DescentBB

i would love to see a few [BOZ] on every server

I like your enthusiasm jf. I have a lot of the same ideas for the boz...
Ability to play team games.
Ability to navigate (goal seeking).
Taunting.
Different personas, snipers, dogfighters, tunnel rats, secondary whores, etc.,.

I was really hoping someone with time, desire, and dedication would take over the reigns to both the BOZ and Anticheat. You certainly sound like you have the desire, but do you have the time?

It's really not about time, it's about priority. I think we could all find an hour a day by getting up a bit earlier or going to bed a bit sooner. I'd have to get a grasp on the size and difficulty of this project before making any commitments.

It's not really complicated coding wise, rather I would say it is somewhat non-intuitive and integrated into D3. I would recommend looking at the D3-SDK and the D3-Edit source files and their underlying functions for a good feel for how everything works.

Anticheat is not a mod, rather it is a proxy DLL, which sits in-between D3 and the mod (anarchy, ctf, etc.,.) This means while Anticheat has access to much functionality, it is also limited to what mods have access to.

The BOZ code all started as an attempt to create a AI player. While it may seem easy to simply add a player through the built in functions, it was not possible given Anticheats position in the hierarchy. The BOZ code actually has to connect like every other player through the network. This meant painstakingly reverse engineering the packets sent/received during the network connection and in-game phase. Some of which is still not fully understood (like Taunts, logos, messaging).

I will be looking into ways of releasing the source over the next few weeks as I really feel this should be available to the community as of this point. Ideally, I would like suggestions on the best method of release from yourself or other coders here familiar with putting code out for open source.

someone needs to fix Anti-Cheat so that Tiger doesn't keep getting kicked for rapid fire weapons cheat. My sides still hurt from laughing. xD

Tiger plays on wireless, as I recall.

What else is AC supposed to think when five seconds worth of Tiger's weapons fire packets come through in a one-second burst? \"Whoa, this guy just fired 52 plasma shots in 1.3 seconds...\". He's just gotta improve his connect.

Team Wired 7
Team Wireless 0

BUBBALOU wrote:Team Wired 7
Team Wireless 0

Wired FTW!!

I play Wireless. I've had one issue, which was my own doing. And that was cuz I didn't have my settings right Once I fixed that? I play fine, my ping is all in the green ._.

Hey, are there any servers hosting the BOZ at this time?

Yes, Burning indika 3 Dfnet II 9

Ah yes, there they are! They're even harder then the last time I dusted off the D3 CD. They pickup spawn now.

Server seems to be down now.

Incidentally, I ran into [boz]newbie again earlier today.

HoneyBunny is a n00b!

^_~

best bot is Marsellus, not Vincent :P

the best ones are the phoenix' with vauss, marcellus is a fusion tank = not the best

the fusion bots have ridiculous aim and timing with their shots. drive me nuts, i can barely dodge it, let alone return fire

no, the best one is the fusion tank as the phoenix is a noob ship

Why can't they open doors?

Lazy, too lazy to fire a flare.

Guess they dont open doors cause most of the mp-levels dont have a valid net with bnodes and path for the bots.
At least the stock d3-bots need that to know where they can go. A door is like a solid wall for them without bnodes and path.

Have the BOZ gotten better yet? I remember I used to run into fake BOZ all the time... And worse? It was obvious =/

The BOZ I knew, few months ago when I stopped playing for a bit, Phoenix + Vause = Pain, Tank + MD = Pain, Player + Smart = Wins every time.

The smart was their nemesis, thoroughly and truly.

This batch seems like the easy lineup.

Here's a story for ya. I was in Ascent fighting a BP which was using the MD. I whittled down his health, but from his right flank, he got cleaned up by another BP which in turn picked up the MD. I whittled down his health too and along came a tank. HE PICKED UP THE MD WHICH MADE THINGS EVEN WORSE!

I finally got this one, though.

Hahah! OK I've increased the power a bit for the Sesame street BOZ today. Also I've removed the smart rocket for the BOZ server now. Thanks

Quoted from a different topic:

Behemoth wrote:Would you mind switching the BOZ level to something more like Kata2 or Athena, Vamped, Skybox or Indika 5?
I say Indika 5 because 3 is too small for them, and it's easy to rack up alot of kills.

Checked the mission history for the BOZ server and saw that every level did already run in the past.

I started Skybox now because of popularity. Plus it has been a while!

Will definitely launch Indika5 again soon. The other missions barely got played in so if you got further ideas?

Thanks man, I appreciate it.
Also, i was wondering, is there any free servers that you could possibly toss up a 1on1 game on?

Indika 5 would be a wonderful welcome after Skybox, maybe possibly some D-Day? i remember playing it a while back and it was fun, also Wolf's den, Boogie's Neptune & IO.
I love classic underplayed levels.

