Any Change of an AI Fix for the Ancient Ones? - Fire Death

Darksbane · Post by **Darksbane** » Thu Jun 24, 2004 11:29 pm

As some of you are aware, when you are with the ancient ones, and doing the "slay rats in the city quest" serious problems can happen if the general guards see the rats.
They will attack them.
Ok, thats not so bad, except they have a nasty habit of using Dragon Breath, or Flame Strike, which due to the PVP settings, do full damage to any PCs in the area. And as you know, a poor little Lv 1 sorcerer has not a hope in hell of survival.
Is there any way/change of an AI/PVP fix to stop this happening? Maybe something as simple as if an enemy is rated effortless, only use mellee?

Ace Dragonfury · Post by **Ace Dragonfury** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 12:16 am

Or any other newb not just a sorc.... been there done that got charred and respawned

DrakhanValane · Post by **DrakhanValane** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 1:14 am

.... Several times.

Darksbane · Post by **Darksbane** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 2:37 am

lol, I was using the Sorc as an example cause it's got the lowest HP (well, tied with Wizard) of all classes

I think the AI shouldn't be too hard to fix, just add in to the Ai script something like "If hostile target is Effortless, use only melee attacks". Would save us low levels a lot of pain and XP, and when you play an ECL character, that XP loss *hurts*.

IcemanXV · Post by **IcemanXV** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 3:16 am

Or just get rid of the breath attacks cause they suck anyway

sep caldessian · Post by **sep caldessian** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 11:54 am

one should always tread carefully when you are seen as just a tasty morsel for the dragons and their guards.

i like the idea of them using their breath weapons. its in character for them, and should be IC for the PC to avoid a dragon-type being when he is about to roast some rats. i say keep it in.

rkanodia · Post by **rkanodia** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 2:23 pm

Having had multiple characters get roasted many, many times by Chirrem and friends, I agree that they shouldn't act with the safety of n00bs in mind. Chirrem has more important things on his mind than whether or not a first-level sorc gets roasted.

I will say that he should probably use less magic, though. It's silly watching him load up on buffs to go up against a pack of rats. Just burninate them all and be done with it.

AndrewCarr · Post by **AndrewCarr** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 3:15 pm

The dragon at the entrance to AO is similar. He's pretty tough up close in melee, but casts a bunch of spells at you if you stay below to shoot him with arrows. This is sorta a problem because there's an advantage in my case to staying away, and so i just leave him on his perch and shoot him a bunch. Giving him a couple powerful nukes or having him walk down to fight enemies would work better imo.

Post by **TGPO** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 4:51 pm

When you sign on in AO you become a servant to the dragons. As such you are only slightly less disposable than those rats. It is of course the job of the servant to know the wishes of its master and comply with them immeadiatly. If it is the wish of a dragon guard to do a quick char broil rat-ouffe, one must move quickly to avoid being included.

The AI there is intentional not an over sight on the part of the developers. It is after all "A dangerous world that we live in"

DarkElvenKin · Post by **DarkElvenKin** » Fri Jun 25, 2004 5:26 pm

That was always one of my favorite touches to AO, though it did suck to be 'burninated' by the guards, I thought it fit really well with all the "Holyer than thou art" attitude that the dragons and half-dragons exude.

In their mind: "Pathetic meatling, I'll not wait for YOUR safety! Burnination powers, GOOO!!!"
*proceeds to enjoy another throughly tasty noob-kebab*

Stormwarden · Post by **Stormwarden** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 3:29 am

What needs to be done is make it so that your own faction guards cannot harm you or deal damage to you and you cannot harm or deal damage to them.

If this is not coded you will never ever be able to aid your faction guards in fending off enemy factions that attempt to take over your town. You can try to use melee and single target spells to fight them off but that won't compare to a proper assault of area damage against you. The main problem is that area spells tend to charbroil your guards or they accidentally walk into your web and stinking clouds spells and go aggressive on you.

LadyCheron · Post by **LadyCheron** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 8:06 am

This was discussed by the Dev team back in March. Here's a quote from the last discussion on the matter:

we leave it in, but make Disciples immune to the AO breath weapons. (Disciple will be a Division you can join later on, after you've moved up in the ranks of the Follower division).

So, yes, newbs will still have to stay out of the way of the Disciples and the Dragon Lords' breath weapons. But those who survive and advance to the ranks of "Disciple" themselves will gain immunity to those breath weapons, and be able to aid in the city's defense.

Creating the mid-level jobs for AO is on the To-Do list, but it's well behind getting the hardware & OS issues ironed out, and getting low level jobs for the rest of the factions.

Dorian_ertymexx · Post by **Dorian_ertymexx** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 9:50 am

Fascinating thing is that so few think of the RPG EXPERIENCE in this thread. It might be very neat and realistic that the dragon eats your character too, wham bang make a new one no respawn... But is it FUN? What is forgotten is that we have limitied vision and sensory input as players, whereas the characters should not. I have been fried by a dragon I did not see over some rats that I also did not see. And losing those meager, hard-earned golds and XP in the first few levels is just dull.

Feeling helpless is not what I count as a cool RPG experience; I can do that at home.

I agree that there should be faction NPC/PC immunity to damage. Or, at the very least, a way to redeem accidental damage done to NPCs of your faction; like paying gold to a temple or somesuch.

Throst54 · Post by **Throst54** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 1:39 pm

no one said the point was to make you feel helpless. it was sad that the dragons dont even care if your helpless... you my firend are more worthless than the scum betwixt your own toes.

Dorian_ertymexx · Post by **Dorian_ertymexx** » Tue Jun 29, 2004 7:19 pm

Tell me this then, oh lowifier of players egos, if we are so worthless, why do the dragons bother to be in a city with us? And if they DO need us, they would make sure not to be too bastardish, as that would lead to revolts and escapes to other factions. Strictly speaking, showing their bellies to the world. And why send an AO biggie to pick up new recruits if they are so worthless that no one cares if they get torched? That logic is fawlty. And also quite beside my point.