AMEN.
well said and I am in the legion as well. barely coping to survive my 7ls jump from station to asteroid field and back. It is really bad out there
News NPC AI update
- Thread starter Zac Antonaci
- Start date
AMEN.
well said and I am in the legion as well. barely coping to survive my 7ls jump from station to asteroid field and back. It is really bad out there
yes they do get esier AI but its not just combat rating...I avoided pirate hunting and built up my merchant skills to have very tough AI attack me. i had just purchased a viper mk4.
They had ships that launched 2 fightes.
i think the ship and the equipment also affect this as i had to restart because of being attacked by suck strong enemies (AI),
this last time i was building up a cobra mk3, just placed two 2g autocannons on it and the enemies got stronger.
Good point, I guess the NPC pilot cost would need to scale. So, for a "low level" pilot to hire help, they would be hiring Harmless or Mostly Harmless wingmen. They should be vastly cheaper than hiring Deadly or Elite pilots.
yeah OK so it's still the same...oh well, I'll log back on here in a couple of months to see if they've changed it...I simply don't have the time or inclination to play against the super AI...
I just lost 3/4 of everything I owned to my ex, getting done over in the same way in a game isn't what I call fun.
Pls fix the much to fast re-coverable shields of the NPCs. I fly a Fer-de-lance with A6 shields, if they are down, it needs so much more time 
Pls also make it happen that NPCs suffer from damaged parts of the ship like life-support etc.
Also they should run out of ammo.
Pls also make it happen that NPCs suffer from damaged parts of the ship like life-support etc.
Also they should run out of ammo.
Ai of the chart
Hi I have been playing Elite on and of for a year and abit now and basically the new Ai is making the game unplayable as a trader you have almost no ability to make a profit as the NPC wack so regularly your just going back wards. I realise that the new AI would be great for hard core combat fans but remember that a game still has to be accessible to new players and other styles of play otherwise it will ultimately die. Anyway I am hanging up my joystick until the issue is sorted
Hey guys,
We wanted to share a quick update with you to let you know how the investigation into the NPC AI has been progressing after the removal of the Engineers weapons for the NPCs and what the next steps are.
The development team have been hard at work investigating these bugs. To give you a little more information, it appears that the unusual weapons attacks were caused by some form of networking issue which allowed the NPC AI to merge weapon stats and abilities. Meaning that all new and never before seen (sometimes devastating) weapons were created, such as a rail gun with the fire rate of a pulse laser. These appear to have been compounded by the additional stats and abilities of the engineers weaponry. (We don’t think the AI became sentient in a Skynet-style uprising!
The bug fix is expected to go live in our next point release which is planned for the end of this week/early next week but we’ll have more news on the exact time in the normal patch notes forum.
I would just like to take this opportunity to clarify a few misconceptions. The AI has in no way been reduced, it remains the glorious, improved version from the update. The only action that we’ve taken so far has been to remove the engineer weapons to allow us to investigate the issue and address a key bug. Once this bug fix goes live we’ll be able to see how the AI is performing and then, over time, should we feel that the balancing is right to introduce a very select few high end engineers weapons to the highest ranked NPCs we will investigate that option. However, that won’t be immediately as we want to ensure that the balance is just right.
Edit: Please note this point update will be PC specific and the Xbox One update will need to follow after. We'll let you know as soon as we have more information.
Hi I have been playing Elite on and of for a year and abit now and basically the new Ai is making the game unplayable as a trader you have almost no ability to make a profit as the NPC wack so regularly your just going back wards. I realise that the new AI would be great for hard core combat fans but remember that a game still has to be accessible to new players and other styles of play otherwise it will ultimately die. Anyway I am hanging up my joystick until the issue is sorted
Yes, it looks like you are quite new to the game. To state it from the beginning I am everything else but no combat pilot.
and yes, you are right doing the first steps and meeting some NPC shooting you mostly ends up with destruction. Don't give up.
Your are to learn a few things that will get better with additional experience.
a) evading interdictions. You will get better on number of occurances
b) decision run or fight. A most important thing to estimate your chances and make a decision.
c) submit and run (highwake). Submitting to interdictions (takes a few seconds to complete) reduces you FSD cooldown massively. You can escape to another system when
engaging your FSD. NPCs won't follow you today.
d) Ship configuration: Some daring pilots run their traders without shields to maximage cargo space. I do not follow this line. Hull reinforcements can help to survive
Keeping an eye on Power consumption and toggling the Power Distributer can help a lot when stressed by pirates. 4 pips to SYS will double your shields as on 2 pips
because ongoing recharge is much higher.
