Need some help with using Allies in Missions

Nivek55555 · 08-24-2010 07:53 PM

Hello I am returning to City of Heroes after a couple of years and figured I would give the Mission Architect a try. I am messing around with my first mission and I can not seem to get Allies to work right. I wanted to have 3 different Allies throughout the mission to help out and one issue comes up.

When I give them powers at least one of the three will just stand there and do nothing. I have tried moving the order that they appear in the editor and where they show up in the mission but it always seems to keep happening and it varies as to what character wont do anything. I have triple checked and all their settings are the same. The only difference is what powers they have.

Tangler · 08-25-2010 02:05 AM

I have yet to try it for myself, but it sounds like what you are seeing are the effects of the new designated helper patch they introduced.

Quote:

Introducing: the Designated Helper

We are removing the reduction to rewards based on the number of allied NPCs in a mission, since that had undesirable side effects and limited legitimate story telling options.
Instead, a team can only get assistance in the form of buffs and debuffs (and Autopowers) from a single ally in the amission. That ally becomes The Designated Helper.
There can only be one Designated Helper in a map.
If there are multiple candidates for Helper, the FIRST eligible ally the team encounters that uses its powers will become the Designated Helper.
In order for an entity to be a candidate for Designated Helper, the following rules need to be true:
- The candidate must Follow the player:
  - Added via choosing an Advanced Mission Goal of:
    - Add an Ally
    - Add An Escort
    - NOTE: If the Author chooses Release a Captive, the Captive will not follow players and is not a candidate for Designated Helper.
  - The candidate must have the Follow behavior set in the goal Settings
    - Ally: Ally Behavior is Follow
    - Escort: Arrival Behavior is Follow
- The candidate must have its combat abilities set to either:
  - Aggressive
  - Fight Defensive
- The ally becomes the Designated Helper once it USES its powers, and Defensive allies only use powers defensively, so if the team meets an Aggressive ally before the Defensive ally uses its powers, the Defensive entity will NOT become the Designated Helper.
- It is possible for the team to end up with a Designated Helper with no buff/debuff powers if the first candidate the player meets does not have Buff/Debuff powers but is set to Aggressive or Fight Defensive.
- NOTE: Allies with combat abilities set to Non Combat or Pacifist will not be the Designated Helper
- No other allies in the map will use their buff/debuff abilities. They also wont use any Autopowers, summon any pets or use location-based attacks (like Rain of Fire) or chaining attacks (like Chain Induction).
  - Including any friendly bosses, patrols, ambushes, etc.
  - Including any Designated Helper candidates after the first
If the author adds more than one buffing ally to the map, and sets those allies to follow the team, after the first ally they will not use their buffing powers. They will still follow the team so goals can be completed and will use offensive powers to attack enemies, but only one ally will use their non-offensive abilities. If the non-DH allies do not have offensive capabilities, they will not do anything other than follow, much like a non-combat escort/ally.

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Lazarus · 08-25-2010 02:09 PM

Let's please keep discussion of the Designated Helper in this thread.

Without more info on the setup of your allies there is little we can do to help. I can tell you though that I have tested the Designated Helper with as many as 10 allies in a single mission without seeing what you're reporting.