Artificial Intelligence??

Well to my knowledge there's no way to update the AI in UT right now. But heres a tip. Set all your bots on godlike. Go into bot settings and set accuracy all the way down. Adjust the other settings to you liking and then make sure you uncheck random order in the bot settings tab. That way the bots get good and aim more like human players.

An FPS isn't chess, even if if Epic calls the figures "pawns". I think good AI in an FPS is a matter of smart algorithms, not CPU power. The amount of CPU power used for AI is probably marginal compared to what is used for graphix and sound. I guess a 386er could do the calculations necessary for UT's AI.

IMO Steve Polge has done an excellent job with UT 's bot AI. The UT bots are some of the smartest computer opponents I've ever encountered in a computer game. (Remember those dumb Doom monsters?? LOL) In DM it is very hard to even tell the difference between human and computer opponents if you don't check their pings. It happened to me more than once that I talked to a bot online, thinking he was human.

I admit the bot's behaviour in teamgames is far from perfect. It's sooooo easy to beat the bots in CTF. But I see that it is extremely hard to make good teamplay AI since the rules for good team cooperation are a lot more complicated than DM. Putting in a randomizer for the bot pathes would be a good start, so that the bots are not so predictable, using always the same pathes in and out of the base. Steve, got that?

If you're interested in the background of UT's bot AI, read this. An other thing that helped me a lot to understand how a bot "thinks" is to spectate a bot (preferrably in 1st person perspective) and type verbose in the console. This displays the "thoughts" of the bot.

As for your questions about AI upgrades: I don't know of any. But AFAIK Steven has tweaked the bot AI a few times between 400 and 436.

There is an interesting project using UT for AI research: Check GameBots

hmmmm

has anyone tried the AI develoepd by these guys? It sounds interesting but I wonder how much of a difference it makes...

MOE

Putting in a randomizer for the bot pathes would be a good start, so that the bots are not so predictable

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Lol this is so true when I used to play only offline I got to know the exact path they would use ie so much from the wall, etc and would end up shooting b4 they got there.
Although the same can be said for many human opponents

On most CTF maps I can easily defend the base alone against any number of godlike bots, because they all come in via the same path all the time. I rarely use the sniperrifle online, but in CTF botmatches is simply camp one point on their incomming path and it goes ...

Headshot!
Headshot!
Headshot!
Headshot!
Headshot!
Headshot!
.
.
.

Jeez, how stupid.

But again ... in DM the bots behave pretty smart and always give me a good fight.

A good point is this, when playing offline i was getting bored so i nabbed my 2 good bots and got a group of 6 med to low bots i had made, I then took a little adventure to face and sat on top of the tower for 15 flags while i simply shot the enemy bots right as they spawned. A single godlike bot, one of mine, took the EXACT same path over and over, one way to go, one way to come back, no jumping, nothing, I played this game with low grav and jump on, i also had X-locs, i got 201 kills in the nearly 10 minutes it took for my bot to get the flag 15 times.

Try this yourself when your bored or pissed, or even depressed, the pue rush you get after those first 50 headshots makes you feel full of self confidence.

You're the kind of guy who would do that online too, aren't ya? Just my view .... word to the wise, get out of this "spawn-sniping on Face is cool" mentality cause if you take it online you will quickly find yourself hated. Badly.

Or, at the very least, do it only against bots. Think of it this way. Offline, it's just bots. Computer programming with no feelings to hurt. Online however, those are not just bots. Those are people. Replace the computer programming with human feelings and emotions. The bot becomes a digital representation of a human, who has feelings and emotions. Whatever you do to those bots, you are doing to real people. Just remember that, and if you don't do it online, then I have no problem with you. In fact I encourage it offline, but only offline. Hell I've been known to do more than a few head-popping marathons on Face offline.