News NPC AI update

[manos70131]

I am now combat logging against NPCs for the first time since getting Elite - they disable your engines before you can escape and the combat is not fun anymore.
Just one example of many, for those who believe you always have a chance to escape.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_54fzFat5iA

I don't know the version that Mukatsuku is running but I understand that this video's primary goal was to demonstrate the power of the weapons the user came against. Good or bad, the tactics are not responsible for loosing the shield and some hull after taking 2 hits. What is the purpose of going against such powerful weapons? You are not allowed to take even a couple of shots? Do we have to be flawless to survive? Is that a valid goal? Is that fun?

I don't have a problem with the new AI. I didn't like going against sitting ducks. That was no fun either. However I don't like the power of the weapons my opponents have. Today I did a test flight and played for about an hour. No bounties, no cargo, no mission. I was interdicted twice. In both occasions I had to flee with serious damages. Especially in the second fight I got a warning that I received a blow by an impulse weapon. I was not chasing the other ship, it just fired an exotic weapon and my shield was out. It was an asp and I had a Cobra MKIII. I didn't think that the odds were impossible so I tried to fight. After the first shot I run.

I don't mean to analyse my gameplay, that's my own business. I do have some questions to ask to all the people that were blaming our friend Mukatsuku for being a bad pilot:
1. why should there be such powerful weapons in the game? What's the fun of being shot with them if your opponent has them and what's the fun of shooting tin cans when we have it?
2. why should someone that does not have access to these weapons go up against them? I run the 1.6 version, no Engineers expansion. I fly in a universe without engineers. How can NPCs have any access to these weapons?
3. why should I have to flee from most fights I get interdicted? All the NPCs I have met after the Engineers introduction seem to have Engineers enhancements. Even when I destroyed some, they left behind Engineers equipment. All of them.

And one word for all the top gun pilots that enjoy the new ED universe and find all the people complaing about the new situation crying babies: the vast majority of the games created till now (I have been playing games for over 20 years and I have some experience) has a scaling difficulty to allow even weaker players to play. ED as it has become seems to have none. It's unforgiving to weaker players that may be willing to learn but when you fly an expensive ship, these lessons are very expensive. What's worse: the game was not like that from the beginning. It became difficult one day just like that not giving time for the weaker players to adapt, leading to the aniheliation of some of them that did not understand what was happening in time, to switch to less expensive ships and adapt. This is not right IMHO.

 

[Red Anders]

Wrong kind of cobra, too. The MK III is very fast; the MK IV... Not so much.

Fair point and good spot. If anything it makes the advice even more relevant though lol.

I don't know the version that Mukatsuku is running but I understand that this video's primary goal was to demonstrate the power of the weapons the user came against. Good or bad, the tactics are not responsible for loosing the shield and some hull after taking 2 hits.

They are when you only put one pip in shields, which is the entire reason why the shields dropped so fast. That is tactics.

 

[Red Anders]

1. why should there be such powerful weapons in the game? What's the fun of being shot with them if your opponent has them and what's the fun of shooting tin cans when we have it?
2. why should someone that does not have access to these weapons go up against them? I run the 1.6 version, no Engineers expansion. I fly in a universe without engineers. How can NPCs have any access to these weapons?
3. why should I have to flee from most fights I get interdicted? All the NPCs I have met after the Engineers introduction seem to have Engineers enhancements. Even when I destroyed some, they left behind Engineers equipment. All of them.

Everybody has access to those weapons because the Engineer modded weapons have been removed from NPCs.

Seriously, the reason he blew up was nothing to do with Engineers and everything to do with the fact that he took shots in the back with one pip in shields on a small ship which doesn't have much in the way of shield strength to begin with, even if running a pure shield tank build. Which he wasn't.

Seriously, you can keep trying to make out that video shows something different if you want but what is actually shows is the end result of about three mistakes happening in close sucession. All people are trying to do is explain how to avoid it, if you genuinely think that situation couldn't be escaped from I have to say that the problem lies with your own arrogance in refusing to review your own mistaken beliefs and not any perceived arrogance in the people who are trying to help.

If the game presents ways to survive that situation and you choose not to use them, that is not the fault of the game.

