New Mob Ai Is Brutal On Cloaking Classes And Other Problems

[Algaron [BTL]]

I am not sure what the reason for changing the new mob AI to include zipping around like they do, but it changes the playing style of my JD once again. I understand most mobs do not stay in one spot when attacked especially ones with hulls and make it even more important to get in behind the mob and attack from the rear to avoid their beam damage. As it is now, once a JD cloaks the mob zips forward 1-2k, uncloak and fire and the mobs immediately reverses direction and zip backwards the same distance, it doesn't turn around - it moves straight backwards causing the player ship to waltz right over top of it when following. No ship in a space battle acts this way - why would the mobs? This only happens to cloaking classes as terran and progens can sit in one spot and fires their weapons. Zippy mobs are of no concern to them as they can fire from anywhere.
Jenquai play a different way but now I am forced to sit in one spot and turn to face the mob and fire, just like a terran..

Jenquai Defenders used to be a ninja in live. See a mob from a distance, engage follow, cloak and get in close behind the mob. Fire all your beams and cloak again to sneak in behind the mob once more. We rely on being very close to the mob and our CC for maximum damage.

- Now we have had our max scan range capped at 30k. Whats the reason for this and why bother with a telescope 9 now.

- Follow is a huge problem. Most mobs can see an uncloaked JD at the distance we need to be within to engage follow. Couldnt we extend the follow range to 7,8 or even 10k away where we would be able to cloak , engage follow and close the distance that way instead of having to cloak, thrust within range to engage follow. I see a mob 25k away. I warp to the mob and try to stop short of it scan range in order to cloak, then engage thrust to get within follow range. It was better when I could see a mob 25k away warp to 10k away out of their scan range, cloak and engage follow to suck me close into the mob. Personally I feel if I can see it on my scan I should be able to engage follow from that distance. Makes it way more fun to play.

- Another problem with follow is when actually fighting the mob. Try following a mob in say XT, one of the oni's. These mobs are very agile of course and can move vertically as fast as they can horizontally. It never used to be a problem as my ship could turn on a dime (as it should) to stay on it's tail. Now it seems my ship is as slow as a progen when turning and instead of closing the degree of separation of say 90 degrees by turning into the mob , my ship will turn in the complete opposite direction and try to close the gap of 270 degrees, and there have been occasions where my ship will turn into the mob 2 or 3 complete times like 720 degrees before lining up behind the mob. It's brutal.

Please let Jenquai Defenders be agile and stealthy again. Please let them play like JDs and not some cloaked up terran.

[Lot]

Didn't the mobs zipping backwards and forwards only start 3-4 days ago? I think it started after Tienbau restarted the server after adding the patch for the organic mob AI behavior ("the swarm of doom" aka "more mobs nobody can safely attack unless grouped"). It may be unassociated with the new mob AI as all kinds of mobs are zipping about not just organics. It is something that mobs used to do a while ago and that behavior got fixed so may be the that bug sneaked out again.

Follow bug affects all professions not only defenders.

It feels quite odd putting a mob on follow and your ship arcs about trying to get aligned with the mob. Follow started doing this before the mobs began zipping backwards and forwards. The range for follow is also too small at the moment. If the mob is beyond 5k your ship points at the mob but stays still. The range needs to be more like 10-15k.

The follow bugs have been reported:
https://forum.enb-emulator.com/index.php?/tracker/issue-14-auto-follow/page__gopid__31#entry31

Follow is a good tactic for Jenquai as it used to reliably put you behind the mob and set the mob up for a shot in the back. With follow broken like it is now, you've either got to maneouver manually to get behind the mob which is doable -- or sit 4-5k away, coma the mob and sniper it with beams. The latter tends to get in trouble with mobs tethering --- mobs should never tether while they have agro!!! Although there are alternatives to follow, follow is still a staple of tactics for Jenquai and it needs fixed. With it broken it removes a tactical option.

Auto-fire shutting off beams while cloaked also needs reverted back to how it was please.

Weapons auto-fire could always be manually disabled so the auto-fire/cloak thing was never needed.

Again, like the issue with follow, it removes a tactical option from Jenquais. Some players liked to use auto-fire and cloak and relied on auto-fire to break cloak and shoot a target.

[Tienbau]

only the scuttlebugs & Nags are using the new AI.

It's just a showcase for the new code, after the restart tomorrow you'll see the same mobs behaving differently, they've lost their Nitro boost too. I'll be leaving those two mob types as the only ones using the new AI until I've got it working a bit better.

Nothing's changed with scan ranges etc. There is no cap, never has been never will. There is a 'glass ceiling' only because there has to be a maximum rating from device configurations and skill levels.

I really don't know what the OP's talking about - I can only assume you've been listening to the rumour channel and are pre-empting what you think is going to change. None of the things you talk about have changed at all for ages, other than follow, which now works in a more organic fashion - before it just 'cheated' and directly pointed the ship at the target which was a bit naff.

Oh unless you're comparing JD's with how they were live? Are you aware the Emu is a work in progress and not finished yet?

[Algaron [BTL]]

Well I was not talking about the tethering/grouping aspect of the mob AI but whatever changes were made to the scuttlebugs and nags had unintentional consequences of tethering the mob to the player. I am not sure if you have tried it with your JE or had another JD test it, but since the changes 4 days ago when you follow certain mobs, lvl 56 Killinger in Moto for example, the mob will maintain distance until you cloak and then it turbos away, when you fire and uncloak, it immediately reverses and nitros backwards towards the player, it doesn't turn at all.

As for the scan range there was no cap in live - I could get over 35k scan range with Scan and a telescope 9. It was the same in EMU until about one month ago when my scan range was 34k. I am not sure if that has something to do with the JE scan bug or not but just saying there was no cap before.

I have heard no rumours about any changes - this is from observations and playing the game from how it used to be not long ago and how it is now.

[kjeron]

Scan range is currently capped at 30k. Has been ever since right after the JD&JE's L7 shared scan started stacking infinitly, that's been fixed, so this cap isn't needed anymore.

[quote name='Tienbau' timestamp='1330944740' post='54940']
None of the things you talk about have changed at all for ages, other than follow, which now works in a more organic fashion - before it just 'cheated' and directly pointed the ship at the target which was a bit naff.
[/quote]
A few problems with the current auto-follow system:
(note - these have nothing to do with the new mob AI)

First, it doesnt appear to apply any increases to your Maneuverability rating that you may have, but instead uses a set base amount.

Second, is that when autofollow turns a player ship to face a mob, it does so in a very inefficient manner. While mobs, when they don't turn instantly or shoot backwards, turn in a far more efficient manner.

Quick Illustration: blue=player, red=mob, and paint has no spellcheck pattern
[attachment=1406:follow.png]

This leads to player's taking far longer to turn to face a mob than it should, especially if the mob is moving further out of their line of sight.
Mobs, however, dont have to worry about the player staying out of their line of sight while they are turning, they have a set timer for how long it will take them to face you, after which they will instantly turn to face you no matter where you are. You literally cannot out-maneuver a mob, unless you hack its engine, which prevents them from turning entirely.

[Algaron [BTL]]

Thank you Will for the picture - this is exactly whats happening and you are correct, as it now it's not working like a JD should. Perhaps a dev with a JD could test this out to see what we are talking about? Like I said in my original post, try Killinger in Moto or Oni in XT to see how this affects JD's.

Thanks