The piloting skills is mostly practice so my advise is DO the trainings offered maybe multiple times (the combat ones) this will help to cope with some attackers and get
the first abilities in defending your ship and cargo.
I act on the statement I made earlier in other threads "If anyone wants to have my cargo, he is to pay for it. The one way or the other"
Regards,
Miklos
Milkos
I am running a python midlevel. I am not completely green.
I was running a typ 9 lakon but there is no way to avoid a lock it turns like a whale and even giving part of my cargo to the pirates i was still getting blownup every 6-7th trip so zero to negative profit. And u can't out run a snail with it. As a trader thats no fun which is what this is ment to be.
The saddest part is i bought an oculus just for elite. Guess i will have to wait for star citizens
I am running a python midlevel. I am not completely green.
I was running a typ 9 lakon but there is no way to avoid a lock it turns like a whale and even giving part of my cargo to the pirates i was still getting blownup every 6-7th trip so zero to negative profit. And u can't out run a snail with it. As a trader thats no fun which is what this is ment to be.
The saddest part is i bought an oculus just for elite. Guess i will have to wait for star citizens
As you are not completely green it is surely known to you that things have changed a lot since 2.1 but clearly FD has tuned down the aggressors after 2.1 update significantly.
I know it because I had just a hard time returning from out of bubble in that timeframe and got attacked by Deadly and Elite only.
Now matchmaking changed but you will not get around limitations that the ships have. Some mentioned mines is a good way if aggressors are in your nack. Sometimes it worked for me too.
Today I learned SQ42 will not come this year and is postponed with no new date. Other things of SC will come some time later.
So to be honest this is no real option.
Regards,
Miklos
You do not have to be the best pilot, not by a long shot, I am still waiting to be killed by these supposed super AI, I have not been killed once since the AI update, not once, and get interdicted just as frequently as the next person, frankly AI interdictions are still easy to escape. I just got done farming a haz rez solo, and on the one occasion I got into trouble I high tailed it, with 80% hull to spare.
I am not saying this to blow my own trumpet, quite the contrary; not only am I 52 years of age, I am also dealing with a trapped femoral nerve which is excruciating preventing me from sitting upright. As a result I am dosed out of my shed on Tramadol and Gapapentin, drugs that affect coordination and cognitive ability. If I can survive encounters with the AI, those who cannot have either been caught napping or making major mistakes, there is no other explanation.
Perhaps folks are making mistakes with ship builds, I have seen some truly awful setups listed by people complaining about the ai, people who throw on a little bit of everything and expect to be effective.
If you are hauling, you cannot now fit every slot for cargo space nor skimp on the shield, it is a false economy and asking for trouble, how many would have survived for the want of an added bulkhead and upgraded hull composite? If you are fitting for combat fit for combat, forget exploration scanners, fuel scoops, cargo holds and other extraneous nonsense, those slots should be assigned to items that enhance the build for combat effectiveness.
Perhaps some of you are getting into a flap when interdicted and not handling the interdictions well enough to affect escape, I don’t know. However, I am certain of one thing, the ai really is not that hard, and many folks are dealing with them just fine. Unfortunately, folks dying to the AI don’t want to hear it, as that suggests the fault may lay closer to home.
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I'm going to recommend you either"downgrade" your ship to something more manageable for you, like maybe a Vulture, OR that you stop hauling engineer cargo in an unengineered ship. That is the reason why you are getting your butt handed to you. I've met the NPCs you're taking about. They may seem tough now, but once you figure out which engineers to use, and get halfway decent upgrades, then you'll be playing the game in godmode again.
They made the engineer's so good that there really is no middle ground, and this becomes more apparent when you get into an unmodded Anaconda. This is because the game scales the difficulty based on your ship.
But more importantly, it scales the game based on your cargo!!! If you're hauling engineer cargo, then the game will send some high powered pirates after you. Again, these guys only seen hard because your vanilla shields are garbage.
So poop or get off the pot with that engineer cargo. Literally. If you're not going to modify your ship, and can't get A rated modules to modify, then you're better off just ejecting that engineer cargo. The game will back to normal.
Never mind, brain fart.
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...or just learn to submit to interdictions and high wake out. I still haven't lost my T9 to an npc and have only had its shields dropped once.
