Natural Selection WhichBot / News: Recent posts

WhichBot v1.03 is now available. The only change in this version is that the bundled Metamod is upgraded to v1.18 - if you are already using the latest Metamod, you do not need to download this build.

WhichBot 1.02 is now available! This build is updated to support Natural Selection 3.1.x.

Note that due to internal Natural Selection changes, this build is not backwards compatible with older versions of NS. Please see the changelog for details.

Natural Selection 3.1 has changed several internal mechanisms (e.g. network messages) and as a result WhichBot 1.0 is not currently working properly - gorges don't build, etc. Check back later for a new build of WhichBot that will support the latest NS.

WhichBot v0.94 is not compatible with Natural Selection 3.0 final due to binary changes in game messages and map updates.

Work is in progress to provide a compatible version - another news item will be posted when that is available.

WhichBot v0.94 is now available. This release provides support for Natural Selection v3.0 beta 5. Highlights include fixes for ladder movement issues, updated bundled Metamod versions and a crash fix for an incompatibility introduced by the latest NS beta version. See the ChangeLog for full details.

Beta 5 has broken the Linux WhichBot build for unclear reasons.

I'm working on a fix - check this thread for up-to-the-minute updates:

https://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=1139392&forum_id=262471

WhichBot provides AI for the alien team of Natural Selection. Version 0.92 is now available, updating support to NS 3.0 beta 4. It incorporates a raft of bugfixes and new support for leap and blink. See the changelog for details.

WhichBot provides AI for the alien team of Natural Selection. v0.91 is now available, which is the first WhichBot release to provide official support for NS3.0 beta! v0.91 includes many fixes and improvements since v0.86, including full lerk flight and support for NS:Combat. See the Changelog for details.

The Natural Selection 3.0 beta is finally being opened to the public. Development of the bot will resume to support the new NS - we'll try to have a testing version out as soon as we can. Keep an eye on the WhichBot forums for more details on the new development effort.

WhichBot provides AI for the alien team of Natural Selection. v0.81 is now available, providing a raft of bugfixes and several new features. Highlights of new features include improved melee code, commands via chat and alien gorges healing friendly team members. See the changelog for the full list of changes.

WhichBot provides AI for Natural Selection, the Half-Life mod. This release includes some significant AI upgrades and bugfixes. See the changelog for details.

WhichBot provides AI for Natural Selection, the Half-Life mod. This release is a bug-fixing update for the bot which supercedes version 0.61. It does not require previous versions of the bot. See the changelog for details of which bugs were fixed.

WhichBot provides AI for Natural Selection, the Half-Life mod. This release is a bug-fixing update for the bot. See the changelog for details of which bugs were fixed.

UPDATE: Build removed, the library didn't appear to be updated properly. v0.62 should be out very soon.

This is the first bot release for Natural Selection v2.0. It includes compatibility tweaks and support for a new map. Note: this release is NOT backwards-compatible with Natural Selection v1.04.

This is the final bot release for Natural Selection v1.04. It includes stability and performance improvements and support for 2 more maps.

JPN (Jet Pack Nerf) is a minor tweak for the Half-Life mod Natural Selection that allows server admins to configure the effectiveness of jet packs in the game. v0.05 of JPN removes falling damage when players are using a jetpack.

The motivation behind JPN is to weaken an overly powerful tactic (the JP/HMG rush) available to the marine team in Natural Selection v1.04.

WhichBot provides AI for Natural Selection, the Half-Life mod. Highlights of this release include Onos support, improved team auto-balancing and numerous bugfixes.

Detailed updates:

# Added Onos support.
# Added a new feature to make it easier to play against larger numbers of bots: wb balance <number>. For example, "wb balance 2" will make the auto-balancer try to keep the alien team size 2 bigger than the marine team. This is done by adding dummy bots to the marine team, which will then leave.
# Fixed a bug which caused the waypoint debugger to crash if started in the ready room.
# Fixed a bug which caused the metamod to freak out if the map cycled to a map with no waypoints.
# Fixed a config bug which caused the bots to ignore turrets.
# Fixed a navigation bug which caused the gorge to take forever to build hives on ns_napo, amongst other problems.
# The bots should now go back to the ready room if they become a spectator somehow.
# Fixed a bug which caused the HiveMind to not get reset if a new game starts on the same map.
# Fixed a bug which caused the bots to keep moving in the ready room with broken body orientations.

WhichBot provides AI for Natural Selection, the Half-Life mod. Highlights of this release include gorge support, Linux support and improved movement code.

Detailed updates:

# Gorge support. Gorges build RTs, hives and rudimentary hive defense. They're not that smart right now - we'll work more on tuning strategy when NS 1.1 comes out. N.B. If you see one sitting still, it may be just be waiting for resources.
# Added Linux support to cater to requests from server admins.
# Updated reactive movement from happybadger. This should hopefully provide better low-level movement.
# Newly waypointed map - ns_napo. Napo is pretty well suited to bot navigation, so they seem to play fairly well on this map.
# Fixed an AI exploit where people were hiding in the hive then knifing bots that evolved. Now bots don't evolve for a while if they didn't live for very long last spawn.
# Fixed a set of crashing bugs that arose from keeping track to entities that were deleted between frames.
# Retired ns_eclipse for now, because the buggy ladders in the maintenance hive were just too big an issue with gorges playing.
# Added a bunch of tweakable parameters, including limits on the max possible number of bots and a limit to save slots for human players, as well as internal tuning parameters for build strategy, etc. More to come here. Look at whichbot.pot in the conf directory for details.
# Added a cap to the max time the pack leader waits for stragglers. Previously, the pack would get too slow when moving round the map because they were waiting for a skulk who'd died to catch up.

JPN (Jet Pack Nerf) is a minor tweak for the Half-Life mod Natural Selection that allows server admins to configure the effectiveness of jet packs in the game. v0.02 of JPN includes Linux support and bugfixes. The motivation behind JPN is as a counter to an overly powerful tactic (the JP/HMG rush) available to the marine team in Natural Selection v1.04.

WhichBot provides AI for Natural Selection, the Half-Life mod. It now has its own domain (whichbot.com) to live in.

WhichBot provides players for the alien team of the Half-Life mod, Natural Selection. Highlights in this release include Fade evolution support, improved navigation and new maps.

Latest features and updates:

[*] Fade support! Aliens now evolve to Fade when they have enough resources and hives. All the bots won't go fade simultaneously, to make sure that vent scouting is still covered (we hate the jetpackers...).
[*] Waypoint path learning algorithm. If a bot is getting stuck somewhere due to a buggy waypoint or whatever, they work out it takes longer to go that way and choose paths accordingly. For example, if a grate is welded shut, they'll figure it out without special waypoints.
[*] New WolfPack(tm) strategy, courtesy of happybadger. Bots now function as rambo-type scouts or as a cooperative attack/scout pack that works together. You'll see the behaviour when you have 3 bots or more. The leader of the pack will wait for stragglers.
[*] New Rescue strategy, courtesy of happybadger. Bots should respond to hive attacks.
[*] Fades should shoot at mines to clear them, if they're not too close.
[*] Newly waypointed level - ns_lost.
[*] Newly waypointed level - ns_eclipse. Thanks to Joe O'Neil for that one.
[*] Added whichbot_version cvar so you can find WhichBot servers via variable filters.
[*] Fixed a number of waypointing bugs.
[*] Fixed a couple of bugs where siege turrets and phase gates never got attacked.
[*] Improved navigation round other aliens somewhat.
[*] Bots now choose Celerity over Silence. Seems to work out better.
[*] Updated Metamod version in the bundled build to v1.16 for latest HLDS support.... read more