Overview

Now if the estimates made in the temple before hostilities indicate victory it is because calculations show one s strength to be superior to that of his enemy; if they indicate defeat, it is because calculations show that one is inferior. With many calculations, one can win; with few calculations, one cannot. How much less chance of victory has one who makes none at all! By this means I examine the situation and the outcome will be clearly apparent.

Sun Tzu, The Art of War

This chapter provides a detailed discussion of EINSTein s design. It applies the general mathematical principles of multiagent-based modeling techniques, as described in the previous chapter and which underlie a very broad class of complex adaptive systems to the specific problem of simulating combat. The discussion includes a summary of the overall program flow, introduces the concept of object-oriented program design, describes EINSTein s notional two-dimensional battlefield, combat agents and their sensor capabilities and primitive behaviors (i.e. personalities), defines the penalty-function-based action selection process and use of behavior-shaping meta-rules, and provides an overview of how EINSTein handles agent-to-agent communication, combat attrition, reconstitution and fratricide, terrain and path navigation using (either user-defined or automatically computed) waypoints.