There are too many variables now - ship, outfitting choice, cargo/mass, engineering, combat rating, tactic (run/fight/hide), skill, location (can't FSD out from planetary rings etc.) - to make any generalisation about AI levels (too easy / fine / too hard).
All my ship builds are fast, agile craft and I can run from any NPC encounter (had 4 deaths since 2.1, all stupidity-related: away from computer, accidentally firing on a clean bounty-hunter near a station, getting sloppy in a CZ when not in a combat build). If I were in a big heavy hauler, or a more lightweight explorer, or if I were a newbie in a starter ship, it might be very different.
Too many variables my eye, a lot of players complaining were previously quite happy sleeping between trade hubs throwing together any old build and amassing credits. Now suddenly there is a risk to their ships they are up in arms.
After some of the complaints trying to use "new players" as an attempt to add validity to arguments, I set out flying around in an eagle and an asp without engineer upgrades to see for myself out how hard it might be.
I survived interdictions and combat with the ai just fine. I had to pick my fights and there were some close calls, but that’s as it should be, and no different than having to bail from a haz rez in a conda. I cannot do anything about my level of experience and knowledge compared with a new player, however, given my combat and trade ranks I was facing tougher ai in interdictions than they would.
The game needed to add risk for a number of reasons, preventing brain death due to boredom probably being the most important for me. Complaints about weak ai were common since launch; even the developers agreed they needed improvement. Before the update, outside of playing in open trading carried zero risk and carried the highest profits, and we had people farming haz rez in lower level ships that really had no place being there.
Post AI update if players want to survive and prosper they have to think about their ship builds, not fall asleep at the helm, and make an effort to progress, and personally I see no reason for the game to go back to where it was before.
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Chances are, if you participate on this forum a lot, and have little trouble with interdictions, then you are at least two standard deviations above normal on the "twitch" skill curve for this game.
Elite is a beauty with no mercy, and the reason we play is because we are *addicts*, not rational people.
Us low-skill players have been developing 12 step programs, but, like most 3rd party development, it's a long, hard, slog.
Elite is a beauty with no mercy, and the reason we play is because we are *addicts*, not rational people.
Us low-skill players have been developing 12 step programs, but, like most 3rd party development, it's a long, hard, slog.
I am sorry to bring this to you, but your reaction is solely based on your abilities and nowhere reflects the learning curve of starting players in 2.1... Even I can fly my ASP without much problems and had 50 runs without much problems, and then suddenly: KABAM! My interdiction rate went up to 50% (mind you: no cargo, no engineer stuff, no missions, no power selected) and of the next 25 runs i was killed a few times with loads of mining goodies (most of the time collected in hours of mining...) because of being interrupted by Elite pilots or/in very heavy ships, getting me off-guard, or cripple in mere seconds)
I now know how to handle them, but I still can get unlucky... Now it adds to my bounty (although knowing FD mines will be banned in 2.2 probably) but the learning curve there was not a nice one and two of my close friends did not survive that curve...
Sorry, but I really think you are talking from your own experience and you are bullying the weak... unintentionally I gather, but still... I just hope that whenever I get to be dangerous, I am more open to complaints of beginning players... If even a experienced player like you says "I had to pick my fights and there were some close calls,", how do you think that would be for a beginning player in a C-rated ASP (not having more money), that does not have a clue which is the best way to improve his ship?
a
There's a mistake in this sentence somewhere...
I will translate: A beginning player is for me someone in the first three months of gameplay... A C-rated ASP is a ship which costs only 8M, so this will be one of the first "bigger" ships he can afford in his first months, although he will not have learned a lot about the game (remember, this is Elite, and not sudoku); he will probably not yet know about how to flee, not how to fight bigger ships and not that missions are dangerous.
and there he goes, stacking 10 missions from CEOS, proudly carrying 10 engineer cargo he got from the prior three missions, and with this B-rated FSD, he could just afford with his last money...
to be interrupted by an Elite anaconda, and learning the hard way that mission stacking is not very handy, that fleeing is an art, that you must have insurance and that engineer cargo should be sold, not kept....
So this bancrupted player brought it al on himself; good for him to start from scratch in a brand new sidewinder!
then again... how could he have known?? Because insurance is on page 54 of the manual? Because the internet is filled with good advice (and some bad too)? This game IS brutal to beginning players; not explaining that a C-rated ship is very dangerous to be in when interdicted; not explaining that engineer cargo is potentially drawing interdictors; not explaining that missions are the easiest way to get yourself a very heavy opponent... etc. etc. etc.