Predicting Victory or Defeat - How do you know you are ahead or behind?

[akreider2]

The alternative of not including ICs, is should you penalize Japan (in the model) for building an IC instead of two transports?  Most players build at least one IC for Japan, and generally two if they are doing ok.  Also, I think if Japan conquers an IC in India (from the UK) it should count as some kind of IPC gain.  Maybe 30 IPCs is too high if the UK is wasting their money on armor and fighters to defend it.

I also think that invading CAU should be worth more than the 4 IPCs of territory (adding the IC’s impact would have roughly doubled the importance in the model of taking CAU).

I included ICs in the model and it didn’t make a difference.  Their impact is too small to measure.  Maybe the fact that serveral Allied games had US ICs on Japanese islands, or SIN made the variable less effective - as those ICs tend to be not so valuable.

[U-505]

@akreider2:

I also think that invading CAU should be worth more than the 4 IPCs of territory (adding the IC’s impact would have roughly doubled the importance in the model of taking CAU).

Definitely adjusting territory value depending on the owning country is a good idea. Strategic positioning is by far the most important variable but is also the hardest to measure.

In this case, Cauc is definitely worth more than it’s IPC value but it should also be higher for Germany controlling it than Japan. Germany owning Cauc usually means that both Axis powers are strong but Japan owning it is usually how the game plays out. Russia collapses to Japan while Germany collapses to the other allies.

Persia, Kazakh, and Novosibirsk also should have a much higher value if controlled by Japan because that is the ideal Russian defensive line. If one of those territories is being traded every turn, or worse, solidly under Axis control the others will quickly fall. Having your model run after the Russian turn is the best place to do it since Japan controlling one of those territories after the US and Russians have moved means that Japan holds them strongly as opposed to just trading them.

[akreider2]

I wonder if the Triple A developers have a set of strategic values that I could test?

They’re developing an AI - so they should have something of that nature.

My guess is that the effects are going to be pretty subtle. Also, I’m more in need of early game factors - affecting the first 4 rounds.  Unlike the previous version of the game, this one seems to have less bottlenecks and thus less points of strategic importance (eg. Kareila used to be very important).

[rjclayton]

I do not think there has been any work done on the TripleA AI in a long time.

[akreider2]

The formula gives you rough estimate.  Here are some cases where it can be biased.

Imagine that according to this formula you are behind.

If you got behind by being unlucky, then this formula will predict a lower chance of your victory than what is actually true (Ex. my game against ncscswitch where I recovered from what I thought were long odds of around 1 in 20 - the long odds weren’t as low as I thought they were.)

If you got behind by bad strategy, then this formula will predict perhaps a roughly equal chance to that which is actually true (this is my guess - I’m not entirely sure about this).

If you got behind despite being lucky, then this formula will predict a higher chance of your victory than what is actually true.

–-

If you take over a game that is behind, the average player (taking over a losing side) will have a higher chance of victory than what this formula predicts (since players who get behind in the game aren’t as good, unless they got behind due to bad luck).

[Magister]

Akreider2 - great ideas ! I’m also a fan of statistics.

I can send you >50 games in TripleA 0.902 and some in 0.821. A lot are also in the archives of Tripleawarclub.org

Obviously, the predicted probability of victory should either assume equal skill, or include the difference in skill (assuming previous experience is relevant). Look about the theory behind ELO and like ratings in chess. It’s quite likely that a poor player may ruin an ‘equal’ position, or need more real luck to win.

[akreider2]

One day I might write a triple A file parser.  Then I could automatically collect the data (manually input is a bit of a pain).  Well that’s if Triple A stores summaries on a by round basis - which I doubt.  Does it?  I need unit-IPC totals at the end of the Russian turn, for every round of the game (starting R1).

[Magister]

One TripleA TSVG comprises all the history so far up to a position. The format is compressed or coded somehow, unparseable as text anyway. One may understand the format from the Open source.

Loading the TSVG into TripleA, it can reconstitute the position at any moment between actions - including at end of R1 of any turn. TripleA also does some good summaries inside, including IPC incomes and total unit values by countries and Axis/Allies.