diplomatic AI?
Author
Can anyone point me at forums and people where diplomatic AI is discussed? By this, I don''t mean antiseptic Game Theory. I mean what it takes to win freeform alliance games with real human players. Games like Diplomacy, for instance. I''m actually working on a 4X TBS called "Ocean Mars" and hence my interest. There seems to be a dearth of discussion about diplomatic AI. For instance I asked on comp.ai.games and nobody had a clue.
20% of the world is real.
80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.
Hey Ferretman, does this sound like GDC 2002?! 
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
quote:Original post by InnocuousFox
Hey Ferretman, does this sound like GDC 2002?!
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
Hey Dave, I thought that guy that wanted to discuss Diplomacy AI was in my roundtable? Was he also in Steve''s?
Brandon: You are right, there is a dearth of discussion on diplomacy AI in the newsgroups and forums. It comes up here every once and a while, so you might try a search on the archieved forums here. When it does come up, I seem to recall there is little discussion of it.
Eric
Geta, he was in a number of them... also in Denis Papp''s roundtables as well. Right along with the Brits from Carnegie Melon.
Perhaps I am nieve... I''ve never bothered to look into diplomatic AI or read any material on the subject... but I think it wouldn''t be terribly hard to model. It seems that a multi-facetted fuzzy machine would work using the following scales:
Trustworthiness (from our observations, how much can we trust this player?)
Strategic Value (how useful is this player strategicly?)
Political Value (how well liked and connected is this player?)
Threatening (how powerful is this player militarily?)
Gulibility (from our observations, how much can we get away with?)
Using scales such as those, you can define algorithms to decide whether or not to tell the truth to a player or lie to a player, whether or not we can trust this player, how much we can include him in our schemes, and how much we need to fear retribution from him or his enemies/allies.
Remember, I just pulled this outta my AIss so it''s a little rough.
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
Perhaps I am nieve... I''ve never bothered to look into diplomatic AI or read any material on the subject... but I think it wouldn''t be terribly hard to model. It seems that a multi-facetted fuzzy machine would work using the following scales:
Trustworthiness (from our observations, how much can we trust this player?)
Strategic Value (how useful is this player strategicly?)
Political Value (how well liked and connected is this player?)
Threatening (how powerful is this player militarily?)
Gulibility (from our observations, how much can we get away with?)
Using scales such as those, you can define algorithms to decide whether or not to tell the truth to a player or lie to a player, whether or not we can trust this player, how much we can include him in our schemes, and how much we need to fear retribution from him or his enemies/allies.
Remember, I just pulled this outta my AIss so it''s a little rough.
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
I have a feeling it''s because you shouldn''t be reading programmer''s point of view on this sort of things.
Rather, you should try to find gamers who play those games.
I am quite sure there are sites dedicated to Diplomacy on the Net, possibly there could be a forum on the newsgroups ? This would sound like an ideal place to start digging.
For as long as I have been on those forums, I have rarely seen people actually discuss other types of games than computer games.
In this particular case, board games seem like the first thing you might want to investigate.
hope this helps ?
Sancte Isidore ora pro nobis !
Rather, you should try to find gamers who play those games.
I am quite sure there are sites dedicated to Diplomacy on the Net, possibly there could be a forum on the newsgroups ? This would sound like an ideal place to start digging.
For as long as I have been on those forums, I have rarely seen people actually discuss other types of games than computer games.
In this particular case, board games seem like the first thing you might want to investigate.
hope this helps ?
Sancte Isidore ora pro nobis !
Actually, a lot of people on here play board games or other such things. Personally, I played Diplomacy quite often - although that was about 18 years ago! 
The bottom line is, however, no matter how much you learn about the ins and outs of the game, the hardest part is designing and representational and decision structure that mimics the way people play the game.
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
The bottom line is, however, no matter how much you learn about the ins and outs of the game, the hardest part is designing and representational and decision structure that mimics the way people play the game.
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
Author
Yes I was at GDC 2002 and did an AI roundtable, among many others. I remember discussing hierarchical AI and being disappointed that nobody really had any compelling answers. I was coming at it from a "real militaries break things up hierarchically and actually screw everything up at the boundaries" perspective. One might say all you can do is provide a hierarchical military organization, not a hierarchical "military intelligence." :-)
I''m not focused on board games. I''m focused on Civilization-style games. I just brought up Diplomacy because its diplomatic problems are fairly pure. I''ve actually posted on a Diplomacy programmer''s mailing list http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dipai/ . Actually got 1 reply back so far.
I''d hazard a guess that much like hierarchical AIs, the state of the art in diplomatic AI is: people don''t have a clue, they just wing it. Anyone beg to differ?
More on AI specifics after we see if anyone is goaded into elaborating "the right way to do diplomatic AI" by my unkind words.
Brandon Van Every www.3DProgrammer.com Seattle, WA
20% of the world is real. 80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.
I''m not focused on board games. I''m focused on Civilization-style games. I just brought up Diplomacy because its diplomatic problems are fairly pure. I''ve actually posted on a Diplomacy programmer''s mailing list http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dipai/ . Actually got 1 reply back so far.
I''d hazard a guess that much like hierarchical AIs, the state of the art in diplomatic AI is: people don''t have a clue, they just wing it. Anyone beg to differ?
More on AI specifics after we see if anyone is goaded into elaborating "the right way to do diplomatic AI" by my unkind words.
Brandon Van Every www.3DProgrammer.com Seattle, WA
20% of the world is real. 80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.
I''m trying to figure out why you would say that people don''t know how to do hierarchical AI. Perhaps you didn''t get a response in a particular roundtable a few years back, but that doesn''t mean that it isn''t done regularly and rather well. If I recall, Eric and I touched on it in a roundtable this past year... the one that I had the audio from (which may still be around here... search this forum for the link to it).
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
Dave Mark - President and Lead Designer
Intrinsic Algorithm - "Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"
Author
Ok, people at the one AI roundtable I went to didn''t have a hierarchical clue, or didn''t care to vocalize it. Or I can''t remember the context of the discussion well enough over a year later to fairly brand it. But I distinictly remember being unimpressed with the level of discussion of the problem. Maybe that''s the luck of the draw. I recall my own interjections being deliberately "politic."
In general, I went to the GDC looking forwards to roundtables, but quickly found that from a technical content standpoint, they''re inferior to mailing lists. I think GDC is best regarded as a big party, not a serious undertaking. Or else I shouldn''t waste time on my strong suits like tech or game design stuff, and should instead go to biz/marketing/legal stuff that I know little about.
The question remains: who has a clue about diplomatic AI?
Brandon Van Every, http://www.3DProgrammer.com, Seattle, WA
20% of the world is real. 80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.
In general, I went to the GDC looking forwards to roundtables, but quickly found that from a technical content standpoint, they''re inferior to mailing lists. I think GDC is best regarded as a big party, not a serious undertaking. Or else I shouldn''t waste time on my strong suits like tech or game design stuff, and should instead go to biz/marketing/legal stuff that I know little about.
The question remains: who has a clue about diplomatic AI?
Brandon Van Every, http://www.3DProgrammer.com, Seattle, WA
20% of the world is real. 80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.
quote:Original post by vanevery0
The question remains: who has a clue about diplomatic AI?
Before one could answer this question, you need to define what a diplomatic AI would be able to do! Presumably, it''s most prevalent activity would be to negotiate with the other agents in the game to achieve its goals.
Automated negotiation systems are a hot topic in AI and the business world. Nick Jennings at Southampton is doing excellent work in this area and has produced products for British Telecom and other large organisations. You might like to take a look at his work.
Timkin
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