Exactly this. I don’t mind lucky streaks, i get them too.
But I’ve felt for a long time that the ai (ps4)makes decisions based on a knowledge of which gems are going to drop. As if they are already there, offscreen and waiting, and the ai can see them.
I would like to know if this is really the case, or just my perception, out of curiosity. But overall, for me the issue is …meh. I still win most games, and make progress. When the ai goes nuts, it makes a win a bit more of a challenge. Why quit before it’s finished?
People defiantly wear different glasses if that’s what you read from Sirrians post.
I read it as: we’ve noticed comments about a potential issue, it was investigated in a lab/test environment to see what’s going on before making public comments, here are the results. The issue doesn’t appear to be occurring.
Just to continue on from these results, we have conducted more extensive testing across the weekend.
For more information on how these tests are run, here is a breakdown on how we have conducted these tests
These tests are run in the PvP environment. This means there is no interference with any luck/combo breaker code.
To keep things fair, we have the following rules for picking teams
Teams are formed by picking random troops from the complete troop pool
Each troop is level 15 with NO traits (As to stop any trait interference)
Both players are given the exact same team, as to ensure that any spells cast (like mana generators) are given an equal chance to cast these spells
If a game takes longer than 20 minutes, the game ends and deems it to be a stalemate, and continues onto the next round
Over the past 72 hours, we have produced and analysed 2024 unique battles using the same scoring system according to @Sirrian 's post to produce the following results:
LUCK SCORES (based on weightings above)
Average Player Luck Score: 23.153
Average AI Luck Score: 22.982
Difference in Luck Scores - the human player was on average 2.62% luckier than the AI player
LUCKY GAMES (counting number of games and the associated luck score)
Games with Equal Luck: 58
Games where the Human was Luckier: 1007
Games where the AI was Luckier: 959
Difference in Lucky Games: The Human player was luckier in 1.22% more games
CASCADES (number of cascades which occurred in a match)
Average Player Cascades: 36.534
Average AI Cascades: 36.894
Difference in Cascades - the human player had on average 1.88% more games with more cascades than the AI player
4 OF A KIND MATCHES (number of 4 of a kind matches performed by each player)
Average Player 4 of a Kind Matches: 5.744
Average AI 4 of a Kind Matches: 5.514
Difference in 4 of a Kind Matches - the human player had on average 1.88% more games with more 4 of a Kind Matches than the AI player
5+ OF A KIND MATCHES (number of 5+ of a kind matches performed by each player)
Average Player 5+ of a Kind Matches: 2.217
Average AI 5+ of a Kind Matches: 2.136
Difference in 5+ of a Kind Matches - the human player had on average 6.72% more games with more 5+ of a Kind Matches than the AI player
BOARD MATCHES (number of board moves which each player has taken)
Average Player Board Moves: 26.049
Average AI Board Moves: 26.734
Difference in Board Moves - the AI player had on average 1.09% more games with more board matches than the human player
SPELLS CAST (number of spells cast by each player)
Average Player Spells Cast: 6.577
Average AI Spells Cast: 5.627
Difference in Spells Cast - the human player had on average 18.33% more games with more spells cast than the AI player
@Strat has the right of it in his reponse to you… we’re just showing you the results here, not passing comment or judgement. Think of it this way :
It means we’re taking your reports seriously enough to spend a lot of time & money investigating. These things are not cheap or quick to set up and gather data on.
We’re sharing the results with all of you, but we didn’t JUST generate these results for you. We generated them so that we could begin formulating a plan to alter the game to maximize enjoyment for the greatest number of players (believe it or not, we don’t sit down to meetings thinking up new ways to screw people over… or how to extort money from them… mostly we talk about improving player experience)
Before anyone concludes from point #2 that we’ll just now make the game easy-mode to appeal to as many people as possible, that’s NOT what I’m saying… there’s a whole raft of other things we can explore!
I have no idea how the AI works, or how random the boards really are, and I may be misunderstanding what your saying here. If so please ignore this post.
But that test sounds like it would only find an intentional bias against the “Human” player.
If there is an issue (it really could just be bad luck) I would think it would be in way the AI determines a move, and as both players are using the same method to do so in your test…
Is PvP Mode handled differently from the other modes? or is it just that explore etc often has poorer team troop combinations compared to players so it’s just seems easier.
Does the AI only see the same 8x8 grid that players see?
Are there actual gems off screen, or are they randomly generated as needed?
The main difference between ranked pvp and all other play modes (not sure about arena) is that pvp does NOT use a combo breaker to cancel out the ai lucky moves. Custom gem selection also makes ai make bettrr moves. That’s why pvp is harder.
The game is totally unaware of any gems off screen or what is about to fall. It is also unable to set up combos on purpose.
All the ai knows is all valid gem moves, and how many of each gem are on the board. It makes gem match moves randomly, but it prefers to make 4 or 5 matches and of mana colors the ai wants. Usually but not always since there is a random factor.
The ai is also dumbed down for lower level players by purposely missing 4 matches more often.
It’s mana transformers that are the problem I think. They are looping too much. Try simulating an initial board setup with a random gem transformation, then count cascades.
