Optimizing Arma 08 - Different Types of AI

Explaining/rambling about the differences between createUnit, createAgent, createVehicle, and createVehicleLocal. Be smart about what type of AI you spawn in your missions and it'll perform better and improve stability, if done right. Sorry for horrible quality, this video editing program ruined the 1440p quality clips...
Here's a list of all script commands available in Arma 3:
community.bist...
And here's a list of all these script commands, but categorized:
community.bist...
To get an agent to move, remember to set: this disableAI "FSM"; on the agent.
The clips used are all from missions I'm working on -- some released, such as the Takistan Insurgency mission:
1) The SOG content will be on the TFR Mike Force server "soon" once a few bugs are fixed.
2) The Takistan clips are a mix of Takistan Insurgency and my "TWAT" mission which is still a WIP, hence why there's less activity.
3) The zombie clips are from a buggy hobby project I also work on here and there.
4) The movie theatre was just a random test clip I left in.
5) The AI stacking up on a door and room-clearing was an old proof-of-concept to get AI to clear rooms a bit more realistically and effectively, but it's too much work and their pathing barely exists indoors.
6) The Altis clips are all from my Altis Insurgency mission; not yet released but maybe someday.
This is my first attempt at editing a video using an ancient program VEGAS Movie Studio 13 Platinum. Lemme know if it sucks and if you prefer them unedited. (10 mins of talking though, you sure you wanna stare at the editor?)

[@FrankieHustla]

I forgot to mention in this video that createSimpleObject is the best for performance of them all, but only for creating a static object -- not an AI -- such as furniture or other inanimate objects.

[@connorhinde]

Good to see you uploading again!

[@FrankieHustla]

Subscribed for 6 years, wow, thanks for stickin' around

[@blackfalco33]

Hey man you are bringing up nice content!! Are you also gonna do some videos about useful scripts for animations / cinematics ? Thanks! 😄💪🏻🤝

[@FrankieHustla]

I don't have any fancy cinematic scripts of my own but I'd recommend ArmaIdiot, its an old dead channel but has good info and helped me get into scripting -- he has a video or two on cinematic stuff.

[@blackfalco33]

@@FrankieHustla Thanks man! I'll have a look in it! :D

[@spacewargamer4181]

createAgent have a note in the community wiki that says that they could use more resources than Normal AI because apparently they(and the player characters) have more physics and collisions than normal AI lol
8:44 Maybe that note was right...

[@FrankieHustla]

The wiki has a lot of outdated information and the community will often regurgitate incorrect information. Agents actually have less collisions; this can be proven by using the setDestination command and use the "LEADER DIRECT" parameter, which makes the agent path from point A to point B while ignoring collisions. Additionally, I have a mission that can handle around 600 agents with about 20 units at 120 FPS. Not possible with units since units have a lot more behaviors.
There's a lot of reasons why agents are better for performance, the biggest drawbacks with them is that they do not always execute commands when told to and cannot target things. They're really just meant for being civilians, animals, or basic AI at a base.

[@spacewargamer4181]

@@FrankieHustla Well, it have correct information more ofter than not imo, it was one of the first resources that I used and most of the time it have worked for me, not saying thats perfect tho, its far from it. I don't understand why Bohemia doesn't do one themselfs that said.
Anyway thanks for the information, I will take it in consideration and thanks for teaching others about how to use this marvelous editor. 🙂

[@dragz4life422]

awesome video dude, been using createAgent for my ambient units doing ambient animations. did not know there were alternatives like createVehicleLocal, definitely going to start using that instead.
if I remoteExec createVehicleLocal with JIP enabled, would there be any downside? is it better in terms of performance? or should I just ultimately use createVehicle so that all players can see the same stuff

[@FrankieHustla]

I'd recommend just using createVehicle if they need to be global anyway. However, I have local triggers in my Takistan mission that use createVehicleLocal, so that AI populate the area the player is in locally. An approach like that would be fine. Maybe I'll do a video on it when I have the time.

[@dragz4life422]

yeah i figured createVehicle would be a better option since I'm making them global anyways.. just was curious if it'd offload stuff from the server to the clients. cheers, noticing an increase of 5-10 fps compared to createAgent@@FrankieHustla 👍