T_Immortalus

Actually, mastermind pets share AI with every NPC in the game.(thank Cryptic and their shortcuts)

Now that I think of it, this was probably broken back when they tried to fix the "Mob AI RUN AWAY!" bug, and/or when they tried to get pets to not sit in burn patches and cook to death.


I just tried to come up with a simple solution, and it looks like ti could work.

...especially considering that this game is much less efficient than other games with much better visuals.

The same computer that runs this game poorly could run a better looking game better.

Actually, that's the beauty of my idea. healing and buffs are ranged, usually.

My idea only stops the "queue melee power then run into melee to activate".
Ranged powers, at least when they all have the same range, activate immediately because they don't sit queued while they try to get into range. You can't cancel a power that is activating(except a few interruptable ones).

The only possible problem is if an enemy is running away, which would only be a problem because of the way I think pet attacking works.

I'm thinking that pets, once they are set to attack a target, queue a power and then either activate it or move into range if out of range.
I don't think they move into range first, like players can/do, and then activate the power.



It would probably be better to attach the function to brawl so that they still try to brawl, but they un-queue/cancel it as soon as another power is recharged(which would require less work likely).
That seems best. It would keep them from just queueing brawl and chasing a target down forever(if the target was fast enough to remain out of range forever).

I was pretty sure I had remembered correctly. Thank you.

1) If this is such a big issue then there is a problem.
A) A lot of people report it and customer support sweeps it under the rug or it gets lost or whatever that signals a problem with customer support.
B) They know about it and don't have an idea that will fix it.
C) Nobody is reporting it.

You have already solved A and C, but B is the problem now. You need to come up with an idea.


2) I am coming up with ideas for causes and solutions, though my solutions(because of lesser direct knowledge than the developers) are extreme, based on the fact that games that are made better from the start tend to stay better and poorly made games tend to stay poorly made.

They can use my ideas for the cause of this to come up with a simpler solution, but it is unlikely given that this is exactly a "worsening of a longstanding issue". "They used to only get stuck in walls, but now they get stuck in their own shadow."


Something tells me this is a "progressive disease" that started from a small "tumor" in the original code.

I'm not campaigning for it. I'm just stating the fact that this game is like swiss cheese with all the longstanding bugs.

Just look at the Investigator Whitworth gender-bender thread. That is definitely an easy quick fix(certainly compared to a lot of other things) and yet it still stands since GR beta.


I HAVE played games that have much fewer bugs and perform much better. I have played offline 3D games that perform MUCH better with barely any noticeable bugs. The ones I am thinking of are all as old or older than City of Heroes, and made with equal to or lesser budgets.
The ones I can think of with similar issues to City of Heroes are poorly made money-grab games, like Champions Online with Cryptic's "we can make a game in one year" claim.

This game performs well enough and is fun, but it's a mess too. That's a fact.

1) Of course it doesn't fully explain it. I'm talking in general simple terms for something I can't quite articulate fully(especially clearly) and don't know the exact workings of.
If I did know that much then I could offer them a piece of code to solve it.

2) Actually, that supports the fact that it would take too much effort to fix.
If all they did was "upgrade PhysX"(probably correct) then the only way to fix it is to either revert the upgrade(if they can), and accept all the downsides to that, or go through it and recode how it works specifically for their own game.




And it doesn't really matter.
I am just trying to get you people thinking about "what is this actually doing?", "what is a possible direction to look for a solution" and to post your ideas.

You can easily send a bug report in game reporting it, but you went to the forums. Did you just want to say "FIX IT!!" even louder, or did you want to offer up ideas or spark a discussion that could result in ideas?

I just put the operating system info up there for the obvious "what operating system are you using? it could mess with your window placement" responses, or unforeseen responses for that information.

Hmm, I don't think my idea could force any pets into melee range, but they already all run into melee range anyway.
This just may fix the ranged pet issue. It doesn't fix their power choices issue though(like the Oni apparently).

I'm one of them too. I want a solution.

I'm just making excuses because....
A) They aren't talking for whatever reason, and still haven't solved it
B) I've accepted some bugs about this game(so long as it performs well enough and is fun) because I know that the only way to solve them easily, once and for all, is to just start over with a new game.


I'm sorry.
I don't want to dash hopes of a solution. I just think we would be better served trying to think of "why is it broken" and thus "how it can be fixed" or accepting it and hoping and begging for City of Heroes 2.

What good do complaints about an issue they haven't figured out do when you could be offering "outside the box" ideas to solve it?
You could spark their imagination, resulting in them actually figuring it out and solving it a lot sooner than "are we there yet? are we there yet? are we there yet? are we there yet?..." to which the only response could be "we'll get there when we get there!!!".

Thus, their tracking("am I on the ground or not? idk") was broken so that the ground now, all too often, has the same issue as the walls.


The most obvious explanation for the bug is the character tracking and collision detection functions now failing even more than they once did.

It's like the thugs Bruiser who would queue up a melee attack, run in, and stop just at maximum range without executing the attack. He just didn't know he was "within range" or actually stopped short.

