Original Post
In my opinion, the meat of any RTS game is in the skirmish missions. The campaign is good for one or two plays, but after that, the thing that keeps you playing are the single player and multi player skirmishes. One problem with the single player skirmishes, is that the computer opponents are too inflexible. They're often too well drilled and quick for newbie players to practice against, and too predictable and stupid to give the experienced players a reasonable challenge. Some games offer a choice of difficulty levels, maybe also some other tweakable parameters like starting resources etc, which goes a long way to making the single player game more accessible and interesting for a wider range of players. However, in the original Settlers game, there were a set of slider bars for each computer opponent which could be used to tweak a number of parameters which determined how the AI fought. This I think is a really good idea, and could be taken a little further. My approach is that instead of selecting 'Computer' as a computer opponent, you'd have a list of AI generals. There'd be a handful that shipped with the game, as well as the option to create your own. You could then select a particular general for each computer opponent, or set it to 'random' - in which case you have no way of knowing which general you're fighting - unless you can recognise them from their style. The real question is, what parameters could you use to define an interesting AI general? Here's a few I've thought of: Rank: Players in this game will have a rank, which will increase as they go. With higher rank come certain advantages, but also certain disadvantages, as the player is expected to achieve more with less. AI Generals do not change in rank, so this allows you to configure this parameter which will make a subtle difference to the number of units and amount of choice the AI has available. This will double as a general 'difficulty' level. Strategy: Is the AI a thinker or a doer? A very strategic AI might build a deep game tree which will make him tough to beat, but if you do something unexpected that forces him to change his plan, it will take him some time to construct a new one. A less strategic AI might be more reactive, with a less coherent strategy but better able to deal with the unexpected. Tactics: Is the AI a cunning tactician, or does he have the subtlety of a sledgehammer? Tactical AIs will tend to use smaller numbers of units in precise, complementary roles, whereas the less tactical AIs will attempt to swamp the player with a huge amorphous mass of units. Command Skill: How quick is the AI at issuing commands? AIs with a high command skill are able to issue many commands per second, those with a lower command skill may have a delay between each command, bringing their micromanagement ability more in line with a human. This will be useful for newbie players who get very frustrated with the computer's perfect micromanagement ability, although most players will probably want to leave it on max. Predictability: Does the AI go by the book, or is he a bit unpredictable? Predictable AI's tend to adhere strongly to an AI script, whereas unpredictable AI's might rely more on dynamic decision making algorithms. Aggression: Is the AI offensive or defensive? Aggressive AIs will actively hunt out the player, and attack him without mercy. Defensive players prefer to get dug in, and let the enemy come to them. Any more ideas, or general thoughts and suggestions on the subject? PS: I'm not too worried about implentation details at the moment, so don't worry too much about the practicality of actually implementing this.
