From: bjbisset@eos.ncsu.edu (BILLY JOE BISSETTE)
Subject: Re: State of Mind
Keywords: AI personality attitude automated opponent
Organization: North Carolina State University
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 19:33:04 GMT

In article <1992Apr1.004317.8102@dg-rtp.dg.com>, poirier@ellerbe.rtp.dg.com (Charles Poirier) writes:
|> In article <1992Mar27.122755.22246@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> junkin@turing.toronto.edu (Mike Junkin) writes:
|> >complex decisions involving factors that are not easily definable and can be
|> >very abstract - such as the player's state of mind, or, more importantly, his
|> >idea of his opponent's state of mind (as Napolean said, morale is everything). 
|> 
|> Wouldn't it be great if the automated opponent(s) *did* have a discernable
|> "state of mind", and if likewise the computer modeled a state of mind of
|> the human player(s)?  The lack of anything resembling a personality is a
|> big limiting factor to the enjoyment of computer boardgames, relative to the
|> face-to-face versions.  I think it's feasible to address the "dryness"
|> problem with simulated personalities and attitudes.
|> 
[more stuff deleted]
|> 
|> MODEL
|> 
|> Suppose you could set up your opponent's personality before starting the
|> game?  You could adjust a movable "slider" that controls the value of each
|> "attitude axis".  The whole set of attitudes comprising a "personality"
|> could be saved to disk and given a name!  Some interesting predesigned
|> personalities would come packaged with the game.
|> 

Wouldn't you rather have the slider's set without your aid.  You could make
an entire cast of opponents, and would have to discern or guess from their
style, instead of saying, his <whatever> slider is <whereever>.  I mean,
learning about your opponents is part of the fun!

|>     The threshold probability for rejecting a move as "too risky" might be
|>     a variable set by the Cautious-Reckless axis.
|> 

Threshold probabilty?
Sounds like you want the computer opponents to learn, too.  A good idea.
It wouldn't have to be a full blown AI system, just have the opponent change
his slider occasionally, based on its opponent, or mood or anything.

|> 
|> The computer deserves to get a model of the human opponent's personality.
|> It's only fair, right?  You might just have the human perform the same old
|> "set sliders" routine, trusting him to describe himself accurately.  An
|> alternative (kind of ugly, but anyway) would be for the computer to detect
|> which moves of the human were not sufficiently close to the moves the
|> computer predicted from its human-model.  Then it would proceed to grill
|> the poor guy to determine the reasons for the discrepancy, and adjust the
|> human-model accordingly.
|> 
Well, if the human doesn't see the computer opponents slider, you don't have
that much of a problem.   Then again maybe you do.  Try to find a way for the
computer to judge the human.

|> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
|> 
|> That's it for now.  Cheers.
|> 
|> 	Charles Poirier

-- 
----------bill the clueless, bjbisset@eos.ncsu.edu
Go, Go, Gadget Clue.  No, Gadget Clue, not Gadget Hammer!  Help Brain!
What do you mean, "The Swedish Chef got him."  Stop Gadget Hammer!
No, not Gadget Flame! Stop!  Stop!!