用流模型提升在线强化学习的策略表达能力,实现更优性能。
Flow-Based Policy for Online Reinforcement Learning
- 通过状态依赖的速度场建模策略,用微分方程生成动作。
- 在动态缓冲区中优化价值并约束与最优策略的Wasserstein-2距离。
- 适合追求高表达力策略的在线强化学习研究者使用。
我们提出FlowRL,一种结合流模型策略表示与Wasserstein-2正则化优化的在线强化学习新框架。我们认为,除了训练信号外,提升策略类的表达能力对强化学习性能至关重要。流模型能有效捕捉复杂、多模态的动作分布,但其直接应用于在线强化学习面临根本性目标不匹配:标准流模型优化目标是静态数据拟合,而强化学习需要基于动态回放缓冲区的价值导向策略优化,导致优化困难。FlowRL首先通过状态依赖的速度场建模策略,从噪声出发通过确定性常微分方程积分生成动作。我们推导出一个约束策略搜索目标,联合最大化通过流策略的Q值,同时限制其与由回放缓冲区隐式推导的行为最优策略之间的Wasserstein-2距离。该形式使流模型优化与强化学习目标对齐,在复杂策略类下仍可实现高效且价值感知的策略学习。在DMControl和Humanoidbench上的实验表明,FlowRL在在线强化学习基准上达到有竞争力的性能。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
We present \textbf{FlowRL}, a novel framework for online reinforcement learning that integrates flow-based policy representation with Wasserstein-2-regularized optimization. We argue that in addition to training signals, enhancing the expressiveness of the policy class is crucial for the performance gains in RL. Flow-based generative models offer such potential, excelling at capturing complex, multimodal action distributions. However, their direct application in online RL is challenging due to a fundamental objective mismatch: standard flow training optimizes for static data imitation, while RL requires value-based policy optimization through a dynamic buffer, leading to difficult optimization landscapes. FlowRL first models policies via a state-dependent velocity field, generating actions through deterministic ODE integration from noise. We derive a constrained policy search objective that jointly maximizes Q through the flow policy while bounding the Wasserstein-2 distance to a behavior-optimal policy implicitly derived from the replay buffer. This formulation effectively aligns the flow optimization with the RL objective, enabling efficient and value-aware policy learning despite the complexity of the policy class. Empirical evaluations on DMControl and Humanoidbench demonstrate that FlowRL achieves competitive performance in online reinforcement learning benchmarks.
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