Discuss the AI here!

[Dave1029]

Well you're wrong.


Tell me were you the guy in that Star Wars showing that stood up and shouted out "RIDICULOUS!" and stomped out when they took out the death star?

The NMS quip just makes the rest of your argument pretty moot tbh - totally different sort of game. Unless your stars are categorised Red, Green, Yellow and Blue?

Didn't that require a small army of x fighters? Or whatever they were called. And the flyer of the one that blew it up was blessed by some supernatural force that helped him dodge certain death.

 

[Pumabear8]

I'm going to try to get video proof of this happening. Also going to equip point defence in order to get some missile protection, and get some shield improvements asap. As long as this is not a regular occurrence I can handle it. It two or three of these happen in short succession I'll not be happy.

I could add ECM's, but it was lasers that wiped me out, I'll try adding a chaff launcher, might buy time to escape.

 

[biohazard15]

Precisely my point, if people waited a bit longer than a little under of 24 hours after a new update that completely overhauls the game, let's say a week down the line, and people have those modifications that the AI is supposedly "wrecking" you with, i doubt the complaints will be there. However just hopping in and facing something completely new when compared to the Old AI without even thinking of how to engage and beat this enemy is surely setting you up for failure, just like if you faced an actual player.

The funny part is that, i didn't even have beta.

edit: but after this post I give up on this thread

I've meant that there will be more votes for "Too hard". Sorry if I confused you.
SJA says she wants to add "new skills" and tweak it further, and I can't see anything good for us pro "Too hard"-ers here.

 

[Hexcaliber]

Show me a video how u dodge in a Anaconda or a Cutter (thats what i fly) or S T F U. These ships can not reliably dodge charges from sniping NPCs, they are just to big from every angle.

Of course they are, keep range and you can see the bloody things coming a mile off, fly fa off, use lateral thrusters; you do use lateral thrusters with FA off, no? If they close in, get in behind them where their fixed weapons cannot hit you, weapon D O D G E D.

It is not rocket science, the ai have a hell of a time hitting with fixed weapons if you are not flying a straight path, its a huge flaw, they are not able to predict where they should shoot.

 

[Arvel Yael]

As I precised, my ASP is in a long range mission/bubble exploration/transport configuration. Not combat fit.

Speaking one 3D HRP + intermediate hull + 3C bi-wave + 2x A boosters. The competent adder was no danger to me, but he was not flying like a total idiot either.
The deadly one was not a danger either, though he when through my weak shields and damaged my hull a bit. He was flying very well in his pirate adder, but still
it was an adder so the issue was never in question.

Sorry, my post wasn't written to call your skills/fit into question, it was more of a "Even the adders are dangerous " post .

So the real poll going on here is, do people want a challenge on par with PVP commanders, or do people want something they can spend a load of time farming on boring brain dead AI.

I'll go with the brain dead AI. But then I'm not an adrenaline type gamer.
If I want a challenge on par with PVPers, then I'll go into open mode .

 

[Cmdr Cheese Wedge]

Pffftt.
Been hauling in an unshielded zero weapons Type 7 most of the night, sure I've been interdicted but then I've bought the best power plant, distributor and thrusters money can buy.
Instant FSD cooldown and can get this baby boosting up to 400Ms no sweat.
The AI can eat my space dust.

Quit ya complainin'.

 

[Javert]

By the way as far as I understood from the beta forums, the AI was even harder than this in the first beta build - it has already been toned down a bit once.

 

[shadragon]

This is what happened to me, no skill involved in hightailing it, no reward either, so now I'm disappointed that that an OP AI can wipe me out, and not even have to choice to fight or run.

This is no different than 2.0 (or any previous version frankly) if you were jumped by a Wing of NPC's in the past the same thing could happen. Did you deploy chaff? Did you have a Point Defence active? Did you do anything to even the odds? The game has changed (for the better IMO), you need to adapt to the new danger.

Now, this is the important part. You can do everything 100% correctly and still get killed. The proverbial Kobayashi Maru scenario. I doubt that will ever change until Frontier comes out with Elite: Bouncy Castle.

 

[biohazard15]

By the way as far as I understood from the beta forums, the AI was even harder than this in the first beta build - it has already been toned down a bit once.

The main complaint about AI in beta 1 was that it favored Brave Sir Robin above all other tactics. That was indeed toned down.

 

[Freak_ZA]

This is Elite: DANGEROUS, not Elite: Hold my hand.

 

[Pumabear8]

Pffftt.
Been hauling in an unshielded zero weapons Type 7 most of the night, sure I've been interdicted but then I've bought the best power plant, distributor and thrusters money can buy.
Instant FSD cooldown and can get this baby boosting up to 400Ms no sweat.
The AI can eat my space dust.

Quit ya complainin'.

Wait till you're interdicted by an NPC that takes your shields down in short order, then your FSD, you won't have the time to fight or run, in your case, running is the only option, I was boosting at 370km/s in a python heavily shielded, that did not stop the anaconda making short work of me.

 

[Rankaze]

No. Once you progress to a certain tier of ship. An adder should pose zero threat to an Anaconda. It's called progression.