On the underlined sentence by the way, the fact that a ship drops loot which is required by engineers does not in any way mean that it was using engineer modified gear.

 

[777Driver]

I don't mean to analyse my gameplay, that's my own business. I do have some questions to ask to all the people that were blaming our friend Mukatsuku for being a bad pilot:
1. why should there be such powerful weapons in the game? What's the fun of being shot with them if your opponent has them and what's the fun of shooting tin cans when we have it?
2. why should someone that does not have access to these weapons go up against them? I run the 1.6 version, no Engineers expansion. I fly in a universe without engineers. How can NPCs have any access to these weapons?
3. why should I have to flee from most fights I get interdicted? All the NPCs I have met after the Engineers introduction seem to have Engineers enhancements. Even when I destroyed some, they left behind Engineers equipment. All of them.

.

1. The NPC in his video wasn't using engineered weapons, he was hit by rails then had a missile launched at him. He was flying a ship with weak shields, doubt he had boosters installed, he made the critical mistake of only putting 2 PIPS into SYS, his shields crumbled from the direct hits, he tried to low wake into supercruise whilst a larger ship was inhibiting his drive.

2. The NPC's don't have access to those weapon enhancements anymore, the devs removed them. I haven't seen them since the hotfix was applied.

3. You flee from a fight if you lack the required skill/build to fight back, how can you expect it to be any other way? Lower rank NPC's have been made easier for those that want an easy fight. Once again, NPC ships do not have engineered weapons, you should record a video and post a bug report if you find one. The majority of NPC's will drop engineer loot, that has nothing to do with the weapons on their ships.

The advice the majority of cmdrs give on the main forum doesn't require being a top gun pilot, all it requires is following some basic steps, no heroics involved.

Check my first video against the Anaconda's, I keep 4 PIPS in SYS and 2 in Engines throughout the whole video, if I had 2 PIPS in SYS I would have been dead

The Absolute basics

1. Go to outfitting and fit a decent shield, doesn't have to be the best one, fit a couple of boosters
2. Place 4 PIPS into SYS when under fire, this dramatically increases shield strength compared to using 2 or 3 PIPS.
3. Throttle back and submit to the interdiction, face the attacker and boost pass them whilst your FSD is cooling down (This buys you time whilst the attacker is turning to face you again)
4. Select any system in the left navigation panel and charge the drive, if needed keep boosting past the attacker whilst waiting to charge. jumping to another system will prevent the attacker from inhibiting your drive from charging.

Running in a straight line,trying to jump to supercruise with 2 PIPS in SYS, guaranteed way to get an inexperienced cmdr killed.

 

[BreakfastMelon]

I am now combat logging against NPCs for the first time since getting Elite - they disable your engines before you can escape and the combat is not fun anymore.
Just one example of many, for those who believe you always have a chance to escape.

I genuinely believed this was satire for a moment.

• You were attempting to outrun a much faster ship (440m/s vs. 310m/s).
• You were attempting to low-wake when mass-locked by a far larger ship.
• You were using 4 pips to engines; fair enough, but you were never going to outrun a Clipper of all things, so four to systems while quickly selecting a system via the nav panel would have saved you, and will save you literally 99%+ of the time.
• You were running in a straight line and not evading. If you've ever used gimballed weapons you'll know that they can not hit a ship doing something as simple as a barrel-roll due to their weapons' travel time. NPCs are flying gimbals - they'll shoot for your current vector.

Please don't blame the AI for being overpowered - that was entirely user error. Take what I, and many others, have said into consideration and maybe you won't have to log out during your next encounter.


o7 and such!

 

[manos70131]

Everybody has access to those weapons because the Engineer modded weapons have been removed from NPCs.

Seriously, the reason he blew up was nothing to do with Engineers and everything to do with the fact that he took shots in the back with one pip in shields on a small ship which doesn't have much in the way of shield strength to begin with, even if running a pure shield tank build. Which he wasn't.

Seriously, you can keep trying to make out that video shows something different if you want but what is actually shows is the end result of about three mistakes happening in close sucession. All people are trying to do is explain how to avoid it, if you genuinely think that situation couldn't be escaped from I have to say that the problem lies with your own arrogance in refusing to review your own mistaken beliefs and not any perceived arrogance in the people who are trying to help.

