Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hm...
If i use podfix and botaim plugins, are the bots become better ????

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

If they improved POD-Bot 2.5, they will also improve this one.

You should also try the mEAn mod by botmeister. It rocks :)

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

but mean takes a biggg memory.. It's make my computer lagg

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hello everybody!

Since the last PODBot update I'm having problems when spectating a botmatch to see if the gameplay is ok: After a short time, an error box with the message "NUM_FOR_EDICT:bad pointer" will appear. Does anybody else have this problem, have I missed a fix or is it some problem with my PC?

It may very well be, because I have installed another *cough* "program" *cough* (I prefer to call it "pest") - steam! (they ought to call it "Scream")Install took 2 attempts, 12 lockups and 2 hrs, and now I'm greeted with occasional BSODs I've never seen before, and it may also be the reason for these new problems I have - or can I still hope that it's just a bug in the bot?

*edit*
Stupid me - forgot to say I'm on a Win32 listenserver, CS 1.5, only PB and BotAim plugin running. Everything worked fine before.

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

I use Steam everyday with my bots, Realbot and these POD-bots, never seen a problem (at least since the NUM_FOR_EDICT problem was fixed in the last release...) Are you sure you aren't just one release late ? Try redownloading the bot, because there WAS indeed an error with the 2 last versions of the bots that would make the game crash after a short time on cs_ maps (with hostages). This bug has been fixed since yesterday or the day before, can't remember. If it doesn't help try reinstalling Steam. If nothing works then I suppose it's a real authentic bug, and I'd then need your help to narrow down the problem. Try putting just one or two bots and spectate them, and take note of the situation of the bot when the crash occurs...

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

OK, forget it. I was just too stupid to d/l the latest version, that's why. Sorry about the fuss I made.

However, I've noticed something different with the current version: I only overwrote the podbot_mm.dll, no cfg files. Nonetheless, every five seconds (some setting in the cfg, I bet) the console shows "Max. players reached. Can't create bot!" It didn't do that before! Before, the server was filled with bots, and then GO, GO, GO! Now, podbot apparently keeps trying to add bots no matter if all slots are filled or not... any idea about that?

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hi PM, could you make this pods use more and better the grenades? I mean, just like EPods would be great, with them you normally see 2 HEs flying towards the enemy, and also i'm *tired* of being blinded by flashbang thrown by the enemy at me! (i actually get excited when they do this lol). I would appreciate also a more realistic buying of the guns, someone who had been tweaking the file botweapons.txt (for 1.5) could lend me there experiences.. ;)

Thx!!

DT

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Sorry, but I won't add features to POD-bot. I only fix bugs. This bot is not my work, it's Count Floyd's ; I just won't hijack it to add features and create a new bot.

You can change the weapon buying by tweaking the botweapons config file. And also, if the bots flashbang you, I don't see this as a bug really. You just have to be more cautious when you walk around the corners :)

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hehe, ok, its just that these pods rarely use grenades and epods are crazy to throw them lol.. anyone has a tweaked botweapons.txt for 1.5?

BTW, they are still using out-of-context radio commands when starting rounds..

Thx,

DT

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

PMB,


The server crashes with mapchanges continue to plaque linux. What happens is the server goes to change maps and then the server trys to reload the metamod plugins over and over again until finally all of them are attached.

Finally the server wil start up but not after several reload attempts. I hope this helps and sorry for the long post.

Cooley

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Well, whoever said that first was right, the buying code of the bots was stuffed up in CS 1.5 : the bots DO buy extra weapons, indeed.

It happens only on CS 1.5, I just noticed it after SoUlFaThEr told me about it, and without him I would probably never have caught it because I happen to run this bot usually on CS 1.6.

