Why the narrow-sighted "AI" is a problem on Madden and NCAA

[Sigma4Life]

Another thing. I should be able to tell my defender to undercut a route or play safe. If it's 4th & 3 I should be able to tell my CB to play underneath the receiver. The penalty would be that he's very vulnerable to a deep pass.

[TombSong]

Good Stuff.

What Rhombic is asking for is DEEP.

To abbriviate the current long post in my mind, I would say I think most people would be happy if the players just did what you expected them to do within the scope of their ratings.

I can kinda see what they are trying to do with NCAA with the player ratings but it needs tweaking BAD.

Think about it, I dont need deep complex CPU AI "IF" I am given the tools to allow me to make my DB make a play on the ball on command rather than HOPE he does. AP2K8 has this and its not cheap or gives the defense an advantage. Its just like screaming pass in a real game, alerting the backfield the ball is in the air which makes them look for the ball.

This allow me to use MY AI to assist the CPU AI to do what I expect them to do. I can live with my man getting beat because the opponent made a good play call or my player got beat on his assignment by a better rated player.

What I cant live with is watching AI players in position to make plays and DONT. If its EA's intent that I take control of these said players to make the play, then PLEASE with sugar on top...make the controls more responsive so that animations/warping does not take me out of the play or give the opponent a artificial advantage.


Just some thoughts.

[SoxFan01605]

Quote: Originally Posted by TombSong

Good Stuff. What Rhombic is asking for is DEEP. To abbriviate the current long post in my mind, I would say I think most people would be happy if the players just did what you expected them to do within the scope of their ratings. I can kinda see what they are trying to do with NCAA with the player ratings but it needs tweaking BAD. Think about it, I dont need deep complex CPU AI "IF" I am given the tools to allow me to make my DB make a play on the ball on command rather than HOPE he does. AP2K8 has this and its not cheap or gives the defense an advantage. Its just like screaming pass in a real game, alerting the backfield the ball is in the air which makes them look for the ball. This allow me to use MY AI to assist the CPU AI to do what I expect them to do. I can live with my man getting beat because the opponent made a good play call or my player got beat on his assignment by a better rated player. What I cant live with is watching AI players in position to make plays and DONT. If its EA's intent that I take control of these said players to make the play, then PLEASE with sugar on top...make the controls more responsive so that animations/warping does not take me out of the play or give the opponent a artificial advantage. Just some thoughts.

lol...did you just refer to your own intelligence as artificial?

jokes aside, you bring up some interesting points as have others in this thread. Very productive, IMO

[Joborule]

Quote: Originally Posted by rhombic21

Yeah, I don't know that any other games have it, and I understand that it's probably pretty difficult to do, but it's pretty vital. I have an idea though, that might get us closer even if it doesn't actually do the whole thing. On offense, the CPU has priorities assigned to routes which allow the CPU QB to determine what to do if it's first option is covered, correct? What about hard-programming in options for every player on defense to know what to do, beyond their initial command? For instance, let's look at the plays that I showed in that video. The first is a basic Cover 3 zone defense out of Dime. So the flat zone defender, for instance, could have the assignment to go to the flat if there are any potential threats to that area. Once he drops to his area, he then runs some sort of radius/route check in which he surveys the field to look for what he should be guarding. Or in the second video, the player is guarding the hook area, which is threatened initially by the receiver running the drag, but is then vacated when the receiver continues past the hash marks. In that case, his first priority is to guard the hook, but then when he sees that there's nobody near his hook zone area, he abandons that assignment and looks for the nearest receiver to guard/defend. And rather than just having generic options for every assignment, maybe even go a step further and have the playbook guys program them in separately for each specific play in the game -- since they know what the scheme of the defense is. In essence, you're doing what a real coach would do. You're effectively telling the players, "____ is your first priority. Do _____ if they do A, but do ____ if they do B instead." I'm assuming the game has some capacity to do this as you'll see that zone players will match up to receivers in their zones -- the issue is that they just have a very small window in which they'll do so. So then you could program in alternate assignments that he should do if there is no threat to his first priority. So in the case of the flat defender there, he would go to the flat area, and then when nobody is out there and there are no threats, he then goes to his second option, and looks for a crossing/drag route and works his way back towards the hash/hook area. Then maybe you implement some sort of design where players can potentially "mess up" these checks if they have low zone coverage ratings, while players with high zone coverage ratings can make decisions on the fly really quickly. So now you have the ability for low rated players to get confused and to have truely random busted assignments that aren't cheap and don't happen universally/predictably. So maybe if I have a really low rated player gaurding the flats, he doesn't go to his second option until very late, or on the other side, maybe he gets too aggressive going to the second option and misses a HB coming out of the backfield. Just a thought.