Elite is intended to be a skill-based game. The big ships will dominate the AI if yyou fly them properly, but no ship will save you if you fly it badly.

 

[Arvel Yael]

This is Elite: DANGEROUS, not Elite: Hold my hand.

"Elite: Now grinding for cash is pants-on-head frustrating instead of pleasantly dull" doesn't have quite the same ring to it.
I want - and had - a game where I can buy stuff, fly to other stations, trade it and make a bit of money, buy a nice ship and customise it, fly around for another bit. Maybe take some potshots at wanted guys if I fancy a change. That's it. I don't want a game that sits like a school bully and goes "Hmm, I haven't effed with you for a while, here it comes!" every time I start to enjoy myself.

And I certainly don't want a sandbox game that forces you to improve in specific areas to cope with the latest box of "this week's new rules". I don't want to have to change a layout that works well for me, or hamstring a ship that I've enjoyed flying thus far. I'm not attending a flight academy, there is no end goal. This is not the last starfighter. "Adapt to cope" is not part of having fun!

Unfortunately, different people want different things. So ED, my trusty friend that I like to hang around with, will now pants me and steal my wallet once in a while. But only until I run out of patience it seems.

Or until I adapt. I can't quite bring myself to walk away.

 

[Vorxian]

Question is, has the new AI actually broken the cr/h ratio of players choosing the field of combat to charge their bank accounts?

Because..

If I'm killing ships after a tenuous jousing match that takes 10 minutes to finish for a whopper 34,000cr, then it stands to reason that combat is no longer viable. Combat ceases to be fun when you get nothing out of it, in addition to the way out of whack risk / reward ratio.

 

[Lord_aNOOBis]

For my taste the new AI is "just right" But that's only for my combat level, I just reached Master rank and I'm flying a trading wars python (good shields and weapons, chaff and point defence, thats it)

Before the patch I was bored by interdictions. Interdicted by an Adder, hah, he died in seconds.
Today I was interdicted by an adder and it took me about two minutes to kill him. Another pirate, an imperial eagle jumped in after and shred my shields in those 2 minutes. That's okay, 2 vs 1 should be a challenge and I could have concentrated on the eagle first. Also I did not use chaff.

Less but more challenging interdictions are just my taste. But I don't know if the AI on higher combat levels might get stronger and I don't know if it's not too hard for the noobs.
I think the challenge for developers here is to provide a difficulty curve. Not too hard for new players, not too weak for elite pilots.
Also, you might have to take in account that not everybody is flying a Python, Anaconda or FDL but also Transport ships, unarmed explorers, etc.

 

[Rankaze]

Wait till you're interdicted by an NPC that takes your shields down in short order, then your FSD, you won't have the time to fight or run, in your case, running is the only option, I was boosting at 370km/s in a python heavily shielded, that did not stop the anaconda making short work of me.

Well, yeah, if you don't dodge the PA that's gonna happen.

If you did dodge the PA, what diid it kill you with?

 

[lysan]

The balance is skewed, it goes from one extreme to another, as my last post in this thread demonstrates, even running away to live and fight another day is no longer an option when an OP AI interdicts you.

OFC you can, I just ran like a little girl from two Elite Vultures in my Python, so that is not true, also ran from other ships in me clipper today so ofc you can run away.

Mines are good to have now, they keep the buggers away from you.
Point defense are good to have, keep missiles away from you.

 

[MottiKhan]

The AI isn't hard as far as flying and fighting skills go. The part that disappoints me a lot is the feeling that I'm just pulling a handle at the casino. Total RNG for one-shotting my shields and taking my hull down. No skill involved at all. This is not AI. It's a roll of the dice. I haven't lost a ship to the AI yet, but the if I wanted to play a totally random game, I could just flip a coin over and over.

I was really hyped about the 2.1 update. I'm terribly disappointed.

 

[Bomba Luigi]

Question is, has the new AI actually broken the cr/h ratio of players choosing the field of combat to charge their bank accounts?

Because..

If I'm killing ships after a tenuous jousing match that takes 10 minutes to finish for a whopper 34,000cr, then it stands to reason that combat is no longer viable. Combat ceases to be fun when you get nothing out of it, in addition to the way out of whack risk / reward ratio.

Made 1.2 million in Bonds in a cz today, took probably a bit longer then in 2.0 to get there but in adition to that I also had a mission going on that paid 3 million for kills in CZ, those missions pay a lot more now and bascily at least doubled my income from CZ. Assassination mission can pay a lot more too now, and if you fancy some res-bounthy hunting go into Antal territory. NPCs there should now have higher bountys (no need to pledge or anything, works like LYR ship and module discount it counts for everybdoy), haven't checked it but word is that bonus is now finaly implemented.

 

[DJ_Arghlex]

I voted that the NPCs are pretty much perfect AI-wise, but what you get for gunning the wanted ones down, that needs immediate change. Just isn't worth what it should be.

That's all I've got to say on the matter. Maybe even buffing the Elite and Deadly ones a bit more so they're really aggressive and stuff.