5.1 Tactics & Strategy's

Tactics & Strategy's

AI strategy's, a technique used a lot of war\strategy type games, its the algorithm rule put into place on a set of characters in that scene. For example in  Call of Duty you could have a group of AI characters tasked to kill the player character and to achieve this as a unit, they would use a strategy. Now each AI character will have its own strategy, its own role to play you could say in the scene. Now using algorithms, each AI in the unit will work on its own decision tree (4.4 Decision Tree) and own state machine (4.1 State Machine) meaning that it will think for itself but on the decisions it makes, that will make an impact on the other members of the unit. The overall behaviour and AI duties will rely on what the unit is doing as a whole, if the unit is programmed to attack the player character then all AI members will do so.

AI tactics links to strategy's because this will be the action of the AI characters in the unit, for example you can have a leader, sniper and four foot soldiers in a unit and because of algorithm tactics, each job will suit the AI's role. What I mean by this is the leader will be sitting back giving commands, the sniper will also be sitting back, away from the main fight trying to shoot the player characters from a distance, and the foot soldiers will be the first to attack the player character on the ground. More in-depth tactics would be that of the ground soldiers, they would be aware of there environment and surroundings, ie. are they being shot at? are they hurt? shall I take cover? these also link to state machine (4.1 State Machine) in respect making decision on what current state their in.

"In strategy games all strategy elements apply (naturally), however strategy games normally comprise other kinds of disciplines as well, that are not strictly related with strategy. For example strategy games normally present other challenges to the player other than the strategical, like tactical, logistical and economical challenges."(16) 

Solo describes the elements of strategy in games and the techniques used to really define a strategic game, one I can think of which suits this quote is Total War, combining the two techniques tactics and strategy's by the AI working as a unit but each individual AI has its own decision tree. Solo does say that some games work with other strategies, by this he could be referring to decision trees (4.4 Decision Tree) and state machines (4.1 State Machine) which backs really backs up the use of algorithms in games today, games today can be incredibly clever will the algorithms that are used, watching units of AI working together to surround and eliminate the player character can really take you to another world.