Unit Pathing is broken and "fixed" AI issue still there

Bla bla, Backer here. First post (I think), hi

So... this released to get more money, I understand. But.. what did uber think when coding this pathing system for units? Why are planets generating with tiny passages that barely a single unit can fit through when the pathing system is as broken as it is? (it doesn't understand "non-direct paths are shorter" or re-routes to skip slow parts of a path). And I've seen units getting stuck in certain "bulges" which doesn't really hold them for long but it still happens all the same.

Look at this here

hxxp://imgur.com/Q8drAG1
replace xx with tt
(for some reason posting screenshots of issues is not a "whitelisted link" yay

Notice something. All these units started in a giant tight packed bulk from a teleporter in wide plane area and were commanded to "move" slightly below the AFK AI commander, something supposedly fixed, by the way.

Observations:

6 units decided to sod formations and beeline there, despite that literally not being where I ordered them to go. To my surprise, they nearly got the afk CMD killed. Even though half of them were tier 2 AA and the other half bulldozers (those armored things with machine gun). Remember, I ordered them to move a good way below the AI position. That isn't in any way "on the way there"

The total buildings AI 3 built (in a me + AI2 vs AI3 + AI4) amounted to 11. AI4 had a better run and built about 50 units. AI 2 in this entire game (50 minutes!) never build orbital units nor Tier 2. Nor teleporters, nor did it use my teleporter.

Now maybe this is by design. But the above screenshot is literally everything I hate about old school RTS games and their unit pathing. It's the "snake" AI system. A giant snake of units squeezing through narrow points. YAY. Epic battles this is not.

And you know what else happened when my units tried to get through there? The previously stable 50 fps dipped below 15fps When the AFK AI actually started running away I had a slide show after I ordered all units to just attack.

I hope this is going to be fixed?

Well it's not that they didn't think correctly when making pathing for units, more so that it's really dang hard to make nice pathing on spheres... Also we did just switch a month or so ago to 3D pathing (as apposed to some 2D system) which means it probably needed some form of rework..

(Honestly I'm not completely sure, but they've talked about it before)

Hopefully pathing does get better soon, pathing can cause some really bad issues with the server as well I believe. (Didn't know it affected client perf though. )

Edit: Oh and you can't post links until you've made enough posts or something, it's to prevent spam or something.

Mhh yeh I don't plan on posting much anyway Is there somewhere where one can see what is being worked on? Unit pathing is a major issue and yes, it did affect client performance. Now granted the screenshot and situation I had there was maybe a bit unique (basically an entire "zone" of 1 unit narrow paths) above the AFK AI cmd... but I shudder to think what would happen to performance if the AI weren't broken and actually built hundreds of units (even after 50 minutes, my AI ally had not really a strong force on the planet I shared with him) all on "Normal" no idea what that does specifically, but that fight was anything but normal ;P

And pathing on spheres isn't particularly hard to do.. the real problem is when units don't stick together. Like those 6 to the right (more units broke cohesion and units got stuck and actually took large detours) but the AI was dead and game didn't continue to see what else might go wrong ;p

Its a lot harder than you think, non-euclidean geometry can be quite tricky. Did you know you can draw a triangle with 3 right angles on the surface of a sphere? There is a lot more to consider than "Oh! The map is round now.". Furthermore, the parallel principle does not hold in spherical geometry, which is one of the big complications.

Yep, in fact I'm wondering what the premise for your claim came from anyway, that it's easy I mean.

Here is the pure image link:


As AI programming and 3D pathing are that easy for you, how about giving them some tips and formulas. You know as you seem to be such a huge crack at programming 3D pathing and AI programming for a 3D environment.
Or how about not talking how "easy" something is you propably have no idea about yourself. That way the parts you do know something about are easier to take serious

Also there is a bugtracking thread, the one with the Build Number in support forum. All issues should be posted there with lobby ID as that is the only thread they actually look into regulkary. And the lobby id allows to see them what actually went wrong in more detail

As I interpret that picture most units got stuck on that rock (they tend to get stuck on indents and fail to get out on thier own) and those 6 were the only ones that got through. Sicne you did not highlight the path by holding Shift/set path to always show or provide any Lobby ID it is very hard to see what movemnet order they actually got.

I am not going to lie, it is so natural for me to micro multiple groups through with a chain of move orders in straight columns, that I almost never get this problem.

I just order the right half of units through the right passage with 3 seperate waypoints, the left half through the left passage with 3, and honestly looking at that I might try to sneak 1/3 the army in through the small gaps in mountain (they are small, no matter how you spin it, no way the whole army will effectively quickly travel past it) while the other 2/3 split in half and 1/3 go through the mex opening and the other 1/3 goes from the bottom of that screenshot.

