MTM2.com

In view of Air Wipeout's extended course problem, and the notes from ZS Rally, it might be an idea to try and clear up some of this.

My understanding has always been that there are no known limits to the number of computer courses a track may use. But wk rightly points out that zoon's readme talks about vectors. This would seem to make things more confusing.

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Extracted from the ZS Rally readme:

This track have reached the MTM2 limitation again. 255 vectors maximum for the map/computer race work. It is IMPOSSIBLE to have more than 255.
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I actually had a chance to speak with zoon last march about this, but either I didn't state myself clearly or the language barrier posed some difficulties to communication, but I was not able to get an explanation.

But even from the little we have, things just don't add up. If ZS Rally has 237 course segments, then there should have been no problem since extended course do not add to the total course segment count and zs rally is well within even his stated limits - whether segments OR vectors.

My "guess" would be that for some reason zoon and/or spider could not get the trucks to run properly on the course, and for some other reason concluded it to be a segment limit in the game. End of story, nothing more complicated than that. Now, I don't mean to judge or criticize their findings or go on about what they could or should have done. They have made their choices and we can live with that. But, obviously, this can mislead up-and-coming track makers like Air Wipeout.

The best solution I can think of right now, pending further discoveries, is that whenever somebody is in doubt about how the computer trucks and extended course segments work they should go check out Mike204's mtm2 AI truck challenge. He's only got this thing going recently, but I think the idea is a good one. How else to master the art of computer courses than to target them as a specific problem in and of themselves?

From my own perspective, I can see no reason why all tracks cannot have working trucks. And more, trucks that give you a moderately competitive race. And there is no excuse for a faulty map. The ultimate challenge I've faced was when LiteningZ@P asked if I would help out on the AI courses for his twistin stadium, which has 20 course segments that criss cross one another in a very restricted area; at some points different segments even ride on top of each other. My conclusion from that exercise is that if the course and trucks can work on that track, then they can be made to work anywhere - there ARE strategies that can overcome even the most frustrating situations.


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- Phineus

Ok, as everyone probably knows already (especialy Phineus, lol... thnx for the help bud ) I am no expert on this subject, but I have discovered something u peeps might find interesting. If you are having trouble with coms, one problem could be the terrain. While working on Ice Hills, I actually discovered that if the terrain is too strange, or altitude transition is too steep, it can actually mess up the course. On Ice Hills, the part where you go up back onto the top area right near the end of the race was particularily hard for me. I had to completly remake the ramp after tweaking the course and testing, testing, and testing. I found that though the hill transition wasn't very steep, the computer had trouble, which actually may have been caused by the checkpoint. It seemed they would stop right before it, on a terrain slope just a little steeper than the rest. Another thing I encountered, is that if the terrain is extremly bumpy, or out of the ordinary, created by a wacky idea a designer had, the trucks would give up in that area and call a helicopter. Helicopters also worked every where else on the track except there. So, if you are having trouble with coms, keep in mind that the course is not the only thing which could present a problem. I do not know why this is but I have made one track I never plan to release for experimental purposes... I am playing with the course on it, and terrain, and trying to solve 'The Mystery of MTM2 AI'

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-Wipeout

There are some areas on some tracks that will fail the computer drivers at one time or another. This is due to a failing of the AI (Artifical Intelligence) in the game engine itself, sometimes the track makers creative work simply can't be perfectly mapped out. I happen to have beta tested OOPS;-) track Gollypop and helped him tweak the computer courses, those courses are now as good as they can possibly be yet in about 1 out of 5 laps a computer truck will crash into a bridge railing and become stuck.

There was also a place where the AI would drive off course and up the wall for no reason at all, there was nothing abnormal about the course segments yet the trucks would go kamikaze. After some experimental shifting of the segments this problem was fixed, but it illustrated to me that setting the computer computer courses can be a tricky business indeed and I fully relate to why many track makers have given up on it.


