Pet AI Potential

I refer to *THIS* in the Beta Forums:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redlynne Quote: Originally Posted by Arbiter Hawk We've also altered Singularity's AI a bit so that it will prefer to stay out of melee range from its targets Is there *ANY* possible way that the AI tweaks you're making to Singularity could be ported over to other Pets?? I'm thinking Mastermind Primary Ranged Pets (*MERCENARIES*!!, Robots!, Arsonist!) as well as some less obvious ones (Illusion's Phantasm and Decoy, Devices Gun Drone). There's a number of Pets that really ought to STAY RANGED (because they don't have any melee attacks at all) but don't because their AI got "messed up" when all Pet AIs got "generic-ed" by the Demon Summoning realignment.

Discuss.

It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...

If they don't port this over to all range-oriented pets after demonstrating they know full well how to make the appropriate coding changes, they might as well pull out a 60-foot-wide hand and slap the playerbase with it.

They've just killed their only valid excuse to not fix pet AI, at least with regards to the melee/ranged thing.

They might fix masterminds or they might not..

Sorry I just don't have any faith

This would make me so happy sine my bots would be far less likely to run up to some random mob only to end up dying due to being outside of my healing range while the remaining pets stay where they are.

It would also mean i could play a Thug MM and not get frustrated over the Arsonist pet displaying "suicidal-like" behavior after proving time and time again that not only can the arsonist stay alive longer than .3 of a second but can actually do something productive.

Problem with adding it for MM's is, to them, the 'run into melee' bug isn't actually a bug and is more 'balance'.

If we could lock our pets in place to fire at will... Think about how OP'd that'd turn Bots into, or Thugs...

I strongly believe they haven't fixed it yet, not because they don't know how, but rather because they don't want to.

As I understand, it is because the pets have a brawl ability which they will use. That is why they run into combat. Taking away bots/merc brawl ability should do it.

Back in the day, playing my Necro/Dark, I used to cringe everytime I noticed my Knights pretending to be blasters. Standing back and plinking away with Gloom...

Took repeated clicks of goto, sometimes even clicking passive then attack, to break them out of it.

I thought nothing would be as annoying as my Grave Knights pretending to be rangers.

Then Demons came out and they broke the ai. My Grave Knights no longer got stuck in range mode thankfully, but the reverse proved to be even more annoying.
While I could easily manage the 2 guys when they glitched, The new bug made my
Bots/Storm nearly unplayable in his current build.
Having the entire army of bots swarm into melee, all the time, to brawl the baddies instead of using the powerful laser cannons...

Yeah.

I don't like the bugs but I think one form of them or another is an intended handicap.

We've moaned and moaned about this for years and I can't recall a redname ever acknowledging it as a 'Bug'.

Just sayin.

Currently, ranged MM pets already "prefer" ranged already: they don't run into melee immediately, but rather only when there's a gap in their ranged attack chain.

Also, the phrase "prefer to stay at range" is not the equivalent of "never goes into melee" that I feel many of you are taking it to be.

More to the point: I'm pretty sure that, if these tweaks are successful, they will port them to MM pets, but I'd much rather let Singy (or Phantasm) be a test dummy for how the new AI works, *then* port the changes to ranged MM pets at some later issue, rather than risk even wonkier things happening to MM pets...

Interestingly enough, Necromancy AI is just about perfect. The T1 and T2 Zombies start with their ranged attacks, then run in for melee. The Lich however is the real shining star. He stays almost perfectly still with changing targets. I'd have to assume Demons is in a similar position.

As far as I can tell with my testing (have done Thugs, Necro, and Demons) when an fight is started at range, the AI has each pet cycle all attacks they can use, if they have no attacks they can use they move in closer and use all attacks they can at that range.

The exception is one pet; an Enforcer for thugs, the Ember demon from Demon, and the Lich from necromancy will stay back and cycle attacks until it gets a long enough pause.

With that pause they will move closer, eventually stoping about 20' from the target. The ember demon and Lich will not move any closer from this point, regardless of pauses. The Enforcer will move in eventually to use melee attacks.

This is from observing the pets attacking dummies in the RWZ in about 10 minute bursts then restarting at the firing line.

I haven't done Bots, Ninjas, or Mercs but I'd assume a protector bot would be the at range exception staying 20' from the target, the Oni for Ninja's until one of the Melee attacks pop up to be cycled similar to the enforcer, and I have no idea what the mercs would do.

I imagine they'll add the change in the same way they did the last time--when the new MM powerset comes out. Either that or with the next issue.

I have noticed that the Lich avoids melee combat. In fact, the Lich is probably the only henchman I've seen on any of my MM's who doesn't really need much babysitting - he always stands clear of the fighting, debuffs like crazy, and drains health to keep himself topped off. If only more pets were like that.

Like Necromancy, I'd argue Beast Mastery is relatively good on positioning AI... the 'when do I use these buffs' AI is stupid, or actually nonexistent (Whenever they're up!) but they always go into melee. They never dilly dally about throwing shuriken, they go right up and bite off the enemy's face. This simply proves that the reverse of the Protector Bots is not true... the PBs have no melee attacks and still run up, the Beasts have no ranged and do not stay back.

I'm sure you don't mind it just like many others don't mind but there are some who don't like it.
We need a way so that everyone can get what they want.

Having pets always running annoys some people who'd prefer them to stay and DPS while getting healed (especially when they run from tiny damage)
Having them always stay would be suicidal with some mobs.

A way to satisfy everyone is by having pets run by defaul but give the player a way to force them to stay. So a suggestion would be 'stay' command has an immobalise function (ie lock them in place)

I am a bit baffled by the comment that pets that are aparently designed to stand still and shoot would be OP if they actually stand still and shoot...

For the record:

Personally, I'm doubtful that allowing us 100% control would indeed make us overpowered. While I can see some outliers maybe needing adjusting, overall I don't think it would be that bad really.
That doesn't mean the Dev's feel the same though, and the evidence I've pointed out seems to paint a clear picture.