Bug/issue discussion thread

[Anborn]

with the newest release, what do you feel is the strongest AI? just curious. only played 3-4 games thus far, but the Hybrid does a good job in some instances, but sits creatures seemingly out of play for no reason sometimes (parking on A4)

[telengard]

with the newest release, what do you feel is the strongest AI? just curious. only played 3-4 games thus far, but the Hybrid does a good job in some instances, but sits creatures seemingly out of play for no reason sometimes (parking on A4)

The minimax is still the best one IMO at least w/ tactics. It still stinks at long term strategy (i.e. using Appease etc). I still have much more work to do on the AI. I did some ground work for minimax to allow me to tweak without having to recompile. The 2 new AIs are not "ready for prime time" yet. The Monte Carlo does pretty well w/ 10k/100k iterations (need a super beefy machine w/ a lot of memory) but still does the occasional bonehead move which I just haven't figured out yet. I almost always shift closer to the center but the AI seems to win more games by *not* doing that. Weird. Could be emergent behavior, but seems wrong to me.

The issue you are seeing with the hybrid is something I'm working on. Long term, the monte carlo one *should* end up being the best one since it can "see" both long term things and short term. Branching factor of minimax prevents it from going much further than 10 or so moves ahead, at least w/ current computer technology.

Does the minimax seem faster to you w/ the default 6/2 settings?

~telengard

[Anborn]

I'll test the speed with minmax...

that said, it seems like activating spawn phase abilities isn't working (at least after resolving HBT)... have a voodoo and a thundersultan both on the board with 11spawn, and its not giving me the option to activate.

also deathblows on the birthingfrog, i don't know if its calculating that properly (didn't get a chance to see it normal attack)... but it just rolled a 13 die db, when there were only 6 unengaged allies. it might have counted unengaged enemies as well? not sure.

i'll do more testing with these.

[telengard]

Nice catch on Birthing Frog, it's fixed. I've attached the updated XML def, just drop it in pieces/serrated_dawn. I'll check out the activation of spawn abilities thing tonight.

thanks,
~telengard

[telengard]

I can't seem to repro the no activation of spawn abilities.

I tried using the same pieces you mentioned. A triggering HBT, Voodoo, Sultan, and even after activating those I was able to spawn a Fido and activate him too. I wonder if something in one of the warbands caused this. Did either warband have a Webwing Dragon (Web Breath ability)?

Do you happen to have the log file you could attach?

~telengard

[telengard]

Hi!

_ I kind of miss the score numbers on the cells. Why not put them back? Maybe they could appear only when the mouse pointer is above?...

I plan to have them there, it's just been a question of graphics. I'm not savvy enough to extract the scoring cell graphics from the DB map. I could always just put some text up there.

About time I got this in there! Sorry it took so long. I had to get my graphics wiz friend to extract the graphics from an existing board image.
The graphics were added in version 1.0.38. Could look better, but due to the ability to (re)size the board, it can look a little off:



~telengard

[telengard]

MECCG is my favorite CCG also, I own every card (3 of every except for uniques). I do not get to play it very often though. The dreamblade engine started out as an attempt to make an AI for MECCG (which I started in 2002). I made many failed attempts but may try it again some day.
~telengard

That would be awesome. I can not tell you how much I would LOVE to see a MECCG game with an AI!

I have absolutely gorgeous HQ scans of every middle-earth card made.

These are the sets that I have full images of;

The Wizards, Dragons, Against The Shadow, Lidless Eye, Dark Minions, The White Hand, Balrog and Promo cards including some from Germany!

Examples; From The Lidless Eye & from the original set, The Wizards:

Any chance these scans could re-fire your juices to try again. I would gladly help you test or input info to help. I have no programming skills, but I would help where I could with tedious input chores & the like if need be.

Just a thought as I know Dreamblade is your focus and looks like a great game.

Still, MECCG is waiting...

Welp, I'm coming to a point now w/ Dreamblade that I'm reliant on bug reports etc to find things to do other than making customs (which I enjoy). I've been burning myself out playing game after game to test and I don't want to get to the point where I don't want to play it anymore.

Sooooooo, I'm thinking it's time to attempt something w/ MECCG. I'm trying to decide on either making a generic hazard playing AI (to play the solo rules as laid out by ICE) or a full blown engine. If you still have those scans they would be a great start! I need to dig up my old card database I had which had everything parsed out. I'll PM you in the event you don't see this.

~telengard

[Bog Wraith]

I apologize for not getting back to you as I have been dealing with health issues this past year.

I am extremely excited about what ever you might come up with & I would love to be able to play ME against an AI opponent.

Here is a link to a zip file which contains every card image that I have which I think covers everything ever done for the game.The scans are stunning so I'm glad it will be put to use in your endeavour. The file is a bit less than 78 MB.

Let me know if you go them & what you think of them too.
Let me know when you have something to beta as I will gladly help test where I can!

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2497926/MECCG%2 ... aphics.zip

[melkor75]

I also can helo eventually on Rules, as MECCG is one of the hardest game to play and with so many FAQ, errata, etc...that's quite difficult to keep track and be aware of

GL on the new project (but i still look forward to see Dreamblade and a new graphic version ),

cheers!
mm75

[telengard]

I also can helo eventually on Rules, as MECCG is one of the hardest game to play and with so many FAQ, errata, etc...that's quite difficult to keep track and be aware of

GL on the new project (but i still look forward to see Dreamblade and a new graphic version ),

cheers!
mm75

Thanks guys,

It will probably be quite a while before I have something playable (my Dreamblade game is the result of a couple of failed attempts at an MECCG game, but I've learned a lot since then).

I'm not done w/ Dreamblade by any measure. A new release will be out soon with a ton of updates/fixes.

~telengard

[Phygerator]

I had issues with the Location Synergy ability of the Seahorse Butterfly as it doesn't recognize when I have 3 locations on board. It still cost 8 spawn points when it should have costed 6.

Thanks!

[telengard]

I had issues with the Location Synergy ability of the Seahorse Butterfly as it doesn't recognize when I have 3 locations on board. It still cost 8 spawn points when it should have costed 6.

Thanks!

I'll hunt this down and fix it. Thanks for the report, much appreciated!

~telengard

[telengard]

Location Synergy (and all the other Synergy abilities) are fixed and will be in the next release (hopefully soon). Silly regression from 1.0.43 when I revamped static abilities.

Thanks for the bug report!

~telengard

[Phygerator]

There is one other bug I found. The respawn ability of the gutsoup golem doesn't seem to work. It is supposed to cost 6 from the graveyard, but there is no option to be able to do that whatsoever.

[telengard]

There is one other bug I found. The respawn ability of the gutsoup golem doesn't seem to work. It is supposed to cost 6 from the graveyard, but there is no option to be able to do that whatsoever.

Nice catch. This one is now fixed too. This one was an xml def issue so I've posted the updated definition for Gutsoup Golem here:

http://home.comcast.net/~bsturk/dreamblade/gutsoup_golem.dxp

You can drop this in the bundle under pieces/chrysotic_plague overwriting the existing one. All pieces with Respawn will be in the next release too if you'd rather wait.

Thanks for the bug reports!
~telengard

(.dxp files used to be allowed as attachments at one point I thought... hmm)