As for ZS Rally, I made the following observation after having had a look at it in Traxx and it makes sense based on Zoon's comments about trying and then failing with the computer courses and deciding to go with a map only. It seems when he went back for creating an onscreen map only he cut many corners on the map course, at some places it crosses over impassable terrain, yet manages to give a close approximation of the course, therefore his segements number less that 255. I'm making this point only to explain why he used less segments than the limit he assumes exists.


A final note, it may have been known previously but I have determined WHY so many tracks have those screwed up maps that often appear as multiple triangles linked together. The ends of their course segments overlap or rest directly on one another. That is IT. You MUST keep a gap between the end of a course segment and the beginning of next.

Lately I've been spending quite a bit of time analyzing ai lines and will have more to share on that once I have had a chance to confirm what I've found sofar.

but for now...

http://malibuco.hostme.com/images_mtmg/speedlimit.jpg

... I need to know what exactly does "with the same index" mean? or can someone define the "index" meaning here for me?
length, direction, location?
thanks

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<IMG SRC="http://home.earthlink.net/~richathr/ratlogo10x10.gif" border=0> Malibu350

>>... I need to know what exactly does "with the same index" mean? or can someone define the "index" meaning here for me?

We have:
Main course (0)
Extended course (1)
Extended course (2)

Suppose the main course has ten segments. If, in Traxx, you use 'generate from main' for the extended courses, then they too will have ten segments...and they very nearly will be exactly the same as the main course you've laid out.

Now, as I tried to demonstrate in the Mike204 project, there are times when a speed limit is desirable. Suppose course segment number five is the one causing trouble. To solve the problem, one solution might be to impose a speed limit on segment five. If we set the speed limit to the main course, then we can, by checking the "apply to all segments with same index" box, apply that same limit to segment five of all the extended courses at the same time. Without checking that box, we would have to manually set segment five on each extended course. In this case, 'index' just means the same segment number of the other courses.

Reason why you would do this: the terrain is rough or the course layout is unusual and so poses problems for all trucks. Make your life easy and cover all bases at once. Check the box.

Reason why you would not do this: the pro trucks drive too fast but the rookie trucks do not. As a result, a speed limit keeps the pro trucks on course but slows the rookie trucks unnecessarily.

Another reason why you would not do this: you've mapped out alternate courses for rookie and pro trucks. Applying a speed limit for one course may effect an area totally unrelated on the other extended course. In this case, you'd have no alternative but to set speed limits one at a time for each extended course.

Hope that helps.

Thank you Mr. Phin that made it very clear, I just wanted to eliminate any uncertainties I had towards the elements of tweaking the ai's goes, and also thanks for reminding me of Mike204's contest, I had forgotten about it so I went back and refreshed my memory on what you had found. (btw the above link to mike's is broken)

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In regards to my previous post about "sharing what I have found", at the time I thought i had made a major discovery... I woke up in the middle of the night with an idea as to precisely how the trucks "see" the lines in all conditions which after further investigation turned out false lol, anyway allow me to share a few tid bits, food for thought if you will that i've found while working on a rally which has many altitude changes, its smooth, its rough, narrow and wide and is an after thought of what I had origionaly planned so it crosses the [url=javascript:void(0)]grid boundries[/url] three times making a [url=javascript:void(0)]very ugly map[/url] but a great ai challenge

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Lets start with the Main Course (0) (creates the map and the path for the blimp)
Fairly simple really, just lay one line right down the "center" of each straight section of your road or path begining at the starting point of your track and mapping the corners as you come to them as follows,
If you come to a [url=javascript:void(0)]45° turn[/url] allow a 1½ to 2 grid square gap between the segments.
If you come to a [url=javascript:void(0)]90° turn[/url] allow a 1½ grid square gap between the segments also you may want to add another segment at the apex of the corner as I have done unless your road is very narrow (1 grid sq.) this will not be nessesary to achieve a nice smooth in game map display.
If you have large sweeping turns to map then several segments will be needed to achieve a clean looking map, how many segments that are to be used depends on the size and radius (radii) of your tracks surface, as an example it took 5 segments to map the bends in [url=javascript:void(0)]DaytonaSE[/url], and to illustrate how ugly it can get otherwise heres a shot of [url=javascript:void(0)]Daytona1.6[/url] which only has one segment, not only that but they are not even centered to the track surface borders... did I do that
So I guess a rule of thumb here would be to never allow more than 2 grid square spacing between the segment ends or any less than one or as WK pointed out you will get those funky lookin TRIangles.

