Series Generating Newgens

[Ceirdiff]

This was originally posted on FMHVibe a while back, but I'm going to post it here too in order to help make this forum more active. Also, I can't guarantee how well this would work in practice, I have neither the PSP nor iOS SDK's, it's merely how I'd code such a feature on a low-specced computer (think HP Mini 2133 ) Enjoy

Some background

At the moment in FMH all players which are generated are "regens". This means the player has all of his stats based off a previous, retired player. Unfortunately this adds a layer of predictability to the game and removes some of the fun. For this reason the game should include newgens not regens.

However, with the small amount of processing power in a handheld device then it would be very clunky to generate stats for every single new player in the game, this would slow things down too much.

The solution

It's quite simple, as in Dr. Who the computer made everyone identical to save space, the game does not need stats for players that are not used or interacted with.

A newly generates player needs no stats, they are not being interacted with at all by anyone. It should not be until they're stats are first interacted with that they are generated, for instance when involved in a match (most players will not go straight into the team).

When a newgen is created it gets added onto a queue of starless players. These players can then be ranked on importance, which would be based off some polynomial judging they're reputation, player reputation, etc. to judge where in the queue they are added (quicksort is, as the name suggests, a fairly fast algorithm, with newgens you are unlikely to have a dataset too big to slow down the algorithm).

Then, as the game notices spare processing time, where it is not expected to do anything, for instance the player is looking at the news, then it will take the top player off the queue and generate stats for that player.

This should hopefully be a fast method of generating player stats, the main issue being in the importance vector taking up extra RAM, but the amount saved by players with no stats should displace this fact.

tl;dr newgens are nais.

[Dec]

Wow mate, I love that. Would be a great addition, well thought out and generally cool.

I love the tl;dr bit too .

[samhardy]

Great work mate

[rafa]

Very nice article, concerning a topic that has been quite hot over the last couple of months.

In my opinion, the suggested way to implement newgens in the game has some intrinsic flaws. First, it's unrealistic that a very promising player has no stats just because he has never been involved in a game.

Second, even if this approach would save processing power, it still doesn't solve one of the strong advantages of the regen system: balance. The regen system makes sure that the database has a balanced number of players in every position, and a balanced number of good players in each position, over the course of 30 seasons.

Balance is delicate over many simulated years, and the game has one big issue with the nationalities in the game. All of you that played more than 20 seasons probably have noticed that a larger and larger number of regens tend to appear with the nationality of the first selected league.

SI could not keep the balance in this simple thing (number of players per nationality), how do you think they can keep the game equilibrated using your proposed system?

In summary, all very nice, but if you want to post something really relevant you should propose a good attribute generation system for newgens.

[Ceirdiff]

You say it's unrealistic, no body would know. As soon as somebody wants to see this young players stats then the game generates them and hands them over. In a game I'm making not a single person has a face at the start, they are all dynamically created during space power time and on request. Goes from two-there minute start up to a tenth of a second delay first time looking at someone.

You complain about balance issues, what exactly does that mean? Too many strong players? Weak players? That's controlled by the CA/PA not the stats, so just fiddle with that distribution. Attribute generation is done in the computer, just give the players a simplified form of that, and to be honest it won't really effect the number of players per nationality at the moment, that's just variables in the code to be fiddled with.

[rafa]

So, if I went on scouting all possible young players, then the game would have to generate stats for all of them?

And I don't "complain" about balance. I am adding a valuable point of view to the discussion (from my perspective). When I discussed balance issues, I was not only referring to the quantity of good/bad players, but their nationality/club distribution (as in China has few good players, Brazil a lot, not many starlets rising from Bath academy, a lot from Barcelona). Plus, relying only on CA/PA to generate all atributes is a rather poor approach. A regen is a well rounded unique player based on a real counterpart, while a poor-man's algorithm can generate newgens that look a lot like each other.

But of course, if the kind of feedback you want is "wow Ceirdiff, that's great!", I'll let the other guys give it to you.

[Ceirdiff]

No, your points are irrelevant as they are all issues that would arise from the existing manner of creating players; moving the players to different clubs and nationalities is the same issue they would have in the existing regen system - they could just use the same algorithms. The algorithm's for choosing player stats clearly already exists as the computer version uses one, just recycle that. My racing game I'm creating, the stats in that are all procedurally generated and based off each other. However, there is not much in the way of lots of similar looking racers as all the procedurally generated stats are based of other completely random stats like the personality. Unless you build a huge spreadsheet then it is unlikely you'll find that a lot look like eachother. I'm sure that FM does things in the same manner.

