How can we make this game more challenging?
By
aasjkydiu,
Posted on: 2009-07-01 13:23 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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"Good" AI is a double-edged sword. Sometimes "good" AI can just be really, really annoying. Guild Wars had much more intelligent enemies, but generally speaking, it just made them really frustrating.
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A good example of this might be the original F.E.A.R. The AI flanks you, flushes you out with grenades, reacts to your grenade throws, calls for backup and takes cover where it can find it. I can't imagine going through the whole game WITHOUT using the bullet-time reflex power of your character. It would become a REALLY frustrating shooter quickly...simply because in a 'fair' firefight against decent enemies with a bit of brains, the odds are NOT in your favor much.
Granted there are games that I've gotten good enough at where I CAN stand it...but that's not a usual thing.
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Mobs in this game need a serious AI overhaul.
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"Good" AI is a double-edged sword. Sometimes "good" AI can just be really, really annoying. Guild Wars had much more intelligent enemies, but generally speaking, it just made them really frustrating.
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In my opinion, this argument doesn't apply to CoX. CoX mobs are 1 step above straw dummies, if you ask me, they have strayed too far below the Mendoza Line in terms of passivity.
You get a mission from a contact and you head off to the villian's hideout ... not your hideout, not that little old lady on the corner's hideout, THEIR hideout ... you're in their house now.
Except . . .
Patrols: What's the point of having patrolling mobs that aren't aggressive enough to engage close by targets. Their perception rules are way out of whack. A patrol should be aware of things like intruders and straight up combat occuring in the same room or hallway they are in. Otherwise, what's the point of introducing them to the game (oh yeah, exp . . . strawman exp).
Ambushes: Once they reach the point they "think" their target is in they should enter Patrol mode (at run speed) and hunt down the target until it is found. Not stand there and wait to be ambushed themselves. Once again, why introduce ambush mobs that aren't capable of performing an ambush (oh yeah, exp . . . strawman exp).
Positional Perception: 5 feet behind you is still just 5 feet away. Mobs completely oblivious to players and combat directly behind them is unaccetable in my opinion (especially when this behaviour was explicitly introduced into game long after launch).
Seems to me the devs are on autopilot and asleep at the wheel lately. All I see is fluff coming from them. Booster Packs and power proliferation, no serious looks at basic game mechanics or improvements.
Now that we have AE, allowing players to make their own little snoozefest exp farm missions to speed to 50, how about working on making contact missions a little more challenging (rewarding) for the rest of us?
What's an "artic"? The only mention in the dictionary is that it's occasionally slang for articulated lorry. (Or possibly a misspelling of "arctic", but that's far less amusing.)
Moving on...
Want more challenging AI? You're in (some) luck! A number of groups have become more challenging recently, apparently due to tweaks in the AI code. Malta are more aggressive and dangerous than before, and as of i15 the Cimerorans have started prepping and using powers even before players get into perception range.
i'm rather hoping that Going Rogue features an extensive revamp of the AI code. Arcanaville's post some time back regarding the game's AI system made it (sort of 
) clear why it's such a pain to tweak and upgrade mob AI with the current implementation.
Dr. Todt's theme.
i make stuff...
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i'm rather hoping that Going Rogue features an extensive revamp of the AI code. Arcanaville's post some time back regarding the game's AI system made it (sort of ) clear why it's such a pain to tweak and upgrade mob AI with the current implementation.
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Why do people keep bringing up how hard it would be to tweak the AI? The whole thing with mobs having Positional Perception, for example, was added long after the game launched. Before this tweak (which was easy to add apparently) mobs simply had a perception radius. Enter that radius and it reacts to you. Then someone got the "bright" idea to make the perception work positionally so that mobs typically only react to things in their front arcs (and btw, all mobs will have their backs towards the front door of their hideout . . . yawn). Now you can stand behind a mob, rest behind a mob, kill a mobs buddy behind a mob, and it will just stand there till YOU decide to initiate the encounter. Poor design if ya ask me.
All my criticisms are about perception rules . . . THE most basic level of mob AI in the book.
This "its too hard" stuff is crap. This dev team is more than qualified at improving game play . . . they just dont seem too motivated about anything other than costumes and power prolif/normalizations (meat grinder work).
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I would love to see the NPCs in this game become more aggressive. If they see you and you're close enough, they should attack; and by "see" I mean if you're 100 feet away, they should not ignore you like they do now. Running bosses should be stricken from the game at once.