The same seems to be happening with the collision detection checking "has NPCXXXXXXXX contacted the floor?" and receiving "error" or "no".

If I remember correctly, either that setting is a holdout from the old Ageia days(thus nonfunctional) or it requires a second Nvidia card to be designated as a dedicated PPU(physics processing unit, which Nvidia allows with even two dissimilar cards).

Enemies have been sticking in walls and floors and plants(or desks or whatever object) since the game started. I also believe they have been contorted into odd positions for the same amount of time.

This complaint is about then having trouble picking themselves up out of the floor.


I think you believe that the above are not intrinsically related, but they are.
At the very least, then staying down for a little longer(and contorted while doing so) isn't the only issue, nor the worst. They still get stuck in the environment and sometimes impossible to attack.

You're right. It was an upgrade to PhysX that did this. It provided us with better physics for things like knockback/down, but we received the annoying side-effect that position and height tracking in relation to ground level was broken such that they don't register as being on the ground(and not flying) or they register as being "in the ground" and thus stuck either way.

WHAT?! O.O

No way has he been that way since GR beta. I know he looks male on ym computer every time I go there, though not since issue 22 have I went there.
Have I been completely failing to see that?!
(loads up CoH to check)

(in the meantime)



"This looks like a job for....Noble Savage!"

PM Noble Savage, a.k.a. David Nakayama.(I think he is the one to call.)





Edit:
IT'S TRUE!!

I must have never noticed because of how bulky his costume pieces are, and how it looked kind of like he was "really sour" with his arms drawn up so tight when crossed.(never seen him in the idle center stance, just crossed arms and akimbo)

I guess I prove why this went unfixed. They didn't see a lot of others reporting it due to everybody not seeing it.

I wasn't sure what I was looking at, though it did look wrong.
I read the description, recognized that the assumption of the OP is correct....and promptly LOLed.


Edit:
As an aside, I've always been bugged by the female rig in this game.

In reality, females are similarly built to males, as far as skeletal positioning and shoulder width. The only real differences(aside from the obvious) are slight pelvic region differences, smaller muscles and generally smaller size. The proportions, such as arm length versus height and shoulder width versus height, are the same.
So, it bugs me that females are essentially "too skinny" because of the default somewhat too narrow waist and definitely too narrow shoulder width(with the shoulders crammed into their sockets).

I've learned to adjust the scale settings as best I can and just ignore it, but it's still not very realistic for human models.

That would probably be good, but I'm betting that would only work when the mastermind issues the command to "stay".
I was trying for a solution that is "always on" to affect the pets while they are doing anything, in combat of course.

Everybody still has to see the enemy/pet in the same position as everyone else or targeting and power execution would be off.

It's character tracking(which is not just your own character) that is the cause of this.


Do you seriously think that you get your own copy of an NPC that can run left while the one on your team member's computer runs the opposite direction?
How can we ever fight the same enemies if one of us is chasing an imaginary enemy because the "real enemy" went the other way?

(Yes, I have given character tracking that much thought to try to improve and minimize network communication for my own game idea, to make it perform as smoothly as possible with more "actors", which is at least an old word for players and variable objects, in the game, meaning bigger battles.)

1) Even additions they make that supposedly do not affect other parts of the game create bugs with other parts of the game, and likely have bugs in themselves.

2) This was broken by a patch. Why was it broken by a patch? They changed something to make something else possible.


Yes, they can fix it if they find out exactly what is causing it, but I believe it is more a symptom of faulty position/collision tracking and overall faulty physics simulation(such as the fact that physics can't predict even our own real world with the degree of accuracy that we demand from these games in every animated pose) that would require so much work as to make a sequel to this game the better option than most likely introducing a lot more serious bugs.

Seriously...
1) They'll have to stop rubber-banding and other artifacts of lag(latency/high ping/lost data packets).
2) They'll have to make accurate collision detection between both static and moving objects.
3) They'll have to make accurate power effects physics and collision tracking, so an enemy doesn't fly the wrong direction like they sometimes do when hit.(FYI, this is hard since we have to have realistically weighted objects yet powers like Propel must toss those objects like foam movie props; good luck with that)








Yes, it is fixable.

No, it is not easy.

Actually, it would be very very difficult to make it behave properly.

In fact, it would likely mean 20% of the game's code needs redoing(conservative estimate).

I would rather not see the amount of serious bugs that would bring to an existing system that currently works "remarkably well", even if I would love to see the fix happen.
I'm wise enough to know that it's harder to fix than eve I think, especially with other humans doing the fixing and the fact that they don't already know how to fix it.

The most logically simple option is an entirely new physics system and object tracking system.







Edit:
Honestly, think of the human body.

They are trying to take something that has only a rudimentary skeleton and skin and make it behave like a real system with a skeleton limited in movement by the limitations of each joint(all joints can only move in certain ways) which is then further limited by tendons and muscles and then the skin as well.

They would need some way to limit the range of motion of each joint in their rudimentary skeleton and weight different parts differently(like the chest being heaviest) at bare minimum to make them fall realistically.


