Starcraft AI blog

My energy is recovering slowly from “blrgh, is it day again?” toward “I wonder what’s for lunch?”

I got a modest amount of work done for Steamhammer 2.1. I fixed 4 different bugs in terran play, and now terran is up to snuff—there was a good one where medics liked to break away and advance on their own. Steamhammer is better than before with barracks units, still klutzy with factory units though vultures may get stuck on each other less often. At least one protoss bug is not as easy and needs actual work to solve. I also feel like fixing scourge, so we’ll see how long it takes. Should be more on the order of days than weeks.

For Steamhammer 2.2, I think the headline feature will be dropping BWTA. That will be a relief. When it looks solid, I can move to BWAPI 4.2.0 and be free of the bugs in 4.1.2. The 4.1.2 bugs effectively make drop more expensive for zerg, which has discouraged me from working on drop skills.

Last year, the end-of-year Steamhammer version 1.4a3 (gotta love that version number) was not only the absolutely strongest Steamhammer of the year, it was also relatively strongest: It showed the best results against other bots. Steamhammer finished higher in SSCAIT than in AIIDE. I’m seeing early signs that it might work out the same this year. This year, the AIIDE version includes a lot of necessary work, but not all of it is polished enough. By the end of the year, the new bugs should be smoothed out and other important problems fixed. I’m expecting a strong chance that Steamhammer will again finish higher in SSCAIT than in AIIDE. I think I am being taught a lesson in good tournament preparation.

Still coming soon-ish: CIG 2018 analysis.