Behemoth wrote:Thanks man, I appreciate it.
Also, i was wondering, is there any free servers that you could possibly toss up a 1on1 game on?

You're welcome!

If you are referring to a normal game: sure! If you are referring to a 1on1 BOZ game: No - that won't work ATM - not unless I've got more than one server with a dual core CPU.

If you want a server-on-demand access for normal game servers on Descentforum.NET - just send me an Email...

Behemoth wrote: Indika 5 would be a wonderful welcome after Skybox, maybe possibly some D-Day? i remember playing it a while back and it was fun, also Wolf's den, Boogie's Neptune & IO.
I love classic underplayed levels.

D-Day rocks! Wolfsden - I'm in! Boogs Neptune - definitely! Remind me on these if you don't see them running in the near future

Heh, had to do a double take that you weren't talking about D1 or D2 there. So many level ports.

I have decided to do some more work on the BOZ code in my free time. I was working on having the BOZ fire secondary weapons as well as primaries, so that could be interesting.

I also have an idea for a delay routine that would give the BOZ actual lag, so we could have BOZ names such as [BOZ]LagMaster, [BOZ]Skipnix, etc.,.

I am real busy so this could be a while before any new releases but stay tuned for more...

Sounds awesome man. The BOZ is impressive work in my opinion. They start firing secondaries and I'm gonna have to start playing hide and seek against them

Hiya Sheep! Good work on the BOZ bots. They're fun.

When you have the code working the way you like, will you be releasing it to people that run servers? I'd run one.

Hey Sheep, Excellent work with the BOZ. In a way I think it helps keep the community alive. If anything else you could always play a game even if no "real players" are playing. I, as others Im sure, would love to see them in several games particularly those many good levels that no one seems to play.

Yes, more BOZ servers with different levels please
and secondaries too!

Thanks guys! I do intend on releasing a version of AC with the BOZ code included. Do_Checkor was kind enough to test the BOZ code and unless I'm mistaken, it appears that the code is holding up to regular play.

I am working on converting a lot of the code over to a cleaner format as when I first wrote the code, I wrote it dirty, just to get functionality. I am now going back and cleaning it up. My idea is that eventually, I want to release the source code to the community and let them have at it.

I have been asked why secondaries are so difficult to add and why it wasn't added from the beginning. The main reason is that secondary weapons are checked against the server and I haven't yet quite deciphered every single packet sent/received. I have cracked about 70% of the packets fully, but there are still mysteries to solve.

If anyone has knowledge of D3 packet structure, I would love to hear from them. I think I can solve the secondary packets, however packets that are compressed are still a mystery. Until that mystery is solved, I can't add taunts, or custom logos for the BOZ.

Thanks to this community for putting up with the time constraints of developers and my pig headedness on certain issues. I really do care about the game and the players, and I would not work on these projects if it wasn't for the community and there continued support.

Sheep ! Welcome back !

Heya Grendel. I've actually been lurking for past couple years.

Good news everyone. I got the secondaries thing figured out. Wasn't too bad actually. Have a new DLL and I am going to be giving it to my trusty tester Do_Checkor to do more testing.

Hopefully, you all will see new and improved botz soon!

Edit: Sent to Do_Checkor

flip wrote:Sounds awesome man. The BOZ is impressive work in my opinion. They start firing secondaries and I'm gonna have to start playing hide and seek against them

Better start hiding!

SuperSheep wrote:Good news everyone. I got the secondaries thing figured out.

Excellent!!

And welcome back (to active posting, at least).

Thank you very much, Rob! The new BOZ code is now running on Descentforum.NET 9 (just as always).

Did you guys see how big my "[BOZ] clan" growed in the past two years? HAHA! I just did a search for "[BOZ]" at www.D3stats.de yesterday and was surprised! Also interesting was this statistic: http://d3stats.de/index.php/servers/detail/62 where you can see that alone the top 10 BOZ had like 4 million kills together already So: Yes - they are running on a 24/7 schedule here...

Please let me know if there are any problems on the server, guys! I've left the Pulp Fiction set in the server and left the mission Skybox, too! I'd like a direct comparison between the old and the new BOZ. The Mission skills will be adjusted in a bit...

Thanks!

From other topics and other boards / forums there is one thing on top of my head:

The most frequently asked feature for the AI would be not leave players who just respawned a little time to get away. As the BOZ shoot very accurate the normal respawn time is barely enough to run (alternatively change respawn time while disabling the fire buttons for this period by AC).

The other thing is type killing. Sure this has been discussed a million times already but it is STILL the worst thing about the BOZ. Especially for new players it appears to have a very negative training effect, too. Either the newbs just run off for the bad type / respawn killing behavior, or they adopt this for use against other players.

Thanks Checkor! I guess I always hoped that because BOTZ were spawn and typekilling, it might reduce the negative feelings people have about it, or at least numb players to it.

I can add that and make it optional for those that prefer true blood lust.