The reason was that the buy shortcuts we use in CS 1.5 somehow don't work with bots. For example, a player can type "buyitem" on the console to get into the equipment menu, but a bot can't. The bot must do a "buy;menuselect 8" instead. If the bot does a "buyitem" command, strangely enough it's the previous menu that is brought back, i.e, the last menu where the bot bought a weapon. So the bots were in fact buying extra weapons when they thought they could buy nades or kevlars or stuff... 9_9

I've just fixed that. Now I'm about to tweak the cost function of the pathfinder, so as to hopefully have the bots learn the dangerous waypoints faster.

This means there'll soon be another release :)

*EDIT* oh BTW, SoUlFaThEr be happy man, all the crash bugs of the waypoint editor are fixed too. It doesn't crash anymore at round restart either. And I make the map reload automatically once you exit waypoint editing mode. To tell the truth there was also big security flaws with this waypoint editor (e.g, have the bots to run and thus use extensively the pathfinder while you add/insert/delete nodes in the waypoints list and paths in the path matrix at the same time, I mean how serious is that ??? Now as soon as you touch ONE waypoint, all the bots are frozen. To unfreeze them save your work and reload the map.)

@Cooley: Does the bot fail to reload ALSO when it's the only plugin running ? Try disabling all the other plugins and try again. I have no clue why the plugin would fail to reload, and I wish I could see it with my own eyes.

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

awesome :)

did you reupload this one?

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Once we're at it, I may as well add 2 points I noticed (I already mentioned one of them in another thread):

1. On my PC, the message "Max. number of players reached. Couldn't add bot" shows every few seconds. This happened after I opened a game and filled the player slots with the option "fill server with bots" from the Podbot menu.

2. When did you change the bots' interpretation of crouching WP's? Nowadays they run/walk until they reach an obstacle, and then they start crouching. Before, they always approached the crouch WP crouching. (sounds cacophonic!) I liked that more. And why?
a) If you thinks it's unrealistic that they crouch for longer distances to get inside a vent or whatever, then all it takes is a different WP placement.
b) It's an important tactical element - tell bots to crouch behind hedges, and they will sneak silently forward, unseen by the enemy.
c) It's now much more difficult for bots to get through windows etc., especially arched and/or narrow windows. I was just checking my de_bergheim WP's and I noticed that in one of those windows (which worked perfectly before), the bot needed 3 attempts to get through, and it sure didn't look very elegant...

*added*

3. Do connections from one WP to itself have any useful purpose? Afaik, all they do is cause an error message when you check or save the WPs. However, they can occur quickly - we all make typos, I guess. So why not make pointing a WP to itself impossible and instead display a message like "Cannot connect node with itself" or something? In that case the waypointer could a) be sure that no error has been written into the WPs, and b) read the error message and know that he typed in a wrong number. Possible or too much PITA? ;)

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

T...the more i see you post the more me likes ya :)

first about T-Wrecks things:
point 1.....i dont have that problem.
point 2.....yes.....make them crawl TO a crouch waypoint again....his points are very clear and absolutely correct from all sides......i miss this as well like letting them sneak behind bushes like in cs_bikini out front of the house. and the window or vent thing is true.
point 3.....also a very good idea.....should be simple considering the other things that happened to this editor so far.


on to my stuff now:
i downloaded the bot again after you posted the crash fix.
i dont know whats wrong today or if you actually uploaded the new (no crashes after a save) dll ......but :

it didnt crash 3 rounds in a row with just saving and letting the next round happen......and then it crashed....and then consistantly.....as if it lost hold of not crashing as time went on.
so i reverted back to the RESTART idea from before.....and even that crashed now 3 times in a row(not even one success).......so im back to doing waypoints for one round.....a crash...a computer restart and a map reload...dang :(

another 2 things i noticed a few days ago thats not a problem, it just struck my curiosity and i forgot to mention it.....

1. when standing on any special waypoint......it changes color to light blue.....???:(
2. flags that are added to a waypoint are SEEN from a distance with its normal color code, (t or ct camp spots for example) but when standing ON the waypoint, the flag is shown by a green regular waypoint sprite....

those are CHANGES to what was.....how did that happen?

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hmm, i think he didn't upload yet..

