[ASC-III] Air Superiority Challenge - King of the Hill (BDArmory 4v4 AI Duels: WW1 Theme) - Now Concluded!

[g00bd0g]

Does anyone know how to save a craft with the firing interval set to 2? In the hangar I can only go from 1 to 4 or more, but in flight can set to 2 or 3...

Edited April 18, 2016 by g00bd0g

[NotAnAimbot]

1 hour ago, Jakerblam22 said:

Formal entry: Nightmare

I've flown your Nightmare against my F-2s, and it is, without being rude, pretty disappointing;

-Maneuverability isn't stellar, try adding canards to increase pitch authority. It can dodge AMRAAMs at long range with its ECM, but it's dead at close range.

-The plane is awfully underpowered. My F-2s weigh around 17 tons, and use four afterburning Panthers. Your Nightmare weighs 25, and has half the power. You see the problem.

-Very, very light armament. No AMRAAM in great quantities, a handful of AIM-9s and twin Vulcans are okay for irl aircraft, but way too light for the ASC.

Keep working on it, you'll get to something.

 

[GDJ]

 

36 minutes ago, Kokanee said:

 

CF-90 Spirit (Block II) ready for the challenge!

 

Going in heavy! Love it! Good hunting!

Edited April 18, 2016 by GDJ

[drtricky]

I love the evolution going on here. We've moved on from fairly conventional fighters with fixed guns to stacked/clipped fighters with turreted guns and lasers.

[g00bd0g]

KSP: ASC King of the Hill jrodriguez vs The_Mad_Emu 

 

 

While The_Mad_Emu's planes looked like the best the 1980's had to offer, they were no match for jrodriguez's X-wings from the future. I did not bother to run a 3rd match.

[inigma]

1 hour ago, g00bd0g said:

Does anyone know how to save a craft with the firing interval set to 2? In the hangar I can only go from 1 to 4 or more, but in flight can set to 2 or 3...

craft file editing. which is permissible under ASC rules.

26 minutes ago, drtricky said:

I love the evolution going on here. We've moved on from fairly conventional fighters with fixed guns to stacked/clipped fighters with turreted guns and lasers.

aye yup.  i'm afraid of @g00bd0g's VulTors. nothing i throw at him seems to crack his defense. I don't believe in a missiles arms race either. I did come up with three craft that decimate him, but 2v2 they lose consistently.

[Monkey29399]

I've just found this challenge, and figured it would be fun to submit my own entry.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/foka09rb6jyn8zy/Fighter.craft?dl=0

This is my extremely simple fighter.

[inigma]

3 minutes ago, Monkey29399 said:

I've just found this challenge, and figured it would be fun to submit my own entry.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/foka09rb6jyn8zy/Fighter.craft?dl=0

This is my extremely simple fighter.

Have you tested it battle against the current King of the Hill? If not, do so, then submit if you're confident.   I'll add you to the roster in the meantime.  You can change your craft at anytime. 

To ease the load on the match hosts, I've added line to the OP encouraging people only to submit entries that they've tested against the current King of the Hill (and others next in line). Not sure how much this limits participation, but at this rate, I think it's a good idea to at least request players to do so (but not mandate it)

Edited April 18, 2016 by inigma

[g00bd0g]

7 minutes ago, inigma said:

craft file editing. which is permissible under ASC rules.

aye yup.  i'm afraid of @g00bd0g's VulTors. nothing i throw at him seems to crack his defense. I don't believe in a missiles arms race either. I did come up with three craft that decimate him, but 2v2 they lose consistently.

Ya know, running these matches has shown me anything is possible. Even if statistically you win 9 out 10 in testing, something in the actual match always goes awry  

[Monkey29399]

14 minutes ago, inigma said:

Have you tested it battle against the current King of the Hill? If not, do so, then submit if you're confident.   I'll add you to the roster in the meantime.  You can change your craft at anytime. 

To ease the load on the match hosts, I've added line to the OP encouraging people only to submit entries that they've tested against the current King of the Hill (and others next in line). Not sure how much this limits participation, but at this rate, I think it's a good idea to at least request players to do so (but not mandate it)

I can't currently test it against the current king of the Hill, because I only have BD armory installed, not adjustable landing gear or F-22 cockpits because of lag issues.

[g00bd0g]

20 hours ago, Monkey29399 said:

I can't currently test it against the current king of the Hill, because I only have BD armory installed, not adjustable landing gear or F-22 cockpits because of lag issues.

If you can't install the required mods to test, you can't expect to be competitive. Plus, I guarantee you there is no measurable performance difference with these mods installed.

