Title
Evolving Stochastic Controller Networks for Intelligent Game Agents
Abstract
It is sometimes useful to provide intelligent agents with some degree of stochastic behavior, particularly when used in games and simulators. The less-predictable behavior that results from the randomness can make the agents seem more believable, and would encourage the players or users to address the genuine problems presented by a game or simulator rather than simply learning to exploit the embedded agents' predictability. However, such randomized behavior should not harm performance in the agents' designated tasks. This paper introduces a method, called stochastic sharpening, for training artificial neural networks as stochastic controllers for agents in discrete-state environments. Stochastic sharpening reinforces the representation of confidence values in the outputs of networks with localist encodings, and thus produces networks that recom- mend alternative actions on the basis of their expected utility. Such networks can be used to introduce stochastic behavior with minimal disruption of task performance, resulting in agents that are more believable and less subject to exploitation based on predictability.
Year
DOI
Venue
2006
10.1109/CEC.2006.1688419
IEEE Congress on Evolutionary Computation
Keywords
Field
DocType
agents,games,multi agent systems,randomness,simulators,neuroevolution
Intelligent agent,Predictability,Expected utility hypothesis,Computer science,Stochastic neural network,Agent architecture,Multi-agent system,Artificial intelligence,Neuroevolution,Artificial neural network,Machine learning
Conference
ISBN
Citations 
PageRank 
0-7803-9487-9
2
0.37
References 
Authors
8
2
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Bobby D. Bryant1586.70
Risto Miikkulainen22981224.85