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

he meant the last update with a crash fix..

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Thats what i meant.. its all coming in a release..

[]'s

DT

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

few will quote themselves but, as these nice guys showed me...i cant read! :

Ignore this please PMB........the problem was in my waypoint.cfg......

for some wierd reason......pod(even after a reinstall) will not set it podbotmenu on the button it always did.....rather......on my B.......which is the buy bind(i put the bind in my config and it was making the bot crash).

also the vgui_menus wont turn off.....and its in my config correct as always......but now my console works normal again......win some lose some right?

shits all messed up in my house.

and after redoing the tundra,dust,havana,and survivor waypoints for this bot...with total 6 hours of testing these 4 maps...i love the bot.........

.......Tundra is just a non happening map.....they ignore the whole right side no matter what you do....its just the gay layout. it should be thrown out bigtime. i hate it thoroughly now(put it in there with de_wallmart and its like-named copies...WHERES THE WAYPOINT SOULFATHER?????) grrrrrrr.

in dust i finally understood why they camp so long:
they are simply waiting for the odds to even out. the last 2 will camp until theres only 2 left on the opponent team......then they move.....so its ok.....but many sit for a long time.......sometimes a group of 5 of them will just SIT, all on the same spot(and they arent stuck!). thats a bit too overdone :) but in a sense that decent team work.

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

they reload excessively sometimes..
right when something blocks the enemy from view they start reloading and even if it only blocks the enemy for less than a second.. so they end up facing the enemy reloading..
and sometimes they don't reload.. i saw a bot walk around a long time with 1 bullet left in the clip... the bot runs into an enemy and fires the last bullet and reloads.. while jumping up and down going around in circles..

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

I agree I'm clueless on why A* performs bad on Tundra. I think that's because the map space is unfarily distributed. At the surface there is a lot of space, hence a lot of waypoints, and all paths are relatively straight. This makes a lot of possible paths for the pathfinder to choose from (since this can't be seen as ONE big path, but a lot of them, like a web). And underground, the passage is only ONE path, and it's so twisted I'm sure it's much longer to walk it than to choose from any other path at the surface. I've been trying to do my best for 2 days to tweak this stupid pathfinder but so far I only succeeded in raising the CPU usage without managing to find the final solution. The playability of this map has greatly improved anyway ; now the VIP alternates all the possible routes at the surface, either on the left or on the right, up the ramp to the rescue vehicle or through the arch, one side or the other of the T building, and sometimes downstairs, but I must say it is very rare. It's a vicious circle anyhow, the more often the VIP reaches the rescue point with these routes, the more likely he'll take them again.

de_dust, however, is now perfect. I play it with modified SoUlFaThEr's waypoints (I added paths up the staircase and on the left of the ramp at the T spawn point and put one or two waypoints more under the tunnel) and the bots alternate routes, either the whole team rushing altogether, or splitting in several squads. The bots spread on the map completely, which is very nice. And the waypoint editor does NOT crash anymore now, I tested it thoroughly : if you manage to make it crash, I make myself a monk.

Here's the changelog:
I'm sorry for the problem of the plugin not reloading, but I really can't reproduce it.

Also I feel worried that you say the bot navigation is worse than before, because honestly I didn't touch anything there ! Are you sure of this ? Can I have a demo if possible (and if you can make the same demo with podbot 2.5 so that I can compare) ? I really don't see what may have gone wrong in the navigation code, but if it needs to be fixed again, I'd be glad to have some reference to compare it to.

There is still a bug with the bots when they decide they are going to camp and another bot reaches their camp point before them. The bots then don't seem to be able to change their mind and keep jumping up and down in front of the occupied camp point, wahey-its-my-camp-point protesting style. This one is a trickier one though.

Uploading the bot as usuals at
http://racc.bots-united.com/releases/podbot.zip

*edit* Feel free to tell me what works and what does not, because I haven't had the time to test each fix individually.

