RTS is a bit of a special case because a lot of the skill involved is micromanagement and software is MUCH better at micromanagement than humans.
The micro capabilities of the AI could be limited so they’re more or less equivalent to a human pro gamer’s, forcing the AI to win via build choice and tactics.
It’s going to be a mess. Even if you, say, limit the AI’s click-per-minute rate, it still has serious advantages. It knows how many fractions of a second can these units stay in the range of enemy artillery and still be able to pull back to recover. It knows whether those units will arrive in time to reinforce the defense or they’ll be too late and should do something else instead.
Build choice is not all that complicated and with tactics you run right into micro.
Human-like uncertainty could be inserted into the AI’s knowledge of those things, but yeah, as you say, it’s going to be a mess. Probably best to pick another kind of game to beat humans at.
The micro capabilities of the AI could be limited so they’re more or less equivalent to a human pro gamer’s, forcing the AI to win via build choice and tactics.
It’s going to be a mess. Even if you, say, limit the AI’s click-per-minute rate, it still has serious advantages. It knows how many fractions of a second can these units stay in the range of enemy artillery and still be able to pull back to recover. It knows whether those units will arrive in time to reinforce the defense or they’ll be too late and should do something else instead.
Build choice is not all that complicated and with tactics you run right into micro.
Make the AI control a robot that looks at a physical screen and operates a physical mouse. Then it will be fair. ;)
The point of the exercise is NOT to devise a handicapping system which will produce a fair match.
Human-like uncertainty could be inserted into the AI’s knowledge of those things, but yeah, as you say, it’s going to be a mess. Probably best to pick another kind of game to beat humans at.
Or the game could be played on its slowest mode.