But implement any form of Diminishing Returns in PvE and I will start eyeing other games a lot more closely. I no longer make Shivan runs over this, and if anyone in devleopment thinks I am tolerating this in PvE, they are crazy.
Add a setting on top of Invincible/Relentless for the Deathomaniacs among us. But keep that Diminishing Returns far, far away from me.
Let's remove Purples and IO sets -in general - from the game.
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Mobs in this game need a serious AI overhaul.
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"Good" AI is a double-edged sword. Sometimes "good" AI can just be really, really annoying. Guild Wars had much more intelligent enemies, but generally speaking, it just made them really frustrating.
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In my opinion, this argument doesn't apply to CoX. CoX mobs are 1 step above straw dummies, if you ask me, they have strayed too far below the Mendoza Line in terms of passivity.
You get a mission from a contact and you head off to the villian's hideout ... not your hideout, not that little old lady on the corner's hideout, THEIR hideout ... you're in their house now.
Except . . .
Patrols: What's the point of having patrolling mobs that aren't aggressive enough to engage close by targets. Their perception rules are way out of whack. A patrol should be aware of things like intruders and straight up combat occuring in the same room or hallway they are in. Otherwise, what's the point of introducing them to the game (oh yeah, exp . . . strawman exp).
Ambushes: Once they reach the point they "think" their target is in they should enter Patrol mode (at run speed) and hunt down the target until it is found. Not stand there and wait to be ambushed themselves. Once again, why introduce ambush mobs that aren't capable of performing an ambush (oh yeah, exp . . . strawman exp).
Positional Perception: 5 feet behind you is still just 5 feet away. Mobs completely oblivious to players and combat directly behind them is unaccetable in my opinion (especially when this behaviour was explicitly introduced into game long after launch).
Seems to me the devs are on autopilot and asleep at the wheel lately. All I see is fluff coming from them. Booster Packs and power proliferation, no serious looks at basic game mechanics or improvements.
Now that we have AE, allowing players to make their own little snoozefest exp farm missions to speed to 50, how about working on making contact missions a little more challenging (rewarding) for the rest of us?
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Agread 100%. More aggressive/more perceptive mobs would go a long way towards making the game more intereting and less effortless.
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Let's remove Purples and IO sets -in general - from the game.
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Much like deliberately gimping your character dsicussed above, taht woudl make teh game harder, in the way that youw oudl suck more, but its not necesarilly more fun.
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in the way that youw oudl suck more, but its not necesarilly more fun.
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So ... many... bad... thoughts...
Please read my FEAR/Portal/HalfLife Fan Fiction!
Repurposed
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Why do people keep bringing up how hard it would be to tweak the AI?
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Because some of us thought you meant smarter AI, not simply raising perception ranges, i'd imagine. It's quite true that the Devs could easily raise perception ranges. That already occurs in Safeguard missions. Not likely to happen, and not at all what i consider "better AI", but it could be done.
There was a period of several years where the Dev team was very small, and it's altogether likely the person who originally coded the AI left years ago. Over the last year or so they've added a lot of new staff, many of them programmers, and been sorting through the code to find out how things actually work, as opposed to how the notes say they work. As already stated, some mobs have had their AI tweaked fairly recently to be more aggressive and cycle attacks more effectively.
Dr. Todt's theme.
i make stuff...
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Positional Perception needs to go. There are times when you can literally be beating up a mob's buddy right behind him and it will not react.
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The idea behind enemies being blind in the back is so that you can hide-sneak-up on enemies with higher perception who would otherwise blow your cover. Assassinating Rikti Drones, for instance, is possible that way, but more importantly, assassinating things OTHER than Rikti Drones when Rikti Drones are present is possible that way.
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Patrols need to be more aggressive. Or rather just BE AGGRESSIVE. Often they will walk right by you unless you're directly in the line of their pathing, even if you're fighting.
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Patrols just need a higher perception radius and a slower movement speed, restricted to walking. Far too many of them super-speed or fly along so you have to CHASE them or wait around a corner and clothesline them as they come around. Agreed on that one.
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Amubushes not only call out there approach, but don't search for their target once they reach the spot that target was at when the ambush was triggered.
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Having ambushes move around after arriving may not be a bad idea, but having them targeted on a PLAYER rather than on a LOCATION is NOT a good idea. Certain characters rely on stealth, and if an ambush spawns aggroed on you, it ignores stealth completely, shafting Stalkers very much. Other characters rely on the enemies not attacking them but their pets, so if an ambush spawns aggroed on a Mastermind, this is very, very bad. Doable, but very bad. Still others rely on first strike capability, lacking the survivability to fight enemies on their terms. I would definitely NOT want to see more ambushes targeted at moving players.