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

@Pierre-Marie Baty

Thank you very much for delivering such frequent updates to the source code of PODBot 2.6!

Unfortunatly you don't plan to add any new features, but you made so many bugfixes to the originally released sourcecode that by now it surely became the most convincing source of the 2.6 PODbot available. Therefore imho it should become the basis for any PODBot 2.6 derivates.

Would it be possible to organize a project around this WIP (why not call it "PODBot 2.6 BU template")? I mean here at the bots-united forums are at least three members who use the original 2.6 source as a basis and they all have to fix the same bugs. That sounds to me like inventing the wheel three times. Would it be possible to split up the source code in more logic fragments (like aiming, weopon selection, combat tactics, squad tactics, waypointing, etc.) and then letting all developers concentrate on what they probably want to do - adding features that help making the bot more smart, easyer to use and more challenging? Or as a further thought, would'nt it be nice for the enduser to be able to choose your modified WIP and then select for example austins waypoint editor (ok, it's allready included but might be improved later on) and the aiming system of LightNinja, the Navigation of IvPBot and so on?

Of course all developers work on their bots for fun, but from the point of view of an end user it is a pitty to see that for example bot "a" has a new sensational combat mode but is not able to navigate doors, whereas bot "b" navigates smoothly but lacks convincing combat behaviour.

Please don't get me wrong, I'm not a coder at all, but seeing that we use the halflife engine, with a hack for plugins (metamod), a plugin for integrating a bot and then another hack (mEAn) that itself overrides the aiming of the bot that is running under metamod seems to be inefficient. Using a hack to hack a hacked piece of program is to weird for me - it somehow reminds me of the development of windows me...

Nevertheless this method works. But woldn't it be better to have metamod loading a plugin that works as a botmanager (without admin tools) that can run in multiple instances and handle plugins for navigation, waypointing, aiming, and so on? This way seems to be more straight-forward.

As I said most developers do it for the fun of developing their bot and beeing forced to certain interfaces may not be challenging enough for them since they would depend on others. But wouldn't it be what Bots-United stands for - joining forces?

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

there seems like a lot of changes in the last update - but i just formatted my computer, then realised i've lost my Half-Life CD >:(, when i find it i'll look forward to testing the changes

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hot-Doc, then you might be interested in reading this

Great News
 

Sorry, I don't check out every forum of bots-united but I should have searched a bit more before. Stupid me, thinking you wouldn't have discussed this before...:o

It is really great to know that you are actually planning something like this!=) No, obviously you are planning somithing much bigger than this. I only hope that you won't get stuck because of the complexity of such a project. I remember that some time ago you wrote that you gave up on making your bot completely engine independent. Nevertheless I wish you good luck for that adventure.

In advertising words:

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

I believe there shouldn't be any problem for KaCaT, LightNinja or Whistler to integrate most of the bugfixes from this bot into their bots ; additionally if I wanted there shouldn't be many problems either the other way around, i.e if someone wanted to take code from these bots and put it into this one. I did not do anything groundbreaking while fixing the bot, and any ANSI C coder should be able to understand what the differences do when looking at the code, even a beginner...

If KaCaT, LightNinja or Whistler ever fiddle with a bug that has already been fixed in this bot code, I encourage them to come and have a look. Identically, if one of them could tell me about an elegant method to fix the occupied camp spot bug, I'd be very grateful. United we win :)

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

DUDE!!!!!!!! OMFFFFFFFFFFFFFGGGGGGG

you are without a doubt #1 on my list of people to squeeze!!!!!!!

so awesome man really.....some of those enhances of your own are sweet like the transparent spawn entities!!! the ct's reacting the T's rechecking thier goal after bomb pick up......man just dying to get this thing in........