And yes, if you scouted every new player as they are generated it would have to generate stats for them all, but this will not slow it down majorly. It is the collective generating of masses of racers that would slow it down. Again, within my game then there is no noticable slowdown in generating faces when called individually, the algorithm takes about 1/10 seconds using fairly unoptimised code and only gets noticed when it's being used to generate thousands of faces at once. I generate about one and a half thousand racers stats (which are admittedly simpler than FMHi's) in the realms of a second, granted this is on a 3.2gHz processor as opposed to a mobile one, with my computer probably able to do 10-20 times the calculations per second. That's why the importance queue is there, it slowly fills them up during spare processing time.

[Ceirdiff]

I've moved this to the SI Forum to help stimulate discussion there.

[Dec]

Can you not do that please, I would rather have it internal as if SI goes down we cannot see it.

Will you reinstate the OP please or have this removed?

[Ceirdiff]

I think, given issues you've mentioned of late, this site is more likely to go down than SI. I have noticed that adverts are on the site so you are effectively using our content to earn money for yourself (albeit being spent on extortionate server costs). I've just done no less than you over on the SI Forums. I think that to reinstate this you should reinstate your posts on SI.

(Not to say I won't reinstate it, just waiting for a better reason.)

EDIT: I'll have a copy here, at least until you reply.

[Dec]

Adverts are at the bottom purely as I am having to pay over £250 on some features for Vibe and for the hosting. The hosting problem is now fixed, I would rather it on here as then you can get more opinions from a busier FMH site and that it is here to look back on as on SI things get lost easily.

I have never removed anything from the SI forums.

[Ceirdiff]

No, but you have just created the thread title there before. As I have previously mentioned however, £250 is extortionate. Surely getting a decent internet connection in the midlands cannot be so difficult that it stops you self-hosting? In anycase, it's not fair on the content creators that there work is being used to sustain the site...

[Dec]

£250 is things I am adding onto the site to improve it. The hosting is about £50 and I am content with that as I trust them more than myself with fixes.

No I haven't, I have posted the OPs then let the download link back to here as we host all things here.

[Oscar]

No, but you have just created the thread title there before. As I have previously mentioned however, £250 is extortionate. Surely getting a decent internet connection in the midlands cannot be so difficult that it stops you self-hosting? In anycase, it's not fair on the content creators that there work is being used to sustain the site...

I think that's perfectly fair. We all post content to help the site and others anyway don't we? I have no problem at all with my content helping to earn money for FMHVibe to continue.

[Dec]

The idea was to allow premium accounts but since little buy them and the costs are going up in order to benefit the site with new features I see adverts as fine, other sites use them so why can't we? It is not exactly plastered at the top of the forum.

[rafa]

Ladies, put your fingernails down! And no hair-pulling!

First of all, realize that there's no competition between SI and Vibe - sites complement each other. Here is more focused on playing the game + unofficial content. There is more about getting answers from SI.

I think the topic is relevant for both sites. Here you can get an opinion from what the community thinks and wants. There you can get the point of view from developers. So no point in restricting the discussion.

Finally, Ceirdiff, it's not really your business how dec manages/funds this site. You are welcome to give suggestions, but its out of place to make demands. If Dec feels that he trust this company more than himself, and if he needs extra cash to keep it running, so be it.

[Oscar]

The idea was to allow premium accounts but since little buy them and the costs are going up in order to benefit the site with new features I see adverts as fine, other sites use them so why can't we? It is not exactly plastered at the top of the forum.

I agree. You don't even really see the ads unless you are looking at the online list. I have always thought that we should have ads. If we post to help the community, and our posts do not generate money because we didn't use ads, and as a result of a lack of money Vibe had to end, then the community would disband, meaning complete failure.

[Ceirdiff]

In any case, what costs £200 to obtain on here? And if self hosting it's gonna costs electrical bills and not much else, especially if using Apache on a modular Linux system.

[Dec]

That is a secret, they are new features.

I am not hosting, I know my Internet and my computer knowledge with servers.

[Fish18ish]

It's a nice idea, better than what we have. But if the player has no stats, how can the AI team judge if they are good enough to play? Surely the AI would just leave them and never play them, as that would be stupid if they just went to play a player and only finds out their stats once they're playing? Goalkeepers would present an issue, an AI 3rd or 4th choice young keeper wouldnt ever be played, and as a result their stats would never be uncovered.

[Dec]

1 hour ago, Fish18ish said:

It's a nice idea, better than what we have. But if the player has no stats, how can the AI team judge if they are good enough to play? Surely the AI would just leave them and never play them, as that would be stupid if they just went to play a player and only finds out their stats once they're playing? Goalkeepers would present an issue, an AI 3rd or 4th choice young keeper wouldnt ever be played, and as a result their stats would never be uncovered.

Not sure you will get an answer from a topic that was posted in 2011. Please look at dates when bumping. Thanks