At least, that is usually how I operate.

Yeah, move/attack command chains have been something I started using back in the good ol' TA days. It leads to a lot less screaming at the AI because you assumed its infallibly going to do what you think it will.

I agree. There was a game, where my commander was completly stuck unable to move.. Also on some planets, the NPCs go into the ground

They.. Go into the ground? I've never actually seen that, if it ever shows up you should make a post in the support forums (with a picture/lobby ID)!

Fyi, before I posted this the support forum was hidden for me (same for Backer Forum.. the heck?). And I didn't mean it's easy to code, I mean it's easy to see what the fastest path is and the one PA choose here isn't for any move order I could have given near that blue AI cmdr And microing.... they dropped like that out the teleport, was I supposed to play sort the marbles for 20 minutes? Originally I expected the AI not to be playing dead here after all. And Just bee-lined for the first red dot I saw.

I have no idea what an Lobby ID is or where I can see that. But now I certainly can't see it anymore ;P The main problem is really more like "AI not working" pathing was just an issue because my fps dipped below 15 in that situation. And 6 units decided that going alone is the way to go in life. In a group move order. In the wrong direction

Ps.: And FYI, if you hold shift you can't take screenshots when that button is f12 Obviously I tried to take a screenshot with move order visible. To clarify, I commanded my units to move near the lava lake, and waited till there were there and from there commanded them to move a way below the blue ai cmd. Part of me was just curious what the game would do with that order. The screenshot is the result. (Standard move order, not attack move)

Anyhow, sorry if this is the wrong Forum, but that's what you get when Support Forum is hidden from view when I have an issue to report (that others already reported in Support, but .. I couldn't see that) ;P

You can get your lobby ID by looking at the recordings tab, then selecting "my games" then clicking the most recent one. it should give the lobby ID near the name. You can rewatch games anytime with chronocam.

Edit: Also, if you're on windows... You can use the snipping tool, look it up on the start bar search.

Ah... thanks for the info Already wondered what the replay tab was for... should I encounter an issue not yet reported I will at least know what to do.

It's pretty awesome, it records every single game hosted, and it's the first RTS with something like chronocam (As far as I know at least), basically instead of just being recordings you can watch. You can also rewinds and such. So you don't have to rewatch the whole thing to see it again. You can also do this dynamically in game!

And that is meerely the tip of the iceberg:
The "save feature" once implemented allows you to start a new game based on any state you can see in the chronocam. So you can start a new game based on your reviews (effectively a save feature). Or on any review of other peopels games.

Also since you now know how to get the replay ID, how about telling it to us?
If you cannot enter support yet, we could easily repost it there.

ha ha hahahha ha
wow that looks bad.

sorry @nanolathe but I think I was right about icon scale and such.

Well I am a bit reluctant to post it because I had the Realm Rebalance Mod active at the time. So the value of the replay may be.. questionable at best (the mod worked fine though, for 2 of the 3 AI's... ,p)

Anyway, here -> imgur.com/6SrDpcL you can see the other problem. That top replay lobby ID doesn't display all numbers because of my window rez. (20 it should display, 19 it displays) and when I tried to watch the replay it simply threw me back to menu. So this is why I wasn't posting it I literally can't see the Lobby ID to post it for that particular game, even assuming games with server mods are even acknowledged as legitimate support reports.

I simply didn't want to bother you guys further either way If using mods is somehow making replays worthless or broken then that is good to know, and for the future I will restrict myself to only report stuff without mods

Ps.: Can someone explain to me what SERVER mods and UI Mods even means? Do mods revert my game back to the patch version they were made for?

I think it's an incredibly cheap defence to say " it's not working properly because it's hard!" It is a feature in the game they are selling as released. The fact that the game has been released without units being able to move from A to B in a rational way is nothing other than a failure.

Can we get over the whole release thing. I'm not saying it shouldn't be good, I'm just saying that's why pathing isn't complete, not to mention the fact they basically had to redo it from my understanding when they went with 3D pathfinding rather than 2D.

Not to mention sometimes people blow the pathing issues out of proportion. Units can get from A to B, just not a couple hundred to a thousand. Need I remind you of O:TA's pathing?

• Release to most people means that basic functionality is finished. Pathing is basic functionality.
• As I said it is not my problem that the feature is difficult to implement. Uber is claiming to have made an amazing RTS. Pathing is an essential feature in any RTS. If a top doctor kills his patient because being a doctor is hard I doubt you would defend him.
• This game is all about scale. If the pathing does not scale this is a failure in the game.
• Game that is X many years old has bad pathing? This isn't relevant at all.