I should send you my present copy of tundra and dust again because you will be happy with the results.......they are much better now.......tundra is fulll of waypoints so everything is open to the public.........

il send them in a minute.........i cant sit down long right now out of pure excitement.......our dreams are coming true

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hehehe are the releases coming out with soulfather's wonderful waypoints? 8o
BTW, I can't see the bot going inside the corridors in de_inferno.. :(

[]'s

DT

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

when i am finished fixing all of the standard map waypoints to fit the changes in this bot........they will be released with it........

what do you mean with inferno? they work fine here......its just an out of the way area for the bot from its goal areas......it will naturally have less traffic......give this bot time.......he will learn.....after all its AI :)

@PMB or AUSTIN
this new command Autopath setRadius N needs a menu with preset lengths just like the waypoint setRadius menu in the editor(say in 25 unit segments or whatever (wp radii are 16 unit increments)).......good or no?
are there enough slots open in the wp mainmenu to add this????

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hehe, glad to see I'm not the only one who'd like to squeeze PMB, our bot king! :D

Well, my experiences so far:

+ Bots DO choose more varied paths, they even stopped neglecting the right side of as_tundra, although the VIP still doesn't go there. Then again, I didn't tweak my WPs any further, and SoUlFaThEr did - according to him, that issue is fixed!
+ Those bastards once again throw grenades like maniacs...wow! Smoke left, smoke right, explosions in the middle, little black dots flying through the air in every direction, then a blinding flash... great! (as_tundra is great for this!)
+ The new brown lines for incoming connections in the WP editor are a great feature; that helps a lot to find bugs.
+ disabling autopath or choosing a radius has also proved very useful when waypointing - now jumps or ledges have lost 80% of their PITA-effect! I don't care if there's a menu with preselected radii or not. It's good the way it is, but a menu wouldn't be bad, either. I'm quite neutral concerning that aspect.
+ The editor is much more stable than before, making waypointing way easier and more comfortable than before.
+ You fixed that in older releases already, but I wanted to give some feedback nonetheless: The way the waypointer's name is displayed is just perfect now. It doesn't show too much, too long or too often and doesn't disturb gameplay. Moreover, it's easier to read than those blueish letters without a dark border. And besides, symbols are read out correctly - with POXBot and earlier releases of the PB plugin, my name showed like this: "Waypoints created by ;BKA: T Wrecks" instead of >BKA<. Now it's perfect!

Some tiny points to ask / criticise:

- I didn't see those translucent player models at spawn points. I only copied the new dll into my PODBot folder - do I need another file? Or does this feature only work in 1.6? But I have custom dll's in 1.5, because I use hi-poly weapon models and player models that use transparency...
- The message "waypoints saved" now appears on screen, but no longer in the console. I'm not too crazy about that because sometimes you don't pay attention, and then you didn't see if those WPs were correctly saved or not. This is only a minor aspect, but imo, it would be perfect to have that message in the console.

All in all, a great release and a good step forward! The list of really annoying things keeps getting shorter and shorter... So much for now - PMB go, go, go! 8D

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

ok
T-Wrecks...ist best to copy all the things from the update other than that wptdefault folder. i see them and LOVE them!

its much easier to waypoint now .......no crash as of yet and ive done 4 waypoints today......Awesome! but a new thing has appeared to my eyes in these last days(before this last update too): after having bots in.....changing the waypoint.....and getting the restart.......after the first round(sometimes during) the entire map goes into a slowmaotion effect except for me. they jump in slow-mo...even shooing is in slow-mo....i highly doubt that its my computer doing this because i move fine and have no lag.......

The brown one-way-To is just frickin awesome.

These bots are playing superbly. The only 3 things left in their nav and actions are this :

1) reload when they DONT have a guy in front of them......they have the worst timing on reloads......they should go for cover to reload.....not run right in with 3 bullets left in the weapon and then reload while jumping around in front of 3 enemy. (someone else mentioned this and its truth)
2) they need to take knife out when doing a jump waypoint. Austin should be getting this but when its in......the bot will move everywhere we can.......PROMISE
3) bots need to crouch at crouch waypoints......crouch while going to them.......crouch while going over them.

when those are in.......there is nothing stopping us waypointing something that every human can do....and the bots will be able to do it to.