That isn't even counting the effort it would take to make the skin(model and texture surface) to bend and not clip while also registering contact with objects in the environment properly in order to properly "land" and not clip through objects.



What do you really want them to fix?
Do you just want enemies and pets to not get stuck on the floor? How do they fix just that?
If just stopping a mastermind pet from running in to brawl instead of staying at range is as hard to do as it is then it's probably a lot harder to get the similar pet/enemy AI to pick itself up properly, if it even registers that it is "on the ground"(which it probably does not, causing the bug).

I would love to see every bug fixed as well.


But, my wish is next to impossible(for this old game built on a flawed base), and I don't think the fix for this bug is possible without rewriting so much of the game that they may as well make a sequel(which would be great for many reasons besides bug fixes).
It's as simple as that.


I welcome people to come up with ideas for solutions to the issue, not just complaints to fix it.

I just put realistic expectations on generic "fix it" complaints.
Unless you have an idea that would work, count on it being low priority and likely still taking a better coded sequel to fix.

They upgraded PhysX to make other things perform better/more realistically as well.
Otherwise, they probably would have fixed the issue immediately.


Also, what do you think controls how knockback behaves while flying?
They definitely had to change the physics reaction to not send a character flopping all the way to the ground.

I think it's a pretty accurate guess(yes, because I don't know the exact issue, but obviously the developers don't either or they would have fixed it and not been surprised by it).







The developers are only human. They're just like you and me. They take relatively simple coding language and turn it into a 3D virtual world for us to play in.
They make mistakes.
Maybe we, as outside observers, have a perspective they lack which sometimes leads to correct or good ideas due to "thinking outside the box".

Maybe it's time to take them off the "they can fix anything easily" pedestal and stop berating them for humanly giving us bugs with a system they didn't create originally.



Edit:
Code itself is also not perfect. The coding languages get updates from time to time to perform functions that were previously impossible. It's also "another language" that the developers have to translate English(or whatever native language).

I didn't "change my tune".

"use the old code"...........that would break whatever the new code fixed.

"fix it".................that would require a completely new physics engine along with new skeletons and animations, bringing about a hundred new bugs.



Seriously, do you make games? games as complex as this one?
Not only do they have a lot of people collaborating, opening up possible conflicts between code pieces, but it's really a lot of very complex code.

You're asking for them to give you the moon simply because you can't see "the man in the moon". It's an oddity of visual most times, sometimes makes enemies get stuck but otherwise works FINE.

Go ask for them to fix the mastermind pet AI first, because that is a bigger problem. It's likely less work than rewriting the physics as well.




I hate being the "they have higher priorities and it would be too much work" guy, especially when there are plenty of annoying bugs that I believe should be higher priority, but it's a fact of life.

The game is over 8 years old, just counting time launched. If it isn't performing very well already, with no commonly seen annoying bugs, then it will never be that good.

That is why other companies put quality above speed and quantity. They know that making the game work as good as possible from the start will make updates easier and players happier, rather than throwing ina bunch of content that isn't fun because of bugs and poor balance.
(FYI: Cryptic's specialty is making games fast, not ones that run perfectly or even close, and this game was originally Cryptic's baby, which the devs have continually said hinders updates due to the way the game was originally coded. How long did it take just to figure out how to give us power color changes when we have been asking since Beta? Years.)




Learn to accept the "mildy annoying" common bugs or push for City of Heroes 2.
Those are the only options we have at this point that actually solve the problem.

1) Don't troll me. I don't bite.

2) I am not talking about "rolling back"/"using old code", which is what the other thread talked about IF YOU ACTUALLY READ THE FIRST POST(caps for emphasis, not yelling).
(Edit: Actually, it was the 5th poster who proposed "using the old code" in that other thread, not the OP. But, nobody else offered any actual solution other than "fix it". It's just a lot harder to fix than other problems which are a lot more important than "flopping enemies that look unrealistic". Anyway, this is not the thread for that topic to be discussed.)

3) You need to think about what is said rather than just read an entire post, which is attempting to explain the reasoning of a position, as nothing more than "I disagree".

It seems that you are just getting upset that people posted anything other than "you're a genius".
I pity your "selective reading comprehension".

It was broken by a fix. That is why.

"It wasn't always this way."

It seems pretty obvious that the current behavior is the result of a change, either unintentional or intentional. Given the timing of the change apparently coinciding with patch notes about knockback behavior changes, it seems to be intentional.

Also, this game was never built with true physics calculation in mind. This bug is a result of their "simplest solution" to other issues.



Yes, they could probably fix it completely, but it would likely require writing all new physics code to properly simulate actual body movements and properly register collisions with objects such as walls and the ground.

It's a lot more time than they would likely invest when it mostly works and usually just "looks funny".

It may be "immersion breaking", but that isn't high on the list of concerns for this game otherwise they would have made a lot of other changes such as merging hero and villain Ouroboros zones(which doesn't seem hard given the code they have already in place in other areas to check alignment), fixing lots of other graphical glitches and generally making a much simpler user interface and more intuitive play so that playing is "more immersive".


I know it isn't the first time that you may have hear "they have a priority list".
This is far from even medium priority.