good.

Come join the No Reload challenge if you have the time. I've started no more than a month ago myself. I've just returned to BG2 after a five-year hiatus (I think) and was pleasantly surprised with SCSII and the NR challenge. You might find it fun, too.

[Alesia_BH]

BelgarathMTH wrote...
I've never had the pleasure of meeting Saror

His full screen name is Saros_Shadow_Follower. He primarily posts in the No Reload Challenge thead.


Best,

A. 

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 02 juillet 2011 - 05:16 .

[touch_of_the_void]

I can see the analogies with chess, to an extent.

But one very fundamental difference is that, in chess, both players are on an equal footing (the only difference is that one goes first and one goes second). They have the same pieces, which move in the same ways.

In contrast, in Baldur's Gate and other RPGs, you are not on an equal footing with the AI that controls you enemies. Even if stat-wise you are facing an enemy which is identical to your character, they do not have the same behaviour. If you are a 'chessmaster' of Baldur's Gate, then the odds have to be stacked against you for the game to be enjoyable, otherwise your superior intelligence and decision-making will enable you to wipe the floor with the AI opponents.

On a slightly related note this is an (to me, anyway) interesting talk about computer game AI:

www.youtube.com/watch


Regarding a Baldur's Gate tournament, it's an interesting idea. I am fairly competitive by nature and I know the game's mechanics well. However I don't think I'd enjoy a tournament. I played PnP AD&D before BG and I don't enjoy exploiting the game mechanics in a way that wouldn't be possible in a PnP game. For instance I'm not interested in a game where I use some exploit to gain unlimited gold or experience, or dodge spells by repeatedly moving between areas, or keep a character out of sight of an enemy to exploit deficiencies in their AI etc. etc. It seems to me that a tournament would end up being as much about these sorts of exploits as actual knowledge of the game.

[Shadow_Leech07]

I agree with you. In chess the AI has more options. Companies spend a lot of money on the AI, so obviously Baldur's Gate AI isn't exactly on par with Chess AI. I've always wondered how a game would be if instead of the AI, a human were on the other side of the field. Obviously the difficulty level would be astounding but it would make for an interesting experience, however short it maybe.

I've played certain strategy games that did this in the multiplayer form(Myth 2: Soulblighter).

Modifié par Shadow_Leech07, 02 juillet 2011 - 01:59 .

[Alesia_BH]

touch_of_the_void wrote...
 It seems to me that a tournament would end up being as much about these sorts of exploits as actual knowledge of the game.

Of course, rules could be established in theory. The problem would be coming up with a comprehensive set given the phenomenal number of quirks and such within the game. You'd need a 300 page rule book and a panel of jugdes...

That perhaps explains the pattern I've observed on Baldur's Gate message boards- one that borders on being a universal law. Every time I've seen players adopt a competitive attitude towards the game, the endeavour promptly degenerates into an unproductive argument about "cheats", "exploits", and "cheese". That's one of the reasons that I hope -for the sanity of everyone involved- the notion of a tournament fades.

In light of the nature of the engine, I think there is wisdom in the approach we've taken in the challenge threads here- that of simply encouraging people to share their experiences with the game while clearly outlining the parameters they've chosen for themselves. I wouldn't be at all pleased to see those thread sent into a competitive direction. And if someone chose to establish a tournament thread, the closest I'd come to involement would be sitting on the sidelines with a bemused grin.

To my mind, in the end, the idea of a tournament reflects an over extension of the chess analogy. In chess, civil tournaments are fairly easy to organize. In Baldur's Gate, that path is fraugt with Jaberwockies.


Best,

A.

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 02 juillet 2011 - 04:12 .

[HoonDing]

Chess computers are stronger than even the world's best grandmasters (even the chess world champion got beaten by a computer at one point), even the chess program that comes standard with Windows 7 is already stronger than the casual chess player.

Perhaps it is already possible to program videogame AI to a similar level as chess AI, but for our sake it is maybe better that it is not so... because what would be the fun if we would always lose?

[BelgarathMTH]

I just watched the video lecture linked by Touch of the Void; I watched the entire hour.

It's really good - I think it should be required viewing for anybody who's ever criticized an AI in a game thread.

The lecturer talks about a sliding scale from "Good AI " (playing to win, chess is the classic example), to "Fun AI" (playing to lose, eventually; priority is for the human player to have fun and an interesting challenge, but little question that the human will win.)

I would say that the BG AI (core version) is on the mid-left of the slider. The AI plays a little more cunningly and effectively than in most current RPG's, which is something a lot of us here like and would like to see more of in contemporary releases.

Installing SCS moves the slider significantly further to the left.

Many posters who express that they have trouble playing BG are probably used to more recent games where the Good AI to Fun AI slider is set significantly farther to the right.

Thus, Baldur's Gate plays a lot more like Chess, which represents the extreme left of the slider, than say, Dragon Age 2, which is pretty far to the right. (Supposedly - I believe the buzz and have refused to buy it.)

[Shadow_Leech07]

Chess AI has literally a library of games in their computer brain. The best openers, the best end game and so forth. In fact every move a human makes against the AI is calculated against that entire library. The processing time is what is important also the decision choices and priority. That's why humans lose all the time to chess AI because humans themselves don't have that intimate knowledge of the game. If BG were to have such AI it would be as if the computer were to respond to whatever the human did, like say drink a potion of magic resistance, or a oil of speed potion. The game would certainly not be enjoyable.

I'm not saying that the BG AI does not have this kind of responsive reaction, in several circumstances it does but it is severely limited. For example in one solo game I had used web with my melee sorceress and noticed the BG AI responding with free action(this is vanilla BG2). This surprised me because it represented some form of AI...however this response is severely limited against something like a sorceress who is not melee because that poor cleric is going to be dead on sight. If BG had chess AI, this cleric would not be in the direct line of fire if a sorceress or mage happened within its vicinity.

BG also doesn't allow the AI to stall like in chess. If faced with superior materiality or position, the AI cannot just get up and flee. They just get stuck on the edge of the fog of war if this is appropriate. In truth the AI would be calculating what it took to take out the human player and then fleeing towards more resources, namely more pieces which in my Slaver Compound example would be the other group on the other side of the compound.

Modifié par Shadow_Leech07, 03 juillet 2011 - 12:40 .

[BelgarathMTH]

@ShadowLeech, indeed. You really should watch that linked video from Touch of the Void, or at least parts of it.

The lecturer there makes your points exactly, and he was a lead developer and executive in Civilization IV, i.e. he actually makes his living designing game AI.

He brings out the point that unless you're actually writing a chess program like Deep Blue, you are not trying to create the best AI you can. You are trying to create an AI that can give a single human player a fun time.

Modifié par BelgarathMTH, 03 juillet 2011 - 01:58 .