I figured out why vents are so difficult for a bot to navigate:
with this new autopath setRadius(please allow to type "ap setradius" please like the "wp setradius")i shortened the radius to 120......and laid waypoints(all one-way) in that long tunnel in cs_747. I only did this because if a bot is crouching with a sniper......he will only have enough "patience" to get to the next waypoint.....if he runs out of patience before getting to this next waypoint(stuck halfway then) he turns around......whether the waypoints are one-way or not......THIS is causing them to get stuck in cs_assault the same way......so i placed the waypoints close to ewach other with a low(120)pathradius......and bingo......no turnarounds........so i fixed backalley and assault right away and played assault quite a few rounds and not one bot turned around......even the nerds in the vent with zoom on thier snipers!

hope that helps ya'll

Tundra......no T-Wrecks......my bots STILL neglect the entire right side even tho i added waypoints there(top of building etc.)

havana/747/backalley...i saw bots take hostages to all locations to rescue :))))) and i am also seeing bots run right by hostages without trying to get them......sometimes a whole round will go by and they wont go for them.....this was real apparent in cs_747......i think thats just bot personality tho because they were getting saved often enough. when you see my waypoint for cs_747 you will see what good that autopath setradius command does......the worked WONDERS in this map. i had it set to 300 outside under the plane.......and as short as 80 inside the plane between all those seats! ...real nice now.

im having SO much fun waypointing again PMB SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZE

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hi people

I've been using the re-released version of POD for 1.6 for sometime now with no problems. Recently though after updating to the latest version ive noticed that when using the PODBOT menu to fill a team i can only fill the terrorist side. If i try and fill the ct side some sort of auto balance occurs. I have of course got autobalance off and mp_limitteams 0 so im lost as to whats going wrong. I even tried pb fillserver 2, believeing it could be a problem with the menu system, but unfortunately it occured again.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hi People

I've been using the re-release of PODbot for 1.6 for sometime with no problems. However, i recently updated to the latest version and now using the PODbot menu i can only seem to fill the terrorist side. When i fill the ct side it appears to auto balance in some way or atleast the bots join both teams. I have of course got autobalance off and mp_limitteams 0 so im lost as to the problem.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

i agree with everything that soul father has said..
except "bots can do everything a human can do"
i say this because they can't see throught the glass in cs_siege..
and the slow motion effect is while the computer is doing the vis tables i think.. but mine never stops slow motion because my computer is so slow it doesn't finish caculating all the stuff before the next map comes around which is 30mins..

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

AWSOME detective work SF!

This is certainly VERY useful information.

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Hey SF, thank you for that hint concerning vents etc. - I'll use that to improve some of the WPs I already made.
Concerning as_tundra: Well, some regular CT bots at least take the right side now, but the VIP still doesn't (my WP)

The autopath on/off feature is sooo great - I just finished cs_waterside (brand new CS 1.6 map, see new thead) and had to use it a lot to have only the desired connections made instead of getting lost in a maze of connection, 90% of which I didn't even want. And that brown line also helps
a lot!

The reload issue is a point that still needs to be addressed. Besides, while checking my cs_tibet WP yesterday, I saw a CT bot with hostages happily ignore the FL_NOHOSTAGE of a camp waypoint and... well, camp. :(
And the translucent player models at spawn points are a great feature as well, because it's very important to see where the start positions of each team are - this way you can place important waypoints much better. However, I only see those models in noclip mode - is that normal?