If the game presents ways to survive that situation and you choose not to use them, that is not the fault of the game.

On the underlined sentence by the way, the fact that a ship drops loot which is required by engineers does not in any way mean that it was using engineer modified gear.

I'm not sure where the arrogance was in my comment. All I tried to do was to state my opinion. I hope I have not offended anyone. In fact a few minutes ago I thanked with a private message a friend for posting a comment above with constructive remarks.

You say that all the engineers enhancements have been removed. I have my doubts. In all my fights till before the engineers enhancement, I have never seen another ship taking down my Cobra MKII shields with a couple of shots. Even Deadly Imperial Clippers were hitting me for some time till the shields dropped. Maybe it was luck. I don't know. It seems like a strange coincidence however.

I don't like fighting other players in the game. I'm not going to fight you in the forum either. Apparently I'm not good at fighting. You stated your opinion that all the players should know what you believe is basic. Maybe you are right. What I believe however is that if they players that do not know the basics are no longer welcome to the game, well that is a kind of problem for the game.

To conclude: this is a game. If many people stop finding it fun, either for a good or a bad reason, the result is the same. Players are the strength of the game, even though you cannot please everyone. If the game is balaced and fair, it has nothing to be afraid of. The people contributing to the forum, we are trying to help the developers decide what is balanced. Most of the people agree that the old AI was not good. A better AI was introduced. I think it needs better balance. If our posts help for that, our time writing these comments is not wasted.

 

[Elethiomel Zakalwe]

I don't know the version that Mukatsuku is running but I understand that this video's primary goal was to demonstrate the power of the weapons the user came against. Good or bad, the tactics are not responsible for loosing the shield and some hull after taking 2 hits. What is the purpose of going against such powerful weapons? You are not allowed to take even a couple of shots? Do we have to be flawless to survive? Is that a valid goal? Is that fun?

I don't have a problem with the new AI. I didn't like going against sitting ducks. That was no fun either. However I don't like the power of the weapons my opponents have. Today I did a test flight and played for about an hour. No bounties, no cargo, no mission. I was interdicted twice. In both occasions I had to flee with serious damages. Especially in the second fight I got a warning that I received a blow by an impulse weapon. I was not chasing the other ship, it just fired an exotic weapon and my shield was out. It was an asp and I had a Cobra MKIII. I didn't think that the odds were impossible so I tried to fight. After the first shot I run.

I don't mean to analyse my gameplay, that's my own business. I do have some questions to ask to all the people that were blaming our friend Mukatsuku for being a bad pilot:
1. why should there be such powerful weapons in the game? What's the fun of being shot with them if your opponent has them and what's the fun of shooting tin cans when we have it?
2. why should someone that does not have access to these weapons go up against them? I run the 1.6 version, no Engineers expansion. I fly in a universe without engineers. How can NPCs have any access to these weapons?
3. why should I have to flee from most fights I get interdicted? All the NPCs I have met after the Engineers introduction seem to have Engineers enhancements. Even when I destroyed some, they left behind Engineers equipment. All of them.

And one word for all the top gun pilots that enjoy the new ED universe and find all the people complaing about the new situation crying babies: the vast majority of the games created till now (I have been playing games for over 20 years and I have some experience) has a scaling difficulty to allow even weaker players to play. ED as it has become seems to have none. It's unforgiving to weaker players that may be willing to learn but when you fly an expensive ship, these lessons are very expensive. What's worse: the game was not like that from the beginning. It became difficult one day just like that not giving time for the weaker players to adapt, leading to the aniheliation of some of them that did not understand what was happening in time, to switch to less expensive ships and adapt. This is not right IMHO.

In no way should it be possible for a lone commander to go up against a ship like that. If an inexperienced player tries to take on a Clipper with a single Cobra MK IV he absolutely ought to be predestined to lose horribly. That said, there are people who could do much better and certainly plenty of people who could pull a win out of that situation (with a Cobra MK IV, not necessarily that build). Basically, everything Mkuatsuku could conceivably have done wrong, he DID do wrong, that's why he died so fast, not because of NPCs with powerful weapons.