If they are going to use zone change up rather then awareness change up, I think it's important that the defender doesn't leave his flats and go up to a deep zone when there is a receiver coming by pulling a flanker route (although it can happen still because he may have just not seen him at that time). Or another example is when a RB does a delay flat route. The defender shouldn't keep falling back (if there's protection there already) if someone is finally coming around his zone.

[mrprice33]

unfortunately, I don't think the AI in place is complex enough for this just yet. It will take a while, imo.

[Deltron]

As previously stated, the key to improving the AI would be to increase the scope of AI defenders' reactions and priorities.

The challenge to be overcome is the sheer complexity of defensive schemes and their corresponding adjustments to offensive counter-strategies. Even if it can be programmed, it must be done so in a way that is realistic without being completely predictable to the point that the offense can entirely dictate a zone defender's drop by sending targets to pull them away from their designated area. Of course that does happen in real life, but defenders are often taught to backpedal to their checkpoints or play between two targets which are looking to stretch the zone. In short, there are all kinds of variables at play and many unique methods of playing the same defense, composed of different teaching points for individual defenders.

What the game needs is an influx of football tacticians who will work with EA to shape the core of the new AI. It would be pointless to rework the AI into a series of priority scripts if they are the wrong ones or if they do not conform to real life schemes. In addition, we need variety and coaching options which the user will be able to control. Not all teams play the same scheme the same way; for example a 4-3 under front might be played in a myriad of different ways depending on which defensive coach you ask. It's the same with coverages as well.

This is one of the reasons I would love to see playbooks become more customizable and tranferrable to online play. If EA were to simply give us the ability to view the nuts and bolts (aka the priority tasks for individual defenders within a given play) and adjust or change those, I think everyone would be ultimately happy.

For example, I've always been frustrated with certain elements of run defense on every football game I've played. On a toss play, I might have a MLB attempt to crash the play instead of contain, when I think he should contain and let my OLB crash the play from the outside. The only remedy to this situation up to the present has been to control that MLB so he doesn't play the defense in a way I wouldn't want him to.

Now of course this brings up the complexity debate, but I feel like if EA does eventually update the AI, why not allow us hardcore fans to customize the assignments to our liking? It could be a piece of your playbook that casual fans never have to enter, yet it would be greatly appreciated by the football enthusiasts who love to create or recreate their favorite schemes.

[Tha_Don_Makaveli]

Quote: Originally Posted by TheFuture15

All good points. Out of sheer curiosity (I'm not trying to deflect here), are there any other sports games out there that you all feel have best-of-breed AI? Before I joined EA I was always kind of in awe that they were able to correctly model football so well (since it's by far the most complicated sport), but as we all know as the visual fidelity increases in games, so do the expectations of every other part of the game (i.e. animation, AI, lighting, etc) I'd like to see what everyone thinks so I am not missing anything and I can research them further.

Well I suppose it depends on what you define as "AI," but at least on games like NFL 2K5, via the VIP feature, the CPU would compile and react to many user tendencies (formations, playcalling, offensive 'handedness,' down and distance calls, short-medium-deep passing, run direction, etc etc). That went a long way towards making the user feel that the CPU was, at a bare minimum, reacting to what the player was doing. On NCAA, every play occurs in a vacuum as far as I can tell.

If every player on the defense can't be programmed to know what every other player on the defense is doing that's one thing, but if you're asking whether or not there are any games out there where I can't throw a screen pass 75 times in a row without repercussion or call the same defense for an entire game, then the answer is yes. 2K sports had a critically acclaimed football series that did just that.

[SoxFan01605]

Quote: Originally Posted by Tha_Don_Makaveli

Well I suppose it depends on what you define as "AI," but at least on games like NFL 2K5, via the VIP feature, the CPU would compile and react to many user tendencies (formations, playcalling, offensive 'handedness,' down and distance calls, short-medium-deep passing, run direction, etc etc). If every player on the defense can't be programmed to know what every other player on the defense is doing that's one thing, but if you're asking whether or not there are any games out there where I can't throw a screen pass 75 times in a row without repercussion or call the same defense for an entire game, then the answer is yes.

Well, I think it's more of a question of the level of implementation rather than just a concept. The VIP system was nice, but it was far from perfect. There were plenty of money plays in 2K5 as well for that very reason. Now in user games, were the options and ability to adjust to these plays better than Madden? Absolutely, but that is a function of better implementation/balancing of user functions and not of A.I.