The AIIDE 2018 workshop on 'Learning to Play: The Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning in MalmO (MARLO) Competition' aims to encourage research towards more general AI approaches through multi-player games. Games have a long and fruitful history of both serving as test beds to push AI research forward and being the first to benefit from novel research developments. It is our belief that this is the right time to focus on multi-player games in the more complex and diverse 3D environments provided by modern video games such as Minecraft.

The problem of learning in multi-agent settings is one of the fundamental problems in artificial intelligence research and poses unique research challenges. For example, the presence of independently learning agents can result in non-stationarity, and the presence of adversarial agents can hamper exploration and consequently the learning progress. In addition to being particularly challenging, progress in multi-agent learning has far-ranging application potential, in particular in modern multi-player video games, where novel AI agents have great potential to enable novel game experiences.

A key feature of multi-agent play in video game settings is a rich diversity of tasks. Modern video games consist of varied maps or levels, all spanned by the theme of the game but varying in interesting and surprising ways. Such diversity poses the challenge of learning to generalize across multiple related tasks. Exciting research on multi-task learning has addressed some of these challenges, but key questions remain. How well can state of the art approaches learn to generalize to variants of a previously learned game?

Goal of the workshop is to bring together researchers and practitioners with diverse backgrounds in artificial intelligence and gaming, to provide a ground for the fruitful exchange of ideas to help start tackling these exciting key challenges associated with multi-task, multi-agent game settings.

Topics:

We invite submissions on all aspects of learning in multi-task, multi-agent settings, especially where they relate to video games. These include, but are not limited to:

• Case studies
• Collaboration and competition
• Communication between agents
• Evaluation and testing
• Feedback and human-in-the-loop learning
• Interaction mechanisms
• Learning approaches
• Opponent modeling
• Scalability
• Systems
• Tools

In addition to novel research contributions, we invite the submission of extended abstracts that summarize recent published work that are related to the topic of the workshop. This is an opportunity for authors to present their work to the AIIDE community, and generate discussion and ideas for future work and collaboration.

We also specifically encourage submissions from teams planning to participate in the MARLO competition, for example with extended abstracts that detail their planned competition agents.

MARLO COMPETITTION

The Learning to Play workshop is associated with the MARLO (Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning in MalmO) Competition, and will host a live tournament round. The competition asks participants to create agents that learn to play with and against other agents across a series of related mini-games that are implemented on top of the game Minecraft using the Malmo framework. It will be kicked off by August 2018, and will focus on learning to play in multi-agent, multi-task game settings.

Details of the MARLO competition will be posted at: https://www.crowdai.org/challenges/marlo-2018

IMPORTANT DATES

• Deadline for paper submission: July 27, Extended! August 8 anywhere on earth
• Review decisions released: August 24
• MARLO Competition Qualifying Round: entries due October 7
• Workshop and MARLO Final Round: November 14

PAPER SUBMISSION

We invite submission of extended abstracts (up to 2 pages, including references) of work in progress or summarising recent relevant publications, as well as full papers (up 4 pages) for novel research contributions or position papers. Submissions should be formatted using the AAAI template

Authors must register at the workshop paper submission site before they submit their papers. Abstracts and papers must be submitted through the submission website; we cannot accept submissions by email.

Please submit papers and extended abstracts on Easychair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=aiide18 (select "AIIDE-18 Workshop: Learning to Play: The Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning in Malmö" when creating a new submission).

CODE OF CONDUCT

The open exchange of ideas and the freedom of thought and expression are central to the aims and goals of the Learning to Play workshop at AIIDE 2018. The workshop organizers commit to providing a harassment-free, accessible, inclusive, and pleasant workshop experience with equity in rights for all. We want every participant to feel welcome, included, and safe at the workshop. We aim to provide a safe, respectful, and harassment-free workshop environment for everyone involved regardless of age, sex, gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, (dis)ability, physical appearance, race, ethnicity, nationality, marital status, military status, veteran status, religious beliefs, dietary requirements, medical conditions, pregnancy-related concerns or childcare requirements. We also respect any other status protected by laws of the country in which the workshop or program is being held.

We do not tolerate harassment of workshop participants. We expect all interactions between AIIDE members to be respectful and constructive, including interactions during the review process, at the workshop itself, and on social media. Workshop participants who violate the terms of this policy may not be welcome to submit to or attend future AIIDE meetings. Concerns should be brought to the attention of the workshop organizers in person (if needed) and definitely in writing, and will be investigated and reviewed by AAAI and the AIIDE Steering Committee. If there is an immediate need for intervention, outside law enforcement authorities may need to be contacted.

(This code of conduct was adapted from the Code of Conduct from the ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Human Interaction. See: https://chi2017.acm.org/diversity-inclusion-statement.html )