Today I did a test flight and played for about an hour. No bounties, no cargo, no mission. I was interdicted twice. In both occasions I had to flee with serious damages. Especially in the second fight I got a warning that I received a blow by an impulse weapon. I was not chasing the other ship, it just fired an exotic weapon and my shield was out.

Impulse weapons do not do more damage; they just physically buffet your ship and make it hard for you aim/maneuver. The actual damage is the same as it has always been pre-2.1; the only thing that has changed is the NPC behavior. There are other mods that can increase weapon damage somewhat but it has nothing to do with 'impulse weapons', and in my experience NPCs don't use excessively engineered weapons. They're just better at flying, aiming, and ship management and tactics than they were before, as they should be.

why should I have to flee from most fights I get interdicted? All the NPCs I have met after the Engineers introduction seem to have Engineers enhancements. Even when I destroyed some, they left behind Engineers equipment. All of them.

It makes sense that you should have to run from most NPCs when you're (I'm guessing) an inexperienced player in probably a cobra, viper, or vulture. The thing about these ships though is that they are all perfectly viable once you understand how to use them! Also, engineer equipment dropped by NPCs does not reflect the engineer upgrades that NPC has. Every NPC just drops an assortment of random materials based on their archetype (authority, pirate, trader, etc.) It also makes sense to be a bit frustrated by it. Elite is not by any means a casual game and now the combat actually reflects that. However you should not be asking for the game to be adjusted because you're inexperienced; you should be asking what you could be doing better and are there any tricks that you don't know that would help you.

And one word for all the top gun pilots that enjoy the new ED universe and find all the people complaing about the new situation crying babies: the vast majority of the games created till now (I have been playing games for over 20 years and I have some experience) has a scaling difficulty to allow even weaker players to play. ED as it has become seems to have none.

This is the one area where I will concede that you have a point. NPCs are far too aggressive now and attack when it makes little sense. High-ranked hostile NPCs should be practically nonexistent in high-security space; however, if a new player chooses to venture outside of high security space or bites off more than they can chew and attacks a high-ranked NPC of their own accord they should absolutely expect not to stand any chance whatsoever.

It's unforgiving to weaker players that may be willing to learn but when you fly an expensive ship, these lessons are very expensive. What's worse: the game was not like that from the beginning. It became difficult one day just like that not giving time for the weaker players to adapt, leading to the aniheliation of some of them that did not understand what was happening in time, to switch to less expensive ships and adapt. This is not right IMHO.

If weaker players who don't know how to protect themselves are flying expensive ships that's really their own problem. It should be a lesson that you learn as a new player when dying is virtually free, which makes you better equipped to protect yourself a few months down the road when you are flying a Python or FDL or Anaconda. Yes, it was very sudden, which I can imagine would be very jarring to players who have never known anything different, but it had to change sooner or later. Adapt or die.

 

[Sneakyprawn]

I have left my FDL in the garage for now, using a Viper mk3, the NPC are fighting well, trying to get behind me, but I have not been killed buy an AI mutated super weapon.............your turn off fix has worked, and I hope you bring a balance for ELITE and MOSTLTY HARMLESS players, I have been put off buy this bug, I got lost creds back, but WHY did it happen

CMDR SNEAKYPRAWN

 

[Oldschool]

The game in it's current state in regards to NPC's/AI is too tough. Makes the game too intense, and slows down play quite a bit. Gang rapped by Cops every time your scooping materials, loosing too many fights, undermining is way too slow now. BGS flippers are annoyed along with the rest of us. There was NOTHING wrong with the way it was before the patch. FD didn't fix any of the problems we had with interdiction's, AI actions before 2.1, so now they are intensified.
I wish we could go back. Instead of being fun and interesting, it's just a pain in the ass now. The rewards just aren't there for this to continue.

 

[Elethiomel Zakalwe]

I have left my FDL in the garage for now, using a Viper mk3, the NPC are fighting well, trying to get behind me, but I have not been killed buy an AI mutated super weapon.............your turn off fix has worked, and I hope you bring a balance for ELITE and MOSTLTY HARMLESS players, I have been put off buy this bug, I got lost creds back, but WHY did it happen

CMDR SNEAKYPRAWN

Oh yeah, the bugged NPC super weapons are supposedly fixed now. I haven't seen any.

