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> How do you have 'over-hyped' and 'very impressive' in same sentence. Which is it? I'm stunned; how would you think they are contradictory? Imagine a transpor

> How do you have 'over-hyped' and 'very impressive' in same sentence. Which is it? I'm stunned; how would you think they are contradictory? Imagine a transportation that moves with the speed of 1000 km/h. Very impressive, right? Now imagine media everywhere say it moves with the speed of light. Wouldn't this be over-hyping? > BUT importantly, it NEVER had perfect information. It could only see exactly the same as the human Maybe we're speaking about different events... In the one I'm commenting on, the AI had some zoom-out, I think 2x (meaning it would see 4 times more at once). Yes it had fog of war, but a zoom out like this is a very significant advantage. > And. Little unsure on what the argument about APM is saying. It was slowed down to match the human speed, No it wasn't, not exactly. Imagine that you measure a human racer speed in km/minute, every minute. Then you take the highest measured "average per minute", and program AI to move with that speed at all times. Then you praise AI for its pathfinding algorithm, because using that speed, it beats the human racers. Yes, if a human racer has to slow down, because e.g. the human is unable to avoid obstacles at maximum speed, it does make the AI being able to move faster, impressive. But few people here would be impressed by a high reflex of a computer, because we all are used to the fact computers can react much faster than humans. It is misleading, however, to allow AI to move faster, and then give it the "spin", as you say, that the AI has won because it was smart, as opposed to being fast. BTW, I think the AI was either only using one race, or was playing only against one race. This one thing was actually mentioned in the event (once). The APM was mentioned too, I think, but the nuance I describe unfortunately wasn't mentioned. It makes me sad, because as I said, it is a very impressive technology. But it's hard to fully appreciate something when it is so blatantly over-hyped and when you see so many people around you being mislead and praising AI for achievements that it didn't exactly accomplish.

FrustratedMonky 3y ago
You are correct, there were limits on the AI in the event. It could only play 1 race, but I think the opposition could be different races. I think it was protoss, but it was playing terrans and zerg. There might have been 1 or 2 units that were also removed. In the first events where it was really dominant. It could see the whole map at once, and move its units all over the map by seeing it all. So moving units on both sides of the map practically simultaneously. BUT, this was called out as just too much of an advantage, so they made another version that actually had to move the camera around the map like a human. And the second version was still able to perform. Map wise though, for AI, I think the dealing with the fog of war and un-known/imperfect information was the big break through. Not the map size or speed. It still had to scout, and keep up with enemy movements that were hidden, and anticipate. The zoom out didn't provide that. I'm not totally buying the APM argument (but by end of the paragraph I do). Even if a computer can move 'faster', each move must mean something, do something worthwhile. So the computer must think out its moves. I know micro in SC2 is very big deal, and speed is essential, but you do have to know what to micro. The computer having 1000+ APM was called out also, and they added a limit. By throttling the AI to what a human can do, is handicapping the AI which isn't proving that AI isn't as good, it is showing that it can be better. Or another way, in Chess or GO, there is a time limit, but nobody is throttling the AI CPU to the same speed as a human brain, like limiting its computation cycles. So, guess in end, I do agree, throttling APM is like a real time imposing a time limit to each move, like in Chess. For Over-Hype/Impressive point. It is difficult. Both can be true. And everyone on the internet has different thresholds for what they think is over-hype and what is impressive. AI seems overwhelmed with both sides right now. Seemingly new miracles every day, and also over-hyped companies pumping their stock by adding an AI sticker to every product. I just say, those AlphaStar matches were like 5 years ago, and they still blow me away. Hard to imagine what could be possible, with this latest release in this post from deepmind. Plug into a camera, on a robot, with a gun, and tell it the world is just a 3d game.
- Etherlord87 3y ago
  We mostly agree then. I think even after limiting the AI FoV, it still was seeing 4× more as I said previously. As for APM: > By throttling the AI to what a human can do[...] I think this is far from true, a human cannot keep the APM throughout the game on the level the AI was throttled to. If the AI was throttled to the average APM in e-sports, that would be more fair, but it was throttled to the HIGHEST APM reached by a human. Again, it's not "highest average APM in a single match", it's just highest number of actions in a given minute [I don't know if it was an all-time record or just some arbitrary value inspired by some arbitrarily chosen local record; what I know it was way too high to be fair]. Furthermore, SC2 players spam unnecessary clicks to keep themselves warmed up - if playing against AI, that is limited to average APM of its opponent, was a thing, then I'd safely bet the APM of that player would decrease 3 to 5 times WITHOUT the player reducing the number of actions that are of little (but still some) significance in order to abuse this AI limitation. Again, the event was cool, but it makes me sad the technicalities weren't communicated clearly, which made it an advertisement rather than sport IMHO.
  - FrustratedMonky 3y ago
    ah. ok. I do get that. I agree. Maybe top pro's keep APM at 400 over entire match, but not really, there are ebbs/flows/spamming. While AI can max out at 400 and do that the entire match, and it isn't spamming, so every move is probably meaningful. Maybe, throttle both AI and Human both to 200? Something like that? So both are capped lower. For real time games. This 'throttling' is tricky. For turn based games, time limits are equal. But real time, because if we are measuring AI performance, it could be unleashed and be faster than a human and win. So is slowing down the AI really allowing for measuring the AI performance? Like in real life. Lets say you have a robot with a gun, and a human with a gun. They both need to draw, aim, and fire. Would we 'slow down' the robot to match the human? That doesn't seem like the way to measure how 'good' the AI is at doing those tasks. It could be faster. Netflix has documentary on AI. Military had AI flying F16's, and it could beat all the best human pilots. Of course, No slowing down the AI. In real world there are physical limits. Just need someway to translate that to real time games.

