User:Rednaxela/SaphireEdge

SaphireEdge is the nickname for the new gun I'm working on. Here is it's testing grounds:

VCS Series

This series is a test of my VisitCountStats, which (to my knowledge) uniquely antialias upon writing and interpolates upon reading. It's also to my understanding the only VCS gun to use precise antialiased botwidth when writing bins. Only uses a single buffer. It's also the first time I've even touched bins at all. Keep in mind that VCS is only one componant of the new gun and there will be so much more to it later.

Challenges

Targeting Challenge 2K7 (Fast Learning)

Name	CC	RMX	SHA	WS	WOE	Surf	DM	FT	GG	RMC	WLO	No Surf	Total	Comment
VCS01	60.89	59.16	53.36	58.13	59.51	58.21	88.71	78.05	83.31	79.36	82.09	82.30	70.26	121.0 seasons
VCS02	57.98	57.45	51.93	54.82	56.59	55.75	89.03	78.06	83.61	79.22	82.82	82.55	69.15	110.0 seasons
VCS03	64.56	67.29	58.01	62.57	62.54	62.99	87.95	78.56	83.47	79.17	82.15	82.26	72.63	110.0 seasons
VCS04	63.08	62.64	54.80	60.26	59.64	60.08	88.63	79.25	83.38	79.22	82.60	82.62	71.35	110.0 seasons

Versions

• 01: A segmentation configuration kind of based on CassiusClay's slow buffer, EXCEPT accidentally have too many slices in backwards wall distance. Uses tickwaves at full weighting. No rolling, so expected to be abysmal against surfers.
• 02: Based on VCS01. Reduce backwards wall distance segmentation.
• 03: Based on VCS02. Dramatically increase the granularity of segmentation by well over 50%
• 04: Based on VCS02. Fix it to ACTUALLY be virtually like CassiusClay's segmentation (before there was a misunderstanding where I thought slice numbers in CassiusClay were the segment centers, when they were actually the segment edges). This should give a good baseline segmentation config.

Conclusions and Comments

(Fellow Robowikiers: Feel free to add your own comments in this section)

Based on VCS01-03 It's seeming that increasing granularity of segmentation of this current gun configuration dramatically increases anti-surfer performance (not that that is very good) however causes a small but notable decrease in performance against random movers (or not?). What I wonder now however is, how strong is possible against non-surfers with only a single pure-tickwave VCS buffer? I see bots in that challenge with scores notably better in the non-surfer category, however half are DC (Chalk and DCResearch) and the other half are multi-buffer (Phoenix & Dookious). Anybody else have any thoughts about how strong single-buffer VCS can get? --Rednaxela 07:53, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

IMO a single buffer can only ever be so strong against surfers (although perhaps your inter-segment smoothing will help with this) due to the fact that your segmentation is rarely exactly the same as them. A single buffer can be very strong against non-adaptive movement though, just look at Raiko. --Skilgannon 17:57, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd agree that a single buffer is rather limited in how it can do against surfers, what I'm speaking about for now is against non-adaptive movement. I suppose my next step will be switching over to TargetingChallengeRM and and benchmarking Raiko, Bee modified to use a single buffer only, VCS04, and VCS04 modified to remove antialiasing/interpolation. Having those three should give quite a solid "baseline". Before I move beyond gun beyond single-buffer VCS (and I intend to move it far beyond that), I want to get the single-buffer VCS componant nailed down realllllly solid (in other words: Build the best damn single-buffer VCS gun there has ever been (against non-adaptives)). Right now I have the temptation to do a mad scientist laugh. Anyone else ever had that feeling when robocoding? :) --Rednaxela 02:20, 21 December 2008 (UTC)