Warzone 2100 Forums

Often many games are ruined because of the players leave the game or lose the connection.
Speaking with some people I realized that many of us would want to replace these players with bots, not to lose so their structures, drives, and power energy.
It would be possible to implement this feature in future releases?
I hope this idea can open up a dialogue and a useful discussion to determine the feasibility of this idea.
Do you think it useful too?

I leave finding at least two similar threads as an easy excercise.

Idea has been posted before, and discussed extensively.. don't remember the outcome though.

Outcome is always: Rather than have an AI hogging the oils, and not playing very well, it's better to just free up the oils and land so the remaining team mates can make use of them.

i haven't finded the other post, but i'm interesting on it.
Better an bad AI than loosing all units and hundred structure (high oil).
AI also do the research.

yes, in low oils freeing the oild drums will be better when you replace a quitter with AI.
right

yeah, why not ? A special AI that don't build derricks. At least, all the units and defence of that teammate would not vanish instantly.

A droid-only AI is an interesting idea and not something that's been discussed before. But maybe there could be a simpler approach?

What if it was just a small script that runs once when a player leaves?

* Distribute all power from quitter to remaining allies in equal amounts
* Transfer all units from quitter to remaining allies - would try and distribute evenly, but would need to take unit caps in to consideration
* Destroy all remaining buildings of the quitter

With the JS API, possibly even in 3.1, it would be possible to do that.

The script, depending on how it's environment is configured, could easily be adapted by modders to act differently. Example: instead of transferring units to allies, it could become a droid-only AI like Iluvalar suggests above.

Note: One downside of an AI script, even droid only, is that it will put extra strain on host machine. If host has slow machine, could cause game lag.

I think the same: distribute power, structure and units at quitters allies could be too an right solution Aubergine.
But for the rest of the game (high oil) other units and research, in particular will be useful too for continuing the game with balance.
Then i prefer a little replace player's with nullbot.
If will be do that with a simple script or map mod will be good.

I think the solution could be something along these lines:

Increase structure and unit cap and absorb quitter or crashed players units and structures, maintaining the overall balance.
Let team do what it can with less players but same resources.

Simpler, more elegant solution to an inevitable problem. I don't think the AI is a solution for this, but removing the penalty of losing 1/2 or 1/3 or 1/4 or 1/5 of your teams forces would be nice in a balanced team game. Similar to what aubergine suggested I guess, but I think the unit cap needs to be taken into consideration as the smaller team needs a handicap. Call it team insurance and make it an option in the game setup menus, if players don't like the idea of assimetric settings (but symetrical teams).

This would also help with the precoce quitter, the guy that quits because he thinks he will lose, when in reality reinforcements are coming and he has a good chance. Happens quite often in my experience and sucks for the team that loses the premature evacuator.

People don't like playing with AI's, just a fact of online strategy gaming. Either they are too hard or they are simply under human par, either way people will moan about them.

My 2c

I think we should do something simple and equitable
a suggestion: divide power player (x) in 2, 3 or 4 parts

In BfW they provide a choice for the host in a popup window: replace with an AI, replace with a spectator (!), abort game (probably something else, don't remember).

this will be dumb!
once a player has left then it is game over usually since there is no way the AI can compete against a good team
just call it a draw and do a rematch

aubergine wrote: What if it was just a small script that runs once when a player leaves?

* Distribute all power from quitter to remaining allies in equal amounts
* Transfer all units from quitter to remaining allies - would try and distribute evenly, but would need to take unit caps in to consideration
* Destroy all remaining buildings of the quitter

Why destroying all remaining buildings of the quitter?
I know in normal game you can only transfer units, but i have a feeling it wouldn't be a technical problem to transfer structures.

Zepherian wrote: sucks for the team that loses the premature evacuator.

Hahaha. That's a good name to give to them :^)

Zepherian wrote:I think the solution could be something along these lines:
Increase structure and unit cap and absorb quitter or crashed players units and structures, maintaining the overall balance.

I very much like this idea. Altough i suppose that technically it would be more work to implement than a simple script, isn't it?