A.I. Q&A

[reinoe]

Hi all.  I've been watching the videos and there are a couple of things that completely confound me re: the A.I.  It's often incredibly unpredictable from what I can tell.

As many people have pointed out, the comp will sometimes spam Quickening and sometimes not.  Certain job classes seem more prone to using quickening than others.  Thieves seem to be the most efficient in this regard.  But I've seen times when there was not discernable reason for not using quickening.  It wasn't even to save AT. 

Sometimes the A.I. will heal and then retreat and other times it will retreat and then heal.  For people who wish to take advantage of "Flee" this can be incredibly frustrating.

Most mindboggling is the most recent video Barren posted for Four Fangs vs Short Circuit.  My tanks fell back and my squishy spellcasters charged forwards.  When the Geomancers fell back I thought "oh cool my Priests will do the same".  But that's not what happened.  The Priests actually charged forward and were rewarded with a Cyclops to the face for their trouble.

Can someone enlighten me on the intricacies of A.I. behavior?  I know it's my responsibility to know the A.I. but the A.I. just seems unpredictable in so many cases.  There has to be some sort of pattern.

edit: My third question was already answered by Malroth in another thread.  You guys rock.

[CT5Holy]

I think when units are in critical they'll heal first then retreat. I think.

Honestly, the best thing to do in my opinion is simply to watch and notice. You'll figure things out eventually, by noticing, and remembering trends and what not.
Alternatively, do hacking stuff and learn about the AI that way. IIRC fdc would mention stuff about AI tendencies from his work on occasion.

But yeah. Notice.

[RavenOfRazgriz]

http://ffhacktics.com/smf/index.php?topic=7896.0

This should have been stickied ages ago and never was.

[reinoe]

Does compatibility have any effect on the percentage chance of Sing/Dance abilities?  For example does good compat improve the chance of Cheer Song?

[RavenOfRazgriz]

Sing and Dance are not affected by Compatibility.

[reinoe]

Charm vs Attack.

When does the computer use one vs another?  Yes I know it's a matter of observation, but I'm completely befuddled despite observations.  Is this another one of those confounding A.I. quirks?

[Gaignun]

It likes to use Charm to interrupt casting, from what I can remember.

[FFMaster]

I haven't delved much into Charm AI, but I remember that enemies liked Charm more when the target was closer to getting a turn.

[Dokurider]

I've cracked the how and why (and when) the AI will use Quickening.

Say you're looking over Arena tables or building some other unrelated team when you hit upon the idea to build the highest power Jump you can build. So you PA Stack a Lancer, give it Dragon Whisker, and Overwhelm. You max out your Jump skill, and you end up with a 15 PA monstrosity that can jump on a neutral compat 70 fury unit for 400 damage. Only problem? You have 8 SP, meaning you have Jump CT of 7, the same CT of Flare. So you think to yourself, 'Well I'll just grab Steal and slap on Quickening, that'll at least get me to to a 6 CT Jump.' You grab Quickening, but grab no other skills, because honestly, a 400 damage jump is all you need. The rest of the team consists of a Slow 2 unit, a chakra battery, and some Mimic Daravon, because you're a douchebag like that. You add the finishing touches and you give your new team a test run, and your Lancer refuses to use Quickening, period. You give it Move MP Up, you give it more MP, you try everything in your power to get it to work, but it still refuses to use Quickening. What the hell's going on?

Quickening use is dictated by actually two very simple rules. The first and more noticeable rule is that you must not have any other skills on your unit that use MP regardless of how much MP you actually have or means of healing MP. I first noticed this behavior when I was creating my Mono Thief team, but at the time, I attributed it to the fact that Thieves have such low MP, the AI has to choose between using Ruins 3 times or using Quickening once and I was sick of Bad Luck's shit at the time. This includes skills that heal MP for an MP cost, like Carbuncle and Angel Song.

The second and more abstract rule is that you must have at least two other skills learned other than Quickening. This was what was tripping up my lancer build because I only had one skill learned, Jump. The AI considers Jump one skill, regardless of what you have learned for it. This is actually one of the easier rules to follow, but many people like to cut down on skills to make their units more efficient.

It even works if you're using skills you can never possible use. If you use Elemental and grab Lava Ball and Blizzard, two very rare Elementals, and go onto a map like Mandalia Plains, you will still be able to use Quickening, even though you can't actually access or use those skills.

Do not have any other MP using skills and have more than two other skills are all the rules I've found to using Quickening. Once these rules are followed, the AI will gladly spam Quickening. These rules makes some otherwise really scary combos not possible like Hawk's Eye + Quickening. For my Power Jumper build, I just slapped on Steal Accessory, and now I have a complete Freight Train of a unit. Now go out there and use your new found knowledge wisely, fellow team makers.