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Runners! God, nothing says "I'm not really trying to win this fight" than the Runaway Code.
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When you eviscerate four out of five people, is it such a surprise when the fifth person decides it's smart to run? No duh he's not trying to win. He's trying to SURVIVE. Others run for a tactical advantage. Mook Hitmen and Longbow Eagles have barely any melee attacks, but they're fast on their feet and sport a few good long-ranged attacks. Their tactic is to back out to range and shoot, which is SMART. Annoying, but smart.
The AI could use some tweaks, but I just don't believe they should be in that direction. By far the biggest flaws in the AI is power use. Ranged vs. melee AI models, NPCs getting stuck cycling the same attack, NPCs getting stuck chasing to attack in melee and completely disregarding their wide array of ranged attacks, NPCs not using certain attacks at all but extremely unlikely situations... That's what needs to be fixed first and foremost, and the fix of that nature that Malta saw made them SIGNIFICANTLY more dangerous.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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When you eviscerate four out of five people, is it such a surprise when the fifth person decides it's smart to run? No duh he's not trying to win. He's trying to SURVIVE.
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That's why he doesn't get help from his buddies he just ran by, or why he will just come casually strolling back as if nothing happened in the first place?
Like my other criticisms . . . why add a Runaway behaviour if it doesn't actually do anything?
Patrols dont' do much in the guarding the hideout department . . . they're parades.
Ambushes don't ambush . . .
There is no incentive to deal with Runners because nothing detrimental will happen if you ignore them . . .
See the pattern? What's the point to all this coded AI behaviour? It's just fluff.
Because it's more interesting than enemies blindly running at you with the sole hope of knocking off a bit more of your hit points. It doesn't have to amount to something to be interesting. Enemies doing something other than standing around, punching their fists doesn't amount to anything. The crates the Council are standing on disappear and they don't use the rifles they were holding, but instead pull out shotguns and submachine guns. It doesn't amount to anything, but it makes them a little more interesting.
And patrols not guarding and ambushes not ambushing are things I LIKE.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Because it's more interesting than enemies blindly running at you with the sole hope of knocking off a bit more of your hit points. It doesn't have to amount to something to be interesting. Enemies doing something other than standing around, punching their fists doesn't amount to anything. The crates the Council are standing on disappear and they don't use the rifles they were holding, but instead pull out shotguns and submachine guns. It doesn't amount to anything, but it makes them a little more interesting.
And patrols not guarding and ambushes not ambushing are things I LIKE.
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No, its not. It doesn't raise the challenge level of the encopunter. It doesn't make you think in new and interesting tactical ways. It just amkes the encounter longer, and more frustrating, but actually LESS difficult.
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And patrols not guarding and ambushes not ambushing are things I LIKE.
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This is the reason we can't have nice things.
I do not want "challenging" ...
I require new zones with new contants...
O LOOKIE : Expansion GR
The problem is that making those changes to each and every group in the game will make some groups very difficult to deal with for several of the game's ATs.
A train of mobs caused by a fleeing runner may be great fun for a stone/stone brute...but a bit less so for a grav/empathy controller.
As someone who has spent quite a bit of time playing the original Everquest and been there for the train of mobs caused by careless adventurers in the Estate of Unrest...I can tell you it's not ALWAYS fun. There is a reason that particular AI no longer exists in EQ2.
Your perception changes are not all necessarily bad...but on the 'wrong' mobs they can be pretty frustrating. Sometimes it is desirable to pull a few mobs off a group first...especially for weaker teams who are trying to take on higher level foes. It's not ALWAYS desirable to have mobs be universally alert and 'smart'.
Don't.
If you want to be challenged, run an ITF with Enhancements off, Players debuffed and other settings. On Invincible.
*YOU* might be able to roll stuff over. When I team with my dUmbies we do 30 minute or 20 minute ITFs (mostly because I'm a slow loader), but sometimes I do ITFs that are one hour, an hour and a half. Players have vastly different playstyles, slottings, ideas of where and how to attack.
You can coordinate a Hamidon raid with newbies if you want challenge.
You can run a Hydra trial with people that can't follow instructions if you want challenge.
You can run a Master RSF run with new players if you want challlenge.