FrustratedMonky 3y ago

You are correct, there were limits on the AI in the event. It could only play 1 race, but I think the opposition could be different races. I think it was protoss, but it was playing terrans and zerg. There might have been 1 or 2 units that were also removed. In the first events where it was really dominant. It could see the whole map at once, and move its units all over the map by seeing it all. So moving units on both sides of the map practically simultaneously. BUT, this was called out as just too much of an advantage, so they made another version that actually had to move the camera around the map like a human. And the second version was still able to perform. Map wise though, for AI, I think the dealing with the fog of war and un-known/imperfect information was the big break through. Not the map size or speed. It still had to scout, and keep up with enemy movements that were hidden, and anticipate. The zoom out didn't provide that. I'm not totally buying the APM argument (but by end of the paragraph I do). Even if a computer can move 'faster', each move must mean something, do something worthwhile. So the computer must think out its moves. I know micro in SC2 is very big deal, and speed is essential, but you do have to know what to micro. The computer having 1000+ APM was called out also, and they added a limit. By throttling the AI to what a human can do, is handicapping the AI which isn't proving that AI isn't as good, it is showing that it can be better. Or another way, in Chess or GO, there is a time limit, but nobody is throttling the AI CPU to the same speed as a human brain, like limiting its computation cycles. So, guess in end, I do agree, throttling APM is like a real time imposing a time limit to each move, like in Chess. For Over-Hype/Impressive point. It is difficult. Both can be true. And everyone on the internet has different thresholds for what they think is over-hype and what is impressive. AI seems overwhelmed with both sides right now. Seemingly new miracles every day, and also over-hyped companies pumping their stock by adding an AI sticker to every product. I just say, those AlphaStar matches were like 5 years ago, and they still blow me away. Hard to imagine what could be possible, with this latest release in this post from deepmind. Plug into a camera, on a robot, with a gun, and tell it the world is just a 3d game.

Etherlord87 3y ago
We mostly agree then. I think even after limiting the AI FoV, it still was seeing 4× more as I said previously. As for APM: > By throttling the AI to what a human can do[...] I think this is far from true, a human cannot keep the APM throughout the game on the level the AI was throttled to. If the AI was throttled to the average APM in e-sports, that would be more fair, but it was throttled to the HIGHEST APM reached by a human. Again, it's not "highest average APM in a single match", it's just highest number of actions in a given minute [I don't know if it was an all-time record or just some arbitrary value inspired by some arbitrarily chosen local record; what I know it was way too high to be fair]. Furthermore, SC2 players spam unnecessary clicks to keep themselves warmed up - if playing against AI, that is limited to average APM of its opponent, was a thing, then I'd safely bet the APM of that player would decrease 3 to 5 times WITHOUT the player reducing the number of actions that are of little (but still some) significance in order to abuse this AI limitation. Again, the event was cool, but it makes me sad the technicalities weren't communicated clearly, which made it an advertisement rather than sport IMHO.
- FrustratedMonky 3y ago
  ah. ok. I do get that. I agree. Maybe top pro's keep APM at 400 over entire match, but not really, there are ebbs/flows/spamming. While AI can max out at 400 and do that the entire match, and it isn't spamming, so every move is probably meaningful. Maybe, throttle both AI and Human both to 200? Something like that? So both are capped lower. For real time games. This 'throttling' is tricky. For turn based games, time limits are equal. But real time, because if we are measuring AI performance, it could be unleashed and be faster than a human and win. So is slowing down the AI really allowing for measuring the AI performance? Like in real life. Lets say you have a robot with a gun, and a human with a gun. They both need to draw, aim, and fire. Would we 'slow down' the robot to match the human? That doesn't seem like the way to measure how 'good' the AI is at doing those tasks. It could be faster. Netflix has documentary on AI. Military had AI flying F16's, and it could beat all the best human pilots. Of course, No slowing down the AI. In real world there are physical limits. Just need someway to translate that to real time games.