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Course 1 (creates a path for the helicopter, rookie trucks, race cam, and the intermediate trucks).
See Course 2 (the same basic principles for aligning the ai segments for course #2 can be used here)

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Course 2 (creates a path for the pro trucks, race cam, and the helicopter)
I haven't been able to yet and god knows I've tried to nail down a definite formula for laying down flawlwss lines for these buggers but so far there is no easy solution there are just too many variables. all I can say for now is that the location of the "ends" of the segments is Critical with a capital C, a fraction of a grid square in their location can mean the difference of the bots instantaneously negotiating the next segment or to driving off into never never land or just circling like hungry buzzards looking for it.

The first thing I do after setting the Main course and generating courses 1 and 2 from it is go through and delete the unneeded segments on course 2, basically just mapping it out how I'd drive it, cutting corners anywhere I can, dodging obstacles, and staying clear of any impassable terrain, ending with the fewest total segments possible without compromising speed and or momentum. (course 2 segments run independently from the main course and can be reinserted at any time and point if need be). next...

Keep the segment ends anywhere from 1 to 4 grid squares apart, the distance depends on the following three things (variables).

First is the speed the ai truck is traveling at the end of a segment, for instance on a straight section of my track the trucks are traveling at 110 mph on a fairly steep flat declining road set to cement 4 and at the base of the grade they need to make a 90° right hand turn, for this they require 3 grid square spacing and they nail the turn 99.9% of the time, because I managed to find the perfect placement of the segment ends, if i move one slightly to the left or right (a mere fraction of a grid square) the ai's will fail to "see" the next segment in time and over shoot the turn, end up in a lake or bypass the next segment completely wandering aimlessly. Obviously for ai's traveling at lesser speeds the spacing should be reduced but keep in mind that not only is the distance critical but also the location to the left or right, placing the next segment end dead ahead in line with the previous (as you see them in Traxx) is not always the best bet unless the terrain under the ai is flat.

Second is the terrain, the ai's tend to overcompensate while airborne to keep in line with the segment they are on and definitely have trouble during the transition from one to the next so try to keep the area just prior to, during, and just after the transition fairly smooth, this will make finding the optimum segment location much easier and reduce the amount of crashing ai's that were trying to negotiate the turn while bouncing off the ground.

Third is coefficient of friction or the combination of, texture grip depth setting, texture type setting, and weather setting. I haven't played with this too much but I assume this is a factor in the distance the segments are to be layed out. A track that ai's run extremely well with a weather mask thats set to rain is HorrorLand by RT DJ_MP, the track is slippery when you drive it, but all the textures are set to default 1, all the course segments are about 1 grid square apart and 0, 1, and 2 courses are identical, I believe what enables the ai's to run so well here is the fact that the terrain is smooth rolling hills therefore keeping the trucks tires in contact with the terrain the majority of the course and most importantly during the segment transitions.

When combining these variables you end up with possible variations that are infinite and therefore make it impossible to pose specific guidelines that work well for every track, it just takes a lot of fine adjustments, testing, and patience, along with the understanding that these ai's are only as smart/fast as you train them to be and the more time spent with them the better they'll behave, but only to a point...


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<IMG SRC="http://home.earthlink.net/~richathr/ratlogo10x10.gif" border=0> Malibu350

From my personal experience i know that the AI on SLO Motion really made me go crazy. It was the hardest track to make the AI work from all of my tracks (starting from Dirty Vally Run). It took a day to make them work but in the end i got them as good as i could. So, Wipeout, as TeamDeath told it to me once: "The track is the world that you make, don't let ur own world beat you".