Challenge in this game is in how you coordinate and plan and execute your powers and team. Coordinated teams will roll over stuff, uncoordinated teams will not.
Questions about the game, either side? /t @Neuronia or @Neuronium, with your queries!
168760: A Death in the Gish. 3 missions, 1-14. Easy to solo.
Infinity Villains
Champion, Pinnacle, Virtue Heroes
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in the way that youw oudl suck more, but its not necesarilly more fun.
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So ... many... bad... thoughts...
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Those usually tend to be fun for someone!
Playing drunk is good. Once the hand-eye coordination starts to go the challenge ramps right up.
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The problem is that making those changes to each and every group in the game will make some groups very difficult to deal with for several of the game's ATs.
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Then address the problems those ATs have by boosting those specific ATs/power sets . . . not taking the lazy way out of nerfing mobs to the level of strawman dummies who are basically exp ATMs.
Nerfs are bad mmkay, even for mobs.
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Then address the problems those ATs have by boosting those specific ATs/power sets . . . not taking the lazy way out of nerfing mobs to the level of strawman dummies who are basically exp ATMs.
Nerfs are bad mmkay, even for mobs.
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The thing is that what the ATs have aren't problems...they are called differences.
To achieve what you'd like to see done with perception and still keep the game fair for all ATs...you would essentially have to redesign it from the ground up. The differences between ATs...hitpoints, mez protection etc...exist because they aren't all supposed to do the same things.
If attacking a single member of a group brings the wrath of the whole group in every single case, then your ATs are all going to have to be good enough at dispatching mobs with enough speed that they are not overwhelmed and killed by the first alpha from the group. A forcefield defender would find that pretty hard to do...as would an empathy defender and controllers early on.
So we're not just talking about making mobs more 'peppy'. Some mobs would need to be nerfed because there is no way you could buff some ATs in a way that would make them adequate for handling that kind of reaction from them.
So you are making it sound simple...but in reality the developers would need to redesign certain core elements of the game to do it. The question is, would it be worth it to see a controller turn into something very different from what it currently is, just so you can feel more 'challenged' when you are playing your brute or scrapper?
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If attacking a single member of a group brings the wrath of the whole group in every single case, then your ATs are all going to have to be good enough at dispatching mobs with enough speed that they are not overwhelmed and killed by the first alpha from the group. A forcefield defender would find that pretty hard to do...as would an empathy defender and controllers early on.
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This is how mobs behaved at launch, and we got by.
This is how street mobs and bank mission mobs behave today, and we get by.
But mission mobs have been reduced to a level of extreme retardation so all ATs can solo?
If an AT/powerset can't solo a level appropriate spawn of 3 or 4 mobs then the devs need to put the new costume creation pipe down and give some attention to basic game play issues. Dealing with additional aggro from perceptive nearby mob is not an AT issue . . . that should be all on the player and his or her skill.
Have you even PLAYED a defender recently?
Either of you? O.O
I soloed my emp/dark defender to 50 with minimal help, around 2.5-3 years back. I cannot even imagine doing so now, but I do know it CAN be done. Slowly. Very, very slowly.
It's why I usually stay on heroic, though, no matter what my hero is.
Challenge is NOT the same for everyone. That's why we have different diff levels AND the ability to go through Oro and do extra-difficult tweaks, AND now we have the MA.
I'd love to see more *variety* to the game's xp earning schema, but what I wouldn't want to see is a series of buff-nerf-buff-nerf tweaks to our characters AGAIN, just because some few people find the "challenge" lacking.
Please read my FEAR/Portal/HalfLife Fan Fiction!
Repurposed
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See title.
The reason I ask this is because I see AE mission teams mowing down groups of lvl 54 bosses with very little trouble. With the exception of EB's and AV's, these are the hardest mobs in the game and random PuG's can kill them in groups now.
With I9 and the invention system, the game has gotten easier than ever. What can be done to make it more challenging? Is the current linear mission system holding it back? Do missions need to be more dynamic in some way? Do mobs need to be harder to kill? More damaging? More CC?
What do you think needs to be done? Or do you think nothing should be done?
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You are watching teams mow down the easiest level 54 bosses they can possibly find (or build). Trust me, that's no yardstick to measure everything by.
And as many people have said, you can easily design AE missions with enemies that are nearly impossible to beat. Making the game more challenging isn't the trick, it's finding players that want to be challenged. At least, finding a full team of them at any given time. ^_^
my lil RWZ Challenge vid