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The game in it's current state in regards to NPC's/AI is too tough. Makes the game too intense, and slows down play quite a bit. Gang rapped by Cops every time your scooping materials, loosing too many fights, undermining is way too slow now. BGS flippers are annoyed along with the rest of us. There was NOTHING wrong with the way it was before the patch. FD didn't fix any of the problems we had with interdiction's, AI actions before 2.1, so now they are intensified.
I wish we could go back. Instead of being fun and interesting, it's just a pain in the ass now. The rewards just aren't there for this to continue.

Those are different issues though. There are no problems with the new AI behavior in combat, and they were far too easy before. Now they are simply too aggressive. But yeah, rewards should be buffed pretty much across the board.

 

[Earthman]

Oh yeah, the bugged NPC super weapons are supposedly fixed now. I haven't seen any.

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Those are different issues though. There are no problems with the new AI behavior in combat, and they were far too easy before. Now they are simply too aggressive. But yeah, rewards should be buffed pretty much across the board.

Well I think you have just summed it up there... "Now they are simply too aggressive"

So that really needs to be addressed.

 

[manos70131]

It has been some discussion about my status. I never thought that feeling sympathetic about some weaker players would be so much frown upon. I guess some people are very fond of the changes and wouldn't want the developers get persuaded that they should go back to the old AI. I think that there is no danger of that however. The new AI is better, most of the users that have posts here (even some that complain) admit that and so do I.

I see lots of confidence that the engineered weapons are gone. Ok, I can accept that. I haven't checked the code of the game to pinpoint a bug. If the developers say this is fixed, I'll consider it fixed. But I'm not a rookie. I know the basics and I know how to escape the danger. I only lost one Cobra the last couple of weeks due to an unexpectedly strong Diamondback Scout. I learned my lesson however and I'm more cautious now. What I'm wondering about is if I should need to evade more than half of the times I get interdicted. Especially from ships that are not in theory much more powerful than me? Even if the NPCs that randomly interdict you don't have engineered weapons, they are still too strong to get called balanced IMHO. I can admit that the new AI will have some learning curve. But to learn, you'll need to be able to survive in a fight for some time. If your shields are out in a few seconds, before you score a single hit on the opponent, there is no time to learn, only to flee. Mastering the ways to escape is important. Eventually we'll find ourselves against too strong opponents. But most us want some fighting too. If the usual ending of a fight is fleeing, that is poor motivation to get better in fighting.

 

[Earthman]

It has been some discussion about my status. I never thought that feeling sympathetic about some weaker players would be so much frown upon. I guess some people are very fond of the changes and wouldn't want the developers get persuaded that they should go back to the old AI. I think that there is no danger of that however. The new AI is better, most of the users that have posts here (even some that complain) admit that and so do I.

I see lots of confidence that the engineered weapons are gone. Ok, I can accept that. I haven't checked the code of the game to pinpoint a bug. If the developers say this is fixed, I'll consider it fixed. But I'm not a rookie. I know the basics and I know how to escape the danger. I only lost one Cobra the last couple of weeks due to an unexpectedly strong Diamondback Scout. I learned my lesson however and I'm more cautious now. What I'm wondering about is if I should need to evade more than half of the times I get interdicted. Especially from ships that are not in theory much more powerful than me? Even if the NPCs that randomly interdict you don't have engineered weapons, they are still too strong to get called balanced IMHO. I can admit that the new AI will have some learning curve. But to learn, you'll need to be able to survive in a fight for some time. If your shields are out in a few seconds, before you score a single hit on the opponent, there is no time to learn, only to flee. Mastering the ways to escape is important. Eventually we'll find ourselves against too strong opponents. But most us want some fighting too. If the usual ending of a fight is fleeing, that is poor motivation to get better in fighting.

Yes, I think this is the gist of what a large number of people are saying in different ways.

The new AI is much better than the previous one, but it needs to be better balanced.
I don't even bother fighting the interdicting AI's now, I just submit, boost away and jump.

IMO we've seen two extremes. In beta 1 the AI fled as soon as their shields dropped so you had to chase them. Now they turn on you and you just end up with a circling game. A bit of variation would make it all much more interesting but still make it dangerous.

As for sympathy to weak players... well, to be honest, a lot of good advice has been given in this thread. Unfortunately, as in real life, written advice can often come across as harsh and insensitive.

