Too many shortcuts taken with enemy behavior

[Alexri]

Defiance has flaws, but one of the ones I've found the most difficult to swallow is the many shortcuts taken in the code for enemy behavior. Things like:

• Rocket launcher and grenade launcher minibosses will immediately hit you from anywhere. Doesn't matter if you're 5 times the range of player grenade launchers away from the guy, sniping him, the uberlauncher will prevail. Sometimes they even fire those things at 90 degree angles.
• Mobs will randomly change direction, semi-teleport a couple of meters when getting back up, and generally act like that squirrel from Over The Hedge. This is extremely annoying when you use weapons that rely on aiming instead of just spraying bullets.
• Enemies live in a flat world. They don't care if there's a plant between you and them, they'll perfectly hit you from half a mile away anyways. They'll also find you in the middle of a bush, no matter if you're hidden. I might have played too many games like Skyrim where things like that affect enemy behavior, but personally I prefer difficulty increases to be a bit more controlled than having mobs be 3x harder to kill because you're in the middle of a corn field where you can't see them but then can see you
• Nade and rocket mobs will shoot the wall next to them and not take any damage.
• Backwards armor systems on enemies. I'm fine with hellbugs taking next to no damagewhen shooting their armor, I'm not so fine with enemies taking no damage when you shoot them in the head with a machine gun because they have a hockey mask covering it.
• Enemies have their heads up their *****. Literally. Trying to play weapons that rely on crits is a game of guessing where the code says the head is on some enemies, as it sure as hell isn't where the texture and mesh says it is. Especially a problem with enemies with helmets, and when you shoot someone in the head from behind.
• Ubersnipers. Apparently it's fully possible to hit someone with a sniper rifle from a hundred meters away while being shot by a machine gun. The game's stagger mechanic basically doesn't scale like it should.

Like I said, I might have played too many games like Skyrim, but I'm very annoyed by how enemies don't behave in predictable ways. I think Trion applied logic from lock-on MMOs and applied it to a shooter, ignoring or missing the obvious differences in effect that enemy behavior has on the two game types.

[crasher]

Nice list.

a.)I want to know when I can start jumping 4 feet to the side and start shooting on-target like Raiders and 99rs.

b.1.) I want the shields the badguys use (Blacklung, SuperBlacklung, some Goldrushers) that instantly regen either while I'm shooting, or from the moment they weave from a headshot to the moment they stand up again. After I kill them, the shield either isn't there, or its a Rhino with a 2 week regen by mail stat.

b.2.) Alternatively, I'd settle for MrTractor's shield after I finally wear him down.

c.) I want the weapons the raiders never have to reload. They either drop crap weapons or nothing. What happened to 'You can't take