But there's one point that still keeps bots from reaching human-like performance: Buttons!! I'm not talking about doorbells, I'm talking about buttons that trigger doors or elevators. Here's some thoughts on that. I don't know the first thing about mapping, ok? So maybe this is bullshit... anyway, let's begin:
First a curiosity: When I place a WP close to a button, in the console it says something like "Button detected, flag set" - but I can't see any flag with "wp showflags". An "internal" flag? ???:(
Now to the point: Doors and elevators are entities, right? And the buttons provide an external trigger for those entities. You could say that an entity has an idle (0) and an active state (1). The idle state is the position where the mapper put it into the map, whereas the active state is the position it moves to when triggered. Ok so far? Now I wonder if it would be possible to determine in which state an entity is and somehow code a corresponding behaviour for the bots into the waypoints.
An example: An elevator is at ground level in idle state (0). When triggered with a button, it goes to the 2nd floor and stays there (1). Now a bot approaches the elevator at ground level. So far he'll maybe push the button (but maybe not) and then rush into the elevator shaft, thus being crushed by the descending elevator.
It's easily possible to force the bot to enter the elevator only after having passed a WP next to the button- yet the bot will only push the button randomly.
Would it be possible to get a kind of thinking process going: If entity in state 0, ignore button and go to next WP. If entity in state 1, push button and wait for n seconds, then continue? Could this be implemented by adding a real button flag to the WP and determine waiting time by a console commando (like "WP setwait n")? And this "wait" flag would only apply at the same time as the button flag, i.e. if the bot "sees" that the elevator is in state 0, he skips the button entirely. If he sees that the entity is in state 1, he knows he must use the button flag, and the WP tells him to wait 10 seconds before continuing? This would be perfect... 9_9

Hehe, I can almost see poor PMB getting angry in front of his 'puter: "Yeah, right! And would you like the bots to serve tea and coffee in the meantime, you ********??!?"

Seriously, I don't have a clue if even 10% of this is feasible - but one thing's for sure: So far, bots don't know at all what to do with buttons, period.
I heard Killaruna's ParaBot for TFC etc. can handle elevators quite well... maybe he can provide some useful information?

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

Just a few comments that I'd like to make.

When the bot sees an enemy and runs away, it tracks through the wall too often and too long. I saw a CT bot on Italy run through the left path watching the wall; it saw an enemy eariler on the right path as it ran away.

Some of the chat flags don't work. When the bot says something like "Duracell is a damn cheater!", the name doesn't show. I believe it's the %s flag or something.

i don't know what else...you have done a GREAT job so far, PMB!

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

they can't see through glass..
i've only tested this on cs_siege..
let me get some demos later today..

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

the button thing is something me and Austin have been talking about for aq long time now.......the WAIT flag idea already exists but is not yet truth.....

we have to wait :)

the transparent spawn entities should show while the editor is ON......AND in noclip........so if its showing only in noclip.....theres something wrong.

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

I just found out they throw nades like idiots..
and also they cannot see through glass but i have not yet gotten a demo of that yet.
this demo is of them throwing nades.. very hard to get a demo unless you stick to one bot..

[edit]
crouch waypoints should have more danger weight cuz i see a crouch waypoint that is the "shortest" route, they all try to go through the crouch waypoint since it is the shortest but it is not the fastest.

on cs_siege where most of the battle takes place near that turn in middle of map..
they all try to go through the jump/crouch waypoints on the boxes because it is the shortest but not the fastest and they all crowd together trying to jump up the boxes then fall down and keep going...

and as for them not being able to see through glass.. I haven't been able to get a decent demo for it unless someone will make a map that has a glass box where 1 team spawns and the other team can look at them from the out side then you will see that they shoot by hearing and they don't actually see through the glass.
[/edit]
[edit2]
maybe different personalities and/or skill level will decide if they take the best-worst route to their destination
[/edit2]

Re: POD-bot back into shape.
 

I did notice they don't see through glass. I'm investigating the problem. I believe the engine PVS stuff is incriminated.

I know they shoot nades like idiots. The fault is their mathematical, statistical, discretized and thus non cognitive analysis of which waypoints are dangerous and which others not. They shoot nades preventively at the waypoint they computed that was the most dangerous for the position they are standing at now. This leads to very stupid reactions sometimes, such as bots on the roof of cs_assault happily shooting nades from the roof into the void. I'll see if I can fix this too.