For the game design I'd like to bring to Spring... I would, in an ideal world, like to see a really, really robust, moddable and controllable AI, period. Said that, been there, done that, won't bug y'all again until I have some work done in Spring to demonstrate that I am really serious about bringing a new game design to the engine, etc., and am not full of crap.
But, for what I'm going to do with Spring to really work out... I need a fully-functioning and non-black-box Gaia AI. Building what I need will also give us a Gaia that's a lot more interesting than non (or minimally) interactive random creatures on a map, anyhow, so I will make the case that what I want is good for everybody making games with this engine.
Here's what I want.
I want a Gaia AI that will build structures, collect resources, and make units, just like any PvP AI. But... with important differences.
1. The Gaia should be designed so that it is neutral to players (including other AIs) unless they attack it. If attacked, units local to the event start responding... and the Gaia gets more and more "angry" with the offending player, until it becomes actively hostile. Once it is "angry", it should not become neutral again until its "anger level" has dropped quite a bit- iow, it should not be possible to attack it briefly, let it become "not angry" and then attack it again- once it's mad, it should stay mad awhile. Otherwise... it should just go around, building bases, but not fight offensively against players unless it is attacked.
2. The Gaia AI should have certain types of "smart" behaviors that will make it more lifelike. For example... there should be categories of unit that aren't armed, and always run away from attackers. All AIs worth a gosh-darn should probably do that anyhow- builders need to flee assault units unless they're armed. But this Gaia definately needs to do that. Armed units, on the other hand, should be aggressive if the AI becomes "angry", and attack the player's units, if it can see them. Otherwise, the Gaia should probably just leave players alone. Gaia should never, ever "win", except under extreme circumstances (say, walking a Commander into a Gaia city and picking a fight, and then dying).
And... lastly... and this is pretty important... all current PvP AIs should not attack Gaia! They should ignore it! I'm pretty sure they would anyhow, because of the "reserved spot" in Spring's current code, but this is very important, if Gaia is going to be useful and not just something that PvP AIs slaughter like everything else.
So... basically folks... what I am hoping somebody will take an interest in is making an AI that can be used for:
A. Civilian populations, in mods that don't just deal with robotic armies, that could flee from fighting and basically act realistically.
B. Neutral AIs with limited objectives that defend locations but aren't aggressive attackers/builders, ala the AIs in Kohan II.
C. Creatures that could, for example, reproduce by wandering around eating Features to collect the resources they need (iow, they'd be harmless bots that would be able to Reclaim and build copies of themselves or whatever, but wouldn't be able to make new resources- we could, with minimal work, even build whole "ecologies" using one Gaia AI, under this model, with "herbivores", "carnivores", and "plants" that could be really, really interesting).
D. ... and the stuff I intend to do with it, that I'm not going to get into yet, since this is a feature that's necessary for my project to be possible with this game engine. Suffice it to say that if a Gaia can be made that can "get angry" and can have "civilian" and "non-civilian" behaviors depending on the FBI definitions, then it will suffice.
At any rate, I hope that you folks will consider my request. Getting a "neutral side" is another issue. My understanding is that Spring already has a "player" reserved for eventual Gaia AIs, so this should be possible to add- the "only" caveat is that this "player" needs to be add-able via the GUI or a mod scripting call. I will take that up with Zaphod et al at a later point- until a Gaia exists, even a crappy one, it's kind've pointless to make a feature request. Thanks for reading my post.