 

[Laurence Oliphant]

As for sympathy to weak players... well, to be honest, a lot of good advice has been given in this thread. Unfortunately, as in real life, written advice can often come across as harsh and insensitive.

If "Git Gud", "Learn how to fly Noob", "play on joystick" etc. etc. can be called good advice...
And this is most common advice I see to players who not so "pro".

 

[InlineSix]

I have left my FDL in the garage for now, using a Viper mk3, the NPC are fighting well, trying to get behind me, but I have not been killed buy an AI mutated super weapon.............your turn off fix has worked, and I hope you bring a balance for ELITE and MOSTLTY HARMLESS players, I have been put off buy this bug, I got lost creds back, but WHY did it happen

CMDR SNEAKYPRAWN

It's always the same: If you get killed in an FDL by NPC in the current game, you're doing something wrong. Seriously and without and gitgud stuff.

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If "Git Gud", "Learn how to fly Noob", "play on joystick" etc. etc. can be called good advice...
And this is most common advice I see to players who not so "pro".

No way.

I repeatedly offered advise. I say "learn to fight. learn to evade. learn to make decisions" followed by "drop me a note, I can show you how to survive in less than an hour".

I have done so about a hundred times since 2.1. went live. Guess how many said: "Wow, yes, great, bring it on"? ZERO.

There was ONE cmdr who was willing to learn something. ONE. He didn't have to, he was quite good, yet. Get my point?

 

[HazardousMatt]

Today I had on separate occasions 2 ships, a Federal Drop Ship and a Federal Assault Ship, dry hump my Anaconda. They were literally pushing up against my ship with their nose. Are you trying to make the AI like players or what a real space commander would do? This is supposed to be a space sim right? If you want to make them like players then good job, you succeeded on making the most annoying bots in the world.

 

[zz9pa]

I'm still pretty sure the NPCs are flying with Engineering mods on other systems (if not weapons) - thrusters, shields, etc etc.

 

[Tecker]

I'm still pretty sure the NPCs are flying with Engineering mods on other systems (if not weapons) - thrusters, shields, etc etc.

Not "pretty sure"
Fact!
There are still NPC´s out there who triggers "Thermal attacs"
There are still FdL´s out there that you can´t outrun with a A Rated FdL (Boostspam and the Enemy get´s closer).
There are modded NPC´s out there.

 

[777Driver]

Not "pretty sure"
Fact!
There are still NPC´s out there who triggers "Thermal attacs"
There are still FdL´s out there that you can´t outrun with a A Rated FdL (Boostspam and the Enemy get´s closer).
There are modded NPC´s out there.

A thermal attack does not mean the weapon is engineered. Ships mass influences speed, the only mods that should be present in game are some low level non combat mods, this has been confirmed multiple times by the devs.

Your last two posts are not giving any facts, they are demonstrating your lack of understanding the game mechanics.

 

[Skurrock]

Not "pretty sure"
Fact!
There are still NPC´s out there who triggers "Thermal attacs"
There are still FdL´s out there that you can´t outrun with a A Rated FdL (Boostspam and the Enemy get´s closer).
There are modded NPC´s out there.

This has been confirmed by replies from FD Support where the reply to a ticket regarding being killed within seconds of combat starting was, and I paraphrase, "Elite NPCs can and will be equipped with the best components and engineer upgrades, this is the way we want it".
I have seen non Elite NPCs equipped with ridiculous weapons where shields and hulls melt before I can even react: I have even had to combat log (something I have never, ever done before) in order to save the Astro Data, from Distant Worlds, from an NPC pirating cargo I did not even have (no cargo bays).
The Bubble is now a source of stress rather than enjoyment, carrying cargo or doing missions causing continual, repeated interdictions is no longer any fun. Getting ganked by NPC's cannot be how it should be.
I have since returned to The Black because I would rather do that and enjoy the view instead of being at the mercy of homicidal and sometimes very much overpowered (compared to my ship) NPC's.
I can fight btw, I have no problems doing that at all but sometimes the game in its current state does not give you any chance at all and the chances of that happening are currently too high.
I am certain that FD will get the balance right, hopefully sooner rather than later.