[WF-Scripting] AI scripting

[Bryce Harrington]

On Sat, 3 Mar 2001, RaFaL Pocztarski wrote:
> I'd like to learn how to write ai scripts. Maybe I could join the
> project, write some scripts controlling NPC's, animals etc. I think that
> even a rat should have some sort of ai and scripting animals behaviour
> should be very important for the world realism. I'm thinking about
> joining the WF Project and scripting is thing which I'm most interrested
> in for now.

Welcome to the project.  :-)

You'll want to be looking into Cyphesis, which is our AI server.  You
can create AI scripts for whatever you feel the urge to do.  There are
already several AI scripts there that you can use as samples.  I think
we've even got some code for operating a squirrel.  ;-)  Cyphesis has
some very cool goal-based AI capabilities in it, that you can use to
make fairly sophisticated bots (*MUCH* more sophisticated than your
typical MUD mob.)

You will want to get a Linux box, install python, SDL, Atlas-C++,
UClient, and Cyphesis, and once you've got that up and running, you can
see the scripts we've got so far in action.  There is a soldier that
patrols the town, pigs that eat acorns, wolves, crabs, and a skeleton.
IIRC, there is also a farmer who is programmed to grow crops, respond to
having his house burned down, chop trees, etc.  I think you'll have lots
of fun fiddling with these scripts.  :-) 

I think you might enjoy asking around if there are perhaps some others
that would also like to learn AI scripting, so you can help each other
learn and bounce ideas off of each other.  

Once you've learned how to create the AI scripts, it would be *great* if
you could help us create some of the AI that we will need for Mason.
You'll want to talk to Zzorn some day, and keep an eye out for the Mason
meetings (they occur bi-weekly).  I think there is still a lot of
flexibility in what kinds of creatures to put into the game, and so the
opportunity to define the Mason AI needs is still open if you're
interested.  Once those requirements are in hand, there's nothing to get
in the way of making prototype implementations of them in Cyphesis.

> There isn't to much at
> http://www.worldforge.org/website/clients/scripting.html or also here,
> on scripting at mail.worldforge.org, so tell me, where can I find more
> details about scripting in WF? I'd like to know how to write them and
> have some method for testing the scripts, maybe using the UClient. Is it
> possible?

'Fraid the only good direction I can point you is to the Cyphesis source
code.  I would *love* to see someone generate some simple docs to assist
other potential AI developers in learning how to start scripting.  We
certainly have enough examples and experience doing it that it's worth
writing some guidelines down.  I know it can be frustrating for new
developers to obtain enough information to be able to even start work on
AI scripting, so anyone who can work to mitigate that will be doing a
lot of long-term good for our project.  Once you feel you've got a grasp
on AI, would you mind spending a few days helping us with writing down
what you've learned?  

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Bryce Harrington     bryce @ neptune.net    bryceharrington @ yahoo.com