VGC AI Competition - A New Model of Meta-Game Balance AI Competition
Simão Reis, Luís Paulo Reis, Nuno Lau · 2021 IEEE Conference on Games (CoG) · 2021
This work presents a framework for a new type of meta-game balance AI Competition based on Pokémon, Pokémon battles can be viewed as adversarial games played by AIs. Around these games, there is also a meta-game: which Pokémon to include in a team for battles, which moves to pick for every Pokémon in the team, etc. This meta-game is itself a game with a set of rules that govern which Pokémon and which moves are available in the roster that can be selected from, or which attributes (health points, damage, etc.) a Pokémon or moves should have. The aim of the framework is to facilitate competitions in creating the most balanced meta-game possible; one where there is a large variety of Pokémon and moves to choose from, and many possible combinations that are effective. AI agents could assist human designers in achieving strategically expressive meta-games, and this type of benchmark could incentivize game designers and researchers alike to advance knowledge on this type of domain.