The paper introduces Multi-step Proximal Policy Improvement (MPI), a method that refines offline reinforcement learning policies through sequential re-centered proximal steps. By modeling policies as a probability manifold, MPI interprets a wide range of offline actor objectives as a single proximal policy improvement step and extends this to multiple steps for controlled policy improvement beyond the behavior distribution. Experiments on D4RL benchmarks demonstrate that a few MPI refinements enhance strong offline baselines such as TD3+BC, ReBRAC, and IQL across many tasks, while diagnostics clarify the benefits of re-centered refinement over fixed-objective scheduling and highlight critic error limitations.
arXiv:2608.20909v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Offline RL methods commonly jointly train the actor and critic, where the critic is used to guide the actor toward higher-value actions. This coupled l...
By Xuyao Lin, Yixiang Shan, Jinru Duan, Tao Yang, Xinyu Zhao, Runyu Lei, Yiming Zhao, Jiaxin Fan, Zongbao Feng, Peng Jia
arXiv:2607. 21302v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Behavior prior reinforcement learning (BPRL) has emerged as a promising paradigm to improve sample efficiency in online reinforcement learning (RL) by leveraging policy priors derived from offline demonstrations.
By Gong Gao, Weidong Zhao, Xianhui Liu, Ning Jia
arXiv:2609.21108v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Deep reinforcement learning (DRL) has achieved strong performance across a wide range of continuous-control problems. These continuous-control policies...
By Sachini Weerasekara, Sagar Kamarthi, Jacqueline Isaacs
The paper introduces Bidirectional Behavior Prior Distillation (B2PD), a method that uses action‑value priors to train a conditional variational autoencoder for generating high‑value behavior support. These expert behavior priors are then distilled into the online reinforcement learning agent, reducing inefficient exploration and stabilizing policy updates. Experiments on state‑ and pixel‑based tasks show that B2PD improves sample efficiency while maintaining stable learning dynamics.
By Gong Gao, Xiao Lai, Jiaji Shen, Ning Jia, Xianhui Liu, Weidong Zhao
arXiv:2107. 08183v2 Announce Type: replace Abstract: High-dimensional state and action spaces combined with sparse reward structures in reinforcement learning (RL) environments typically require advanced control architectures.
By JaeYoon Kim, Junyu Xuan, Christy Liang, Farookh Hussain