Sponsoring BWAPI StarCraft man vs machine tournament

[LetaBot]

Hello everyone,

I am Martin Rooijackers, programmer of the StarCraft bot LetaBot. For those who don't know, kovarex started the BWAPI project in 2008. The BWAPI allows anyone to create an AI for the game StarCraft (Brood War). So far the only big tournaments using the BWAPI are bot vs bot, therefore I have already organized several small man vs machine tournaments in between these big tournaments (AIIDE and CIG in the summer, SSCAI in the winter).

Now with the steam release, I was wondering if Wube Software is willing to sponsor the next man vs machine tournament (in return for exposure to Factorio of course). Doesn't have to be a large sum. Most small tournament have around 50 euro in prize money.

In terms of viewership, these AI competitions usually get around thousands of viewers
( I am not allowed to post links yet, so look up "SSCAIT 2015 Mixed Division: Round of 16'" on youtube. Or add watch?v=S7LgwN5tIng to the youtube url)

[kovarex]

Sounds good, can you email us as factorio@factorio.com with the link to this topic? I'm sure we can figure it out.

Btw, did you know that AI won against Lee sedol (strongest go player) today for the first time?
I would like to know when it happens in Starcraft

[LetaBot]

Sounds good, can you email us as factorio@factorio.com with the link to this topic? I'm sure we can figure it out.

Btw, did you know that AI won against Lee sedol (strongest go player) today for the first time?
I would like to know when it happens in Starcraft

I will mail you the details via my Student mail.

I know about AlphaGo's victory yes. For StarCraft the bots are currently at C- level. Slightly above average. Since the state space of StarCraft is more than a billion times as complex as that of GO, I highly doubt that just plugging in a deep neural network (even with MCTS added) would be enough. But since DeepMind expressed interest in StarCraft, they might find a way to adjust neural networks for specific games with some domain knowledge.

[Koub]

Next factorio update, new AI for biters, a single biter will be able to destroy a base protected by hundreds of turrets thanks to its advanced neural network

[LetaBot]

Ok e-mail with details send. I you didn't receive it I can pm you my e-mail via this forum if need be.

[TN_Creator]

I know about AlphaGo's victory yes. For StarCraft the bots are currently at C- level. Slightly above average. Since the state space of StarCraft is more than a billion times as complex as that of GO, I highly doubt that just plugging in a deep neural network (even with MCTS added) would be enough. But since DeepMind expressed interest in StarCraft, they might find a way to adjust neural networks for specific games with some domain knowledge.

Damn, better than my best rating

This project sounds interesting, i'll take a look.