AI smarts

powerferret · Post by **powerferret** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 5:23 pm

In regards to the A.I., how does it go about choosing a target in a party? Every time Ive ever partied, 80-90% of all the mosnters we fight will make a beeline for my character, and proceed to chase me around in circles while my other party members hack away at them. I cant figure out why this is happening, because I can be higher level, lower level, higher AC, lower AC, higher health, lower health than my party, or whatever. Im a ranger by the way, and ive also seen it happen to either bards or rogues (not sure which) who are using a bow. Just seems kindof odd that the monsters would ignore the characters that are in melee combat, already engaged and doing sigificant damage, to chase me around, all the while still getting hit by the melee characters.

cyberman · Post by **cyberman** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 6:24 pm

Wouldn't surprise me if monsters have a propensity to attack a certain type or class of character more often or less often.

In Shadowbane monsters aggroed bards a whole lot (bards were the main buffers in sb). Low level bards were always told to stay back, and don't attack.

Kell Of Neversummer · Post by **Kell Of Neversummer** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 6:28 pm

I thinl you will find they tend to attack the first person that attacks them, and ignore subsequent attackers - this was the default in the original NWN.

powerferret · Post by **powerferret** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 7:30 pm

no, i purposely wait untill somone is attacking something before i shoot at it, it can be almost dead and it will then ignore whoever is killing it to come attack me. Example, I was in a group fighting ogres, there were 6 of them, 2 were attackin one tank, 1 was attacking another and 2 were attacking one guy and the the last attacked me, after killing the one that was attacking me, i switched to bow and shot one of the ogres fighting a melee guy, then all the remaining ogres started chaseing me.

Joran · Post by **Joran** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 7:32 pm

Without going into details, there's an alogrithm the AI uses to determine the relative danger of a certain target, and usually tries to go with the one the poses the most danger. This is based on a number of things - for example, predefined notions such as "kill class X first" or things calculated on-the-fly such as total damage dealt to you by that target, etc.

Later on in the fight, it sometimes switches to "cleanup" mode, instead of targetting the most important or dangerous target, it tries to get rid of the one with the least HP.

There are also a few other types of calculations used, but generally those are the most heavily favored.

powerferret · Post by **powerferret** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 8:33 pm

ah ok, just makin sure it wasnt a bug or something

ToxicOkie · Post by **ToxicOkie** » Thu Apr 29, 2004 8:34 pm

heres a thought that demolishes the custom AI...
the other day i experimented when i had gotten a darkness and a true see... i blasted them both on near a very heavy monster populated area where non of them could even see me.. i pulled out a bow and just took em all out and they dident even look at what was killing them, they never saw me so they dident come attack me

Joran · Post by **Joran** » Fri Apr 30, 2004 1:41 am

Another reason to remove darkness from the game entirely...

JesterOI · Post by **JesterOI** » Fri Apr 30, 2004 1:52 am

Joran wrote:Another reason to remove darkness from the game entirely...

Or just make the monsters run away out of range

Or give monsters an item that has a couple charges of ultravision on it, or a buddy that can cast it on them

Revenge · Post by **Revenge** » Sun May 02, 2004 4:07 am

Ack no don't remove darkness! That spell has saved my life so many times already! You find yourself swamped by too many monsters, use the innate drow darkness and run for the hills.

But yeah I've seen the custom AI at work, and it's nicely done to say the least. I noticed before that when I got down to 10/35 hp fighting a single shadow, the other 4 or so shadows fighting my party suddenly broke off and all came after me! Even nastier is that I'd run off and lose them, they'd go back to my party, and the moment I came back into view they'd all break off and start chasing me again even if I didn't attack!

And ofcourse, the instant they see a little "Sneak Attack" label floating up over my head, they realise that they can more than half the damage I am doing by going for me instead, even if someone else is hurting them at about the same rate even without a sneak attack.

It's a little scary, but very cool

EDIT: Come to think of it I've seen for myself that if you shoot a monster with a bow and they can't see you they don't react. This means you can pretty easily abuse any cave corner... Considering that players have arrow tracers to work with, can't you make it so that if a monster ever gets damaged while in idle status, it's first reaction is to run to the origin of the attack? That way even if they can't see the attack, they atleast get closer to give themselves a better chance of finding their harasser. In the above example, under this tweak, those heavy monsters would have all run into the centre of the darkness, and once they were close enough they would have been able to spot and attack him (as any player would have done). Also casting ultravision and see invis, or using potions of the same effect, tend to be pretty high on a normal player's list of things to do when under attack from something you cant see.

Agent Shiny · Post by **Agent Shiny** » Sun May 02, 2004 6:12 am

i think the script AI on summons is a bit weird...
i mean yes... i summoned a friggin lemure of all...
still it's screwed since when i say attack nearest creature. it attacks the nearest creature but after that IT stays where it was meaning if you move further deeper. IT wouldnt follow you.
but other summons are working correctly.
is it just the lemure?
but still attack nearest creature does not mean stay in 1 place all the time like stand ground or something =D

JesterOI · Post by **JesterOI** » Sun May 02, 2004 6:14 am

Agent Shiny wrote:i think the script AI on summons is a bit weird...
i mean yes... i summoned a friggin lemure of all...
still it's screwed since when i say attack nearest creature. it attacks the nearest creature but after that IT stays where it was meaning if you move further deeper. IT wouldnt follow you.
but other summons are working correctly.
is it just the lemure?
but still attack nearest creature does not mean stay in 1 place all the time like stand ground or something =D

Hit v e e, that's the follow me command

Agent Shiny · Post by **Agent Shiny** » Sun May 02, 2004 10:08 am

in normal nwn... it still follows you though, that was my point. =D

Chimaira · Post by **Chimaira** » Sun May 02, 2004 10:49 am

Joran wrote:Another reason to remove darkness from the game entirely...

The normal monster AI NWN has still makes monsters sitting ducks once they are blind, as soon as you KILL(yes kill, it actually has to die) the other remaining monsters will come after you, same with darkness, same with WOF, same with mass blindness/deafness. So I think the whole problem lies with the AI, rather then the spell, even tho darkness was bugged from the beginning NWN came out, the same is true with the blind effect in general.

XxDkCobraxX · Post by **XxDkCobraxX** » Sun May 02, 2004 11:29 am

i have an AI issue with my summons. seems summons attack the monster furthest away from you at all times. my Arrowhawk summon enjoyed luring one enemy to me, then instead of staying and fighting with that enemy ran to the next nearest and repeated the process!! kinda tough to rely at all on your helper if said helper is running away from the battle to create a bigger battle all the time.