Sorry it took me a while to make this video. I’m not sure if it helps much, but hopefully so as there are several instances that have been discussed in this thread that have taken place in the matches I recorded today. Another HUGE problem is the AI getting 90% of their turns as ‘Mana Surges’ while the player is lucky to have 10-20% of their’s being ‘Mana Surges’.
The ONLY game on this video that I managed to dominate was the one that I used a goblin team. I shouldn’t have to depend on my goblins to win all the matches for me. I should be able to use any team that I like with a better success rate of winning, especially when challenging against players several ranks/levels lower than me.
*This was live streamed, so it may still be processing when I made this post. If you can’t view it yet, try again in an hour or so. The video is about 40 minutes long and I discuss SEVERAL key things about the AI that I have noticed, and that have been mentioned in this thread.
Was very interested to see this in action, however at 46 minutes that’s too long for me. If you do this again (or in the future) could you throw in a few time stamps of the relevant sections. Thanks.
The gems “falling from the sky” I have seen on pc as well, but the mana surges you’re talking about is because your masteries are way too low to be getting that many mana surges. I believe you said you have 34 on every mastery and you’re in a low level guild, so that’s why.
On console the AI has almost never gone for skulls over something else. They go for skulls on pc, but for whatever reason console players like “random.”
I only watched your first battle, but it was pretty standard. With stronger cards you wouldn’t have had an issue. I’d like to see more of what you’re talking about, but I don’t have that much time to watch the stream.
Oh yeah and from what I gathered from your video, Kerberos doesn’t work the way you think it does. 50% chance does not mean if it misses this time it’ll hit next time. Think of it as a 2-sided dice. One side he devours, the other side he doesn’t. Every time you cast his spell you reroll the dice. But with that being said, I feel the same way as you do. Kerberos doesn’t devour as much when I use him, than when the AI uses him. But that’s just player bias, and “luck” of the roll.
As @UKresistance rightly mentions, the AI has no knowledge on what is going to be dropped next on the board. The AI will make a move based only on what the player can see, the board and spells it can cast. There isn’t even any code in there to line up any further moves or check for cascades, and as much as I would love to add that into the AI, I know that all it would cause is more complaints about “Cheating AI”, as much as it would then be closer to a smarter human opponent.
The hard part about mana generators is that it is something that both the AI and the Human player can do outside of just playing the game. I can confirm that it is running the same bit of code to drop gems down if it is a board match or from a mana generator, although by having more gems move on the board, there is bound to be a “higher chance” to get matches, kind of like rolling one dice compared to 3, 5, or 10 and hoping to get a 6 come up. If we did “nerf” these spells, it would have to affect both the AI and the player, which would be negative on both sides.
Thanks @HADuke for posting the video, although as others have mentioned, looking into a 48 minute video is quite impractical since we would like to spend that time working on adding new features and fixing bugs instead.
As for the points you did bring up, Mana Surges are dependent on many factors, including player level, guilds and kingdom levels. Having players get Mana Surges more often generally means they are in a higher level guild, where their chances are improved. Looking into leveling up guild statues would help bring you (and your guild) up to get more mana surges and improved troop stats.
For percentage chances, as mentioned by @HKdirewolf, this is all up to chance. For example, when rolling a dice, if you roll a number, it is not like that number will not appear in the next 5 rolls. You could get a streak of sixes, or a streak of ones, or just a random smattering of numbers in between. If someone rolled a six five times in a row, is that cheating or is it luck?
As for everyone that is concerned with these chances not appearing to be working correctly, I am giving you homework. Please read this article, all nicely put together to explain probability, especially on chances seeming “wrong” - http://www.abc.net.au/science/surfingscientist/pdf/lesson_plan19.pdf.
My point on mana surges is that the AI ALWAYS gets WAY more than I do. And it has happened to me against AI players leveled WAY lower than me so player level definitely has nothing to do with it. As for it having to do with the guild, I doubt that has too much to do with it either. I am in a rather high level guild with our guardians all above 20. I don’t typically battle against players several levels higher than me either. I have battled players around 50+ levels lower than me and have seen them get mana surge after mana surge (one of the battles in my video shows that btw). Am I supposed to believe that much lower level player has higher ranked cards than I do and they are also in a much higher guild than me? Every single time? Nah, I’ll just chalk it up as ‘AI luck’, right?
Unfortunately, this may be the fact. Other players, even at low levels can be in higher ranked guilds, which would cause something like Mastery to be higher than someone a higher level in a lower ranked guild. Some of these other players could have statue levels of 50, or 100, and unfortunately, that would put mastery points highly above someone who has their statues only 20. If distributed out evenly, it would take 60 levels to get the same amount of mastery as someone who has their statues leveled 10 above your guild. This could be amplified if they have leveled all their kingdoms up to level 10. As I mentioned before, there are many factors to the game that could be causing this problem.
Player level usually doesn’t indicate strength of their teams. Someone at level 50 could have gotten a few excellent card drops, and they funnel all their collected souls and traitstones into building a great team. This team can be more powerful that a team of someone at level 200, or maybe not. I can’t speak for every case, but there are many more factors in play than player level. I would also recommend scouting out teams and seeing what troops you are up against. Forming counters to other teams can turn the tide of battle in your favor, and you can also be one of those people facing opponents 50+ levels higher than yours and winning.
