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[Frumple]

I did notice they like to get "stuck" on boulder traps that have stuff underneath them. Someone dies on a boulder trap tile, trap gets reset while the loot is still in the tile, imps spend rest of forever dancing around the boulder, failing to retrieve the junk. Might be a few other things that cause similar behavior, I'unno.

[Sappho]

Yeah, I ended up figuring it out: there was a stockpile by the entrance from when I started, then I wanted to move it further in so I removed the old one. I foolishly expected the AI to be able to handle "grab stuff from here and move it," but apparently when there's a huge stack of something (200+ wood), the imps are unable to split it and only grab as much as they can carry. So they just keep trying to lift the whole stack, failing, and trying again, and they will never cancel the job or go do something else.

In the end, I took my keeper and manually went back and forth, carrying 10 wood at a time until there was a small enough pile for the imps to carry it without my help. It took ages, of course, and immediately afterwards, before I could get anything else set up, I was raided and murdered to death.

This game is fun and all, but the AI is absolutely retarded. I hope that will be improved.

[0x517A5D]

Yeah, I ended up figuring it out: there was a stockpile by the entrance from when I started, then I wanted to move it further in so I removed the old one. I foolishly expected the AI to be able to handle "grab stuff from here and move it," but apparently when there's a huge stack of something (200+ wood), the imps are unable to split it and only grab as much as they can carry. So they just keep trying to lift the whole stack, failing, and trying again, and they will never cancel the job or go do something else.

In the end, I took my keeper and manually went back and forth, carrying 10 wood at a time until there was a small enough pile for the imps to carry it without my help. It took ages, of course, and immediately afterwards, before I could get anything else set up, I was raided and murdered to death.

Maybe you could have just moved 10-stacks of the resource to the surrounding tiles?  Then the imps could grab them.

This game is fun and all, but the AI is absolutely retarded. I hope that will be improved.

It's open-source.  You can help improve it.

[Sappho]

Yes, that's what I did, moved 10-stacks to the surrounding tiles, but it took ages. Actually there was about 400 wood on that stack, now that I think about it, took ages to do and by the time I figured out how to do it, it was too late. In any case, the imps wouldn't grab them until the first stack had been reduced down to almost nothing. Once they took the job of taking that stack of wood, they wouldn't cancel it for any reason, and when I made new imps, they all made a beeline for the wood stack despite the many other jobs available.

I'd love to help improve the game but I can't code. Not for lack of trying, either - I took coding classes in high school and have been trying to teach myself for about 15 years, but I have never been able to get my head around it. Certainly don't take my criticism as a complaint; I understand this is early alpha, I'm just sharing my reaction to its current state. In my opinion, improving the AI should take highest priority, so players don't get stuck like I did. It kind of breaks the game.

In any case, I spent about 2 hours playing this game yesterday, 3 tries at it, and the third time I apparently killed everything on the map without even realizing it. I was still building up traps and training creatures, then finally went for a walk around and realized that was it. So it's a cool start for a game, and I enjoyed it for the most part, but I think I'm done for now. I'll give it another go in a few months or so, maybe, when there's more to experience.

[miki151]

This game is fun and all, but the AI is absolutely retarded.

LOL, I agree. I have quite a bit experience in game AI programming, but had no idea how complicated this imp AI will be. Notice how much smarter they need to be than in a typical RTS. I'm working on it hard though, I promise.

It's weird that you didn't get an end-game message after you killed everyone. Probably another bug.

[Sappho]

I might have missed an elf child or two - is that part of beating it? I did get a message saying I had defeated everyone in the second town, but it didn't look like a victory message.

I can't even begin to imagine how complex AI programming is. Looking forward to seeing how it evolves!

[miki151]

No, you only have to beat the armed forces, and they should all come to you eventually. In the next version things will be different though.

[Robsoie]

I don't find the AI being "absolutely retarded." , it's actually fine, the enemies are trying to flee when they're too damaged, the AI can pursue those running away, the guards attack the intruders, the troopers are trying to run from boulders coming to them, etc..

The only problem i had was the imp not refilling the boulders trap in the most efficient way (as if you don't let diagonal passage they can refill the last boulder trap instead of the 1st , preventing their own work to be done).
But even that is not nonsensical, they're stupid imps like in dungeon keeper, they're not rocket scientists , so it's your fault for thinking they will solve a problem created by you  not planning enough:D

[Sappho]

The problem was that they dumped too much wood on one tile, and when I asked them to move it, they just stood there forever because they couldn't take the whole stack of wood at once. They didn't pick up just part of the pile, and they never quit trying to pick it up. I had ten imps milling around one tile, refusing to do any other jobs, because there was a stack of wood too large for any one of them to pick up all at once.

Not all aspects of the AI are bad, but the imp AI is terrible as it currently stands. They look at a huge pile of things and say "nope, I can't lift that whole pile, so I'm just going to stand here and look at it until something kills me. I won't consider doing any other jobs, even though there's an enormous work queue currently waiting for me to address it." There is no way to cancel their current job, and creating new imps just had them running directly to the crowd to stare at the wood pile for all eternity.

I even tried redesignating a stockpile to be built under the wood so they'd stop trying to move it, but they wouldn't build it. They wouldn't do anything but try to lift the stack of wood, fail, and try again. Accidentally removing a single stockpile tile should not break the entire game. That's what happened.

When even the game developer agrees that certain aspects of the AI are terrible, there's no reason to argue that point, I think. Hopefully he'll find a way to improve it. For now, I'd be happy if it was possible to cancel an imp's current job, or maybe possess them and have them choose another job.

[miki151]

Cheer up, I fixed it already 

[Sappho]

Cool! Hooray for responsive devs! : D

[EuchreJack]

Anyone have any advice for dealing with the fact that most of the opposing forces have ranged weapons but none of the Keeper's forces have ranged weapons?

I've already started to plan my corridors with lots of turns and corners to limit the amount of ranged fire, but any other ideas?

[Frumple]

Turns, corridors, throwing stuff, steal their ranged weapons. Speed boots can help close the distance, if you can manage to loot a store before something shoots you. Forest can provide cover to kill a few initial ones.

If you're particularly desperate, you could try to spam imps at them until they run out of arrows. I think that'd work. Or just keep summoning imp arrowcatchers while your other stuff approaches.

[ragnar119]

I hope the next update will be more of unlimited sand box option, where the game is not finished when you kill all the invaders

[miki151]

The next version will have more villages, and possibly a bit larger map. They will behave more randomly, some will be aggressive and invade you, others will do it only if you attack first and others will be completely passive. So hopefully it will feel less scripted. There will be a dwarf village under the ground and possibly another race. Is that what you would expect?

I've finished saving & loading the game, so with out too much more work it should also be possible to play adventurer and invade your own fortress.