Thoughts on AI Ship Design

[AML]

Curious to see what people think of the ships the AI comes up with. Any tweaks you think it could use or trends you've noticed in designs?

 

In my experience bulkheads could maybe use a small bump in priority, seeing lots of designs with few or minimum which has led to some quick sinkings. In a few BB duels I've actually managed to sink the AI before its ship was even fully identified thanks to some quick flooding hits.

[akd]

Too much mixing of calibers.  Doesn’t matter much currently, but hopefully will in the future.

[SmoCro]

I think it is rather balanced.

Yes, I had BCs that sunk with one hit because they flooded.

I also had destroyers that where basically red all over and would not sink because they enjoyed maximum bulkheads.

 

[Cptbarney]

I think it's alright, they could have the AI produce more 'uniform' ships which could also go into more depth depending on the country at hand or AI level (difficulty basically).

Otherwise it's generally fine, the unusual designs actually makes the game more interesting and also allows you to focus one target and priotoise which targets need to die first (basically anything with poor bulkheads lol).

And it also showcases the customization of the game and keeps it fresh.

[arkhangelsk]

The overall things it needs to do is "Less Variety, More Efficiency". Let's face it, not every design is equally effective and right now it's as if the Auto-Design is made to create as much variety as possible so the designers can generate a vast number of designs and see which ones work beter. It is now more an "auto-debugger" or "tester" than an AI being the best competition it can be. I guess it's OK while we are still on test-builds, but that'll have to change by Steam Early Access.

Starting with the bulkheads, there are really only two viable choices - Many and Maximum, so the AI would be better competition if it used just those two choices. Also, it can't go very wrong selecting the best fire control gear available. I don't know how many times I dryly think "Man, if only the AI ships can hit me about as often as I hit them plus have Maximum bulkheads they'll be serious competition."

For the main guns, there should be three main choices - the biggest caliber available (say 18 inch Mark 3), the bigger caliber available with a higher mark (say 15 inch Mark 4) and the caliber available with the highest mark (say 13 inch Mark 5). If it'll even stick to these three choices, rather than picking something like 9-inch overall it'll be more effective.

[AML]

12 hours ago, arkhangelsk said:

For the main guns, there should be three main choices - the biggest caliber available (say 18 inch Mark 3), the bigger caliber available with a higher mark (say 15 inch Mark 4) and the caliber available with the highest mark (say 13 inch Mark 5). If it'll even stick to these three choices, rather than picking something like 9-inch overall it'll be more effective.

This would tie in nicely with differing nations designs from each other. A few nations focusing on large gun calibre, a few on best quality, and the rest going for a balance would provide a nice variety of possible opponents.

[SmoCro]

Can we sum up the ask as

"We want the AI to be good"?