[Dokurider]

tl;dr do not have any MP using skills learned and have more than two skills learned.

[Avalanche]

Thanks Doku that was enlightening, i was puzzled how the Ai uses quickening and i thought that some jobs simply refuse to use it.

I wonder why it seems not possible to Change the Ai in a patch? or is it possible?

[Pride]

Thanks Doku that was enlightening, i was puzzled how the Ai uses quickening and i thought that some jobs simply refuse to use it.

I wonder why it seems not possible to Change the Ai in a patch? or is it possible?

Hacking the AI has not been as extensively done as other things (such as our immense knowledge of the game's formulas). Changing the AI is completely possible, just need more research.

[Dokurider]

Quickening Addendum:
Quickening will not work with any spell that uses MP, with one exception: Yell. Yep, you can both haste and quicken with the same unit. Not that Yell is particularly that good of a way of adding Haste but whatever. My working theory is that the AI considers Quickening and Yell to be one and the same spell. Consider that: 1. Yell's vanilla effect was adding +1 speed 2. Yell does not count towards the spell count required for the AI to use Quickening. You still need two other skills to enable Quickening. Perhaps the AI identifies Yell by both it's spell slot and effect and any spell that has it's effect is considered to be Yell?

[reinoe]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9kxm2fw-A0&feature=youtu.be

As most of us are aware, the A.I. will retreat from the battle when in critical status.  Units in critical will only seem to attack when their entire team is in critical.  However take a look at Dokurider's undead thief "Terrorblade".  He rises from the dead and then just starts fighting like a madman.  Zombie jokes aside, this is the only time I've seen a critical unit act like that.  Is there a way we can get the A.I. to do that more often?  Because of that thief's bravery and willingness to fight, Dokurider was able to win the match in an epic fashion.  But again, why did the A.I. do that when in so many other situations it wouldn't?

[CT5Holy]

My best guess is because it could OHKO the summoner. Does anyone else have ideas?

[Dokurider]

My best guess is the OHKO potential and high move just made him aggressive. Note that Terror Blade does not have Revive.

[TrueLight]

What's more interesting is that he didn't heal himself with Chakra when he was in critical. The only time he healed himself was when the match was already won when it was 3v1 and all that was left was that charmed Summoner. I guess he was expecting his undead buddy to heal him while he went on a slashing spree.

[Dokurider]

Quickening continues to get stranger and stranger. Not only does Quickening work with Accumulate, it also works with Ultima(!), but not Focus. While I'm pretty sure Ultima Quickening strategies aren't going to be a thing anytime soon, I think that the entirety of Basic Skill, minus Focus, is an exception to Quickening's no other MP skill rule. So theoretically, if you were going to add an MP cost to Wish or god help you, Bullrush, they should still be compatible with Quickening.

I'm not entirely sure, but I think Focus is not a native skill to Basic Skill (unless it's modified skill slot of Scream then I don't what) therefore not covered by Quickening's Basic Skill Exemption. As for Accumulate, it is confirmed to work, you just need some patience. On my Move = 0 Accumulate/Quicken Bot, she tended to do nothing the second turn for some reason. There might be a pattern to when it uses Quickening or Accumulate tied to how many skills it knows, but I can't confirm it right now.

[reinoe]

Quickening continues to get stranger and stranger. Not only does Quickening work with Accumulate, it also works with Ultima(!), but not Focus. While I'm pretty sure Ultima Quickening strategies aren't going to be a thing anytime soon, I think that the entirety of Basic Skill, minus Focus, is an exception to Quickening's no other MP skill rule. So theoretically, if you were going to add an MP cost to Wish or god help you, Bullrush, they should still be compatible with Quickening.

I'm not entirely sure, but I think Focus is not a native skill to Basic Skill (unless it's modified skill slot of Scream then I don't what) therefore not covered by Quickening's Basic Skill Exemption. As for Accumulate, it is confirmed to work, you just need some patience. On my Move = 0 Accumulate/Quicken Bot, she tended to do nothing the second turn for some reason. There might be a pattern to when it uses Quickening or Accumulate tied to how many skills it knows, but I can't confirm it right now.

RE: Focus/Alacrity not being native, I know it didn't exist in Vanilla while Accumulate did. 

[Dokurider]

Well obviously Focus didn't exist in Vanilla. I'm saying that FFM overwrote something to make Focus, but I don't know what Focus originally was.