i19 and ranged-pet retardation

I'm at work for the next long while and haven't been able to test ranged pets. Are they still going into melee bonkers mode?

i19 is out?

Is it? I'm at work right now.

Yep, released today. I'm still at work, myself, so I can't test it.

:sigh:

Well I was on Test last week and my bots still moved into melee. Hell, I forgot to equip them and they started out by charging int melee.

This actually helped when I soloed both the Honoree and the Vanguard av, believe it or not. I was able to keep everyone in a tight melee cluster, but that was more about the luck of the inclosed space and the fact that neither av has a massive damage pbaoe attack or a damage aura.

They have melee attacks so the answer will be yes until they just remove it from ranged pets entirely. Easy fix.

Unfortunately, it's still there.

I don't understand how it works. My bots charge into melee needlessly. This is kinda wonderful on my Necromancy Henchmen, as the Grave Knights stick to melee more often...but they're still using Gloom in melee instead of bashing with their swords.

The only quirk is the Lich. In all circumstances, the Lich maintains his distance (the downside being that he doesn't do too much if he's too close to a target).

Also...Yes, the AI is awfully retarded in the case of AoE patches. They'll rush INTO the burn patches by destroyers in Praetoria, and they'll break to scatter to the ends of the map against Rikti gas and Artemis caltrops.

There is something that's even more annoying. Whenever your pets are standing in an enemy created persistant AOE, they just go bonkers. Jumping on roofs, sprinting 100 yards in all directions aggroing groups of mobs, running into different rooms only to get stuck on corners, etc. Am I missing some magic commands that can prevent this? From what I've tried, goto or follow only works if you use it the split second the persisant AOE starts while attack does nothing to override their automatic reaction. If you fail to issue one of those move commands during that split second, there's also a significant time delay between when you click the command and when the pets actually start excuting it (about 2 seconds). Even if you successful move them out of the AOE, chances are they'll just charge *right back*into melee range with the mobs (which are probably still standing in their persistant AOE) only compounds the problem. When will PS finally pay some attention to the horrid pet pathing/AI problem?

Short Term Solution: Make a Necro till ranged pets are fixed.

These range pet issues will have me shelving my masterminds soon. It's gotten really bad. I wish their was a way for them to let demons have their 'new' AI and let the rest of us have the 'old' AI. Sure they always were occasionally retarded, but my bots/thugs/mercs are now CONSTANTLY running off into new spawns of creatures unless I spam commands to try and stop them (and even THEN they still do it every once in a while).

It's not just particular pets like he arsonist or bruiser either. Even battle drones and the like now feel like they will get a MUCH better shot off if they run 200 yards away on the complete opposite side of the spawn. It makes playing my */traps MM especially annoying since their erratic behavior constantly takes them all out of range of my traps (not to mention my supremacy buff).

There has got to be a way for them to program an AI that says 'just stay next to me and blast who I tell you. If I don't tell you who to blast, just blast someone in range'.

Edit:

I think there is a misconception that the problem solely deals with ranged critters running into melee. Yes, this is annoying, but the retarded AI I am seeing is FAR WORSE. It's not just ranged pets running into melee, it's ranged pets running right past the mobs waaaaay off into the distance (usually just ending in them getting killed, sometimes ending in them running back to me with a lot of new 'friends').

If my pets only run into melee I can deal with that, but having them run all over the map like their backside is on fire is completely different.

I'm really fickin sick of this problem and the fact that Poison is sooo watered down with it's debuff's and no AoE heal (Like Thermal/Dark/Emp/PD). Can the Poison MM's please get a respec on second power set. I would would love to have something other then Poison, I totally hate this power and do not or should not have to reroll AGAIN! After issue 13, this set went to total HELL and if this power set doesn't get fixed or we have a respec out of it...why pay for a NO fun MMO? Also, with thugs running off...i'm an even worse target and at 14.95 a month i'm wondering why I pay this!!!!!