 

KSP: ASC King of the Hill jrodriguez vs JollyGreenGI

 

 

Wow, a great match, and this did not go the way I expected. JollyGreenGI shows you don't need massive firepower to win. They get a draw in the 1st match. JollyGreenGI takes the 2nd round and jrodriguez took the 3rd. This results in a draw 1-1-1.

Due to a brain-fart I didn't run the Tie-Breaking round, in the 1st video. Here it is!

 

Another great battle! JollyGreenGiant must have some special sauce in those planes as he takes the win!

Edited April 19, 2016 by g00bd0g

[drtricky]

35 minutes ago, inigma said:

aye yup.  i'm afraid of @g00bd0g's VulTors. nothing i throw at him seems to crack his defense. I don't believe in a missiles arms race either. I did come up with three craft that decimate him, but 2v2 they lose consistently.

Welp, it seems missiles ultimately dominate. My laser-equipped duo is almost consistently overwhelmed by vulturaptor's sheer number of missiles, and I can't imagine smaller craft faring much better. Although my duo managed to win 2 out of the 7 test fights against it, in both of them, one of the planes ended up destroyed simply due to the sheer amount of missiles! The missiles are like probe drones, but better!

[inigma]

Added craft file editor rule to OP to clarify craft file editing permission:

Craft file editing is permissible, but only within current in-game ranges. This allows players to fine-tune their craft in case the game does not offer the exact setting they desire.

Edited April 18, 2016 by inigma

[g00bd0g]

16 minutes ago, inigma said:

Added craft file editor rule to OP to clarify craft file editing permission:

Craft file editing is permissible, but only within current in-game ranges. This allows players to fine-tune their craft in case the game does not offer the exact setting they desire.

Just so everyone knows, this is in response to my max missile craft which was launching 24 missiles at 0.1 interval. With 2 crafts that's 48 missiles in the air simultaneously in 2.4 seconds. KSP did not like running that. Could have gone to 100 missiles at .01 interval ;p It's essentially a missile autocannon. I agree editing should only be used to obtain settings with the current limits. For example it is not possible to set the firing interval to 2 in the hangar where you can save your craft, but you can set it "in-flight", so it seems fair to allow it to be edited and saved.

 

Also wondering how you guys feel about "pre-fight" friendly collisions. I try to space them on the runway but they will still frequently collide before the fight start. There are parameters for spacing in formation flying. So, should we reset when collisions occur, or force people to design crafts that don't (or rarely) collide?

Edited April 18, 2016 by g00bd0g

[inigma]

47 minutes ago, g00bd0g said:

Just so everyone knows, this is in response to my max missile craft which was launching 24 missiles at 0.1 interval. With 2 crafts that's 48 missiles in the air simultaneously in 2.4 seconds. KSP did not like running that. Could have gone to 100 missiles at .01 interval ;p It's essentially a missile autocannon. I agree editing should only be used to obtain settings with the current limits. For example it is not possible to set the firing interval to 2 in the hangar where you can save your craft, but you can set it "in-flight", so it seems fair to allow it to be edited and saved.

 

Also wondering how you guys feel about "pre-fight" friendly collisions. I try to space them on the runway but they will still frequently collide before the fight start. There are parameters for spacing in formation flying. So, should we reset when collisions occur, or force people to design crafts that don't (or rarely) collide?

In the past, I considered pre-game collisions as a bug. If after 3 or more attempts I can't get the new challenger's craft not to crash, I reboot KSP, try again. It usually works. I figure if it still crashes due to bad placement, then it's probably a fault with the aircraft. I might have you guys run the match to confirm, or just simply disqualify the entry until the challenger can provide a reliable craft placement.  I've had up to 6 collisions when doing matches. I fix it by either rebooting KSP, or toggling to the problem craft to give more physics attention to it. I say give it at least three good tries, but giving up after that is fine, and probably is dependent on how patient you are if you want to keep going.   Thanks by the way for all the matches you've run so far!

[g00bd0g]

 

KSP: ASC King of the Hill JollyGreenGI vs CommanderCoye

 

 

This match was fraught with difficulties, CommanderCoye's planes collided in two rounds in a row before the start. I ran 4 rounds total, the 1st and last being reasonably clean. JollyGreenGI takes it 2-0 (discounting the 2 throwaways).

 

 

17 minutes ago, inigma said:

In the past, I considered pre-game collisions as a bug. If after 3 or more attempts I can't get the new challenger's craft not to crash, I reboot KSP, try again. It usually works. I figure if it still crashes due to bad placement, then it's probably a fault with the aircraft. I might have you guys run the match to confirm, or just simply disqualify the entry until the challenger can provide a reliable craft placement.  I've had up to 6 collisions when doing matches. I fix it by either rebooting KSP, or toggling to the problem craft to give more physics attention to it. I say give it at least three good tries, but giving up after that is fine, and probably is dependent on how patient you are if you want to keep going.   Thanks by the way for all the matches you've run so far!

Given that you can increase the formation spread and lag parameters to make a collision EXTREMELY unlikely, I am tempted to count collision results. Basically how tight you want your formation is a tactical decision, and the penalty for a tight formation is frequent collisions.

I am currently giving several plane lengths separation in both length and width on the runway, and any collisions cause by overly close placement on or near the runway should be re-run. But later? I'm not so sure...

Edited April 18, 2016 by g00bd0g

[inigma]

looks like im up next. when u run the phantoms, they request they be run at night.  

Edited April 18, 2016 by inigma

[drtricky]

1 hour ago, g00bd0g said:

Just so everyone knows, this is in response to my max missile craft which was launching 24 missiles at 0.1 interval. With 2 crafts that's 48 missiles in the air simultaneously in 2.4 seconds. KSP did not like running that. Could have gone to 100 missiles at .01 interval ;p It's essentially a missile autocannon.

I could actually see firing that many missiles that rapidly being a disadvantage because they're fired so rapidly that they're all heading towards the target with similar positioning, meaning that if a fighter manages to break the lock of one missile in that formation, then most of the missiles in that formation would also likely have their lock broken. It would also seemingly benefit my frickin sharks with laser beams, as the issue with it defending against incoming missiles is that it more often than not randomly targets missiles, regardless of how close a missile is to them or their partner.

Although I will say again that I've never had an aircraft fire missiles that rapidly before. Do you have any experience that could prove or disprove my statement?

Edited April 18, 2016 by drtricky

[g00bd0g]

8 minutes ago, drtricky said:

I could actually see firing that many missiles that rapidly being a disadvantage because they're fired so rapidly that they're all heading towards the target with similar positioning, meaning that if a fighter manages to break the lock of one missile in that formation, then most of the missiles in that formation would also likely have their lock broken. It would also seemingly benefit my frickin sharks with laser beams, as the issue with it defending against incoming missiles is that it more often than not randomly targets missiles, regardless of how close a missile is to them or their partner.

Although I will say again that I've never had an aircraft fire missiles that rapidly before. Do you have any experience that could prove or disprove my statement?

I'm not gonna give away all my secrets, but let's just say, in some permutations, edited missile interval and quantity numbers (out of default limits) are pretty darn exploity.

 

Edited April 18, 2016 by g00bd0g

[Jakerblam22]

10 hours ago, NotAnAimbot said:

I've flown your Nightmare against my F-2s, and it is, without being rude, pretty disappointing;

-Maneuverability isn't stellar, try adding canards to increase pitch authority. It can dodge AMRAAMs at long range with its ECM, but it's dead at close range.

-The plane is awfully underpowered. My F-2s weigh around 17 tons, and use four afterburning Panthers. Your Nightmare weighs 25, and has half the power. You see the problem.

-Very, very light armament. No AMRAAM in great quantities, a handful of AIM-9s and twin Vulcans are okay for irl aircraft, but way too light for the ASC.

Keep working on it, you'll get to something.

 

I was testing it against the Yipper, which is fairly maneuverable and speedy, and it won once I tweaked the AI. It uses its lack of brute power (being slow) to get behind the planes and shoot with Vulcans, then switches to AIM-9 missiles once the plane is farther away. I can see how it does have a light armament though. I will add your suggestions, and see how it does. Thanks!

EDIT: How's this?

https://kerbalx.com/Jakerblam22/Nightmare

Edited April 18, 2016 by Jakerblam22

[JollyGreenGI]

Software update for next match:

Anti-spooky measures enabled

imgur

Edited April 18, 2016 by JollyGreenGI

[NotAnAimbot]

1 minute ago, JollyGreenGI said:

Anti-spooky measures enabled

3spooky6me

[JollyGreenGI]

Super complex "photon projectors" were installed in anticipation of Fighter Papa-1 Phantoms.

[colmo]

When I conceived Top Gun AI, the different aims (to test craft building skill) meant it evolved rather differently from this challenge (to test BDA AI) - e.g. we quickly banned any turret rotation and wing/engine clipping. I'd be interested to see how winning designs would do in a head to head!

[inigma]

1 hour ago, colmo said:

When I conceived Top Gun AI, the different aims (to test craft building skill) meant it evolved rather differently from this challenge (to test BDA AI) - e.g. we quickly banned any turret rotation and wing/engine clipping. I'd be interested to see how winning designs would do in a head to head!

Yes. I wanted to test the theory that no holds barred would actually produce something OP and undefeatable without resorting to an arms race. At some point I would imagine collective ingenuity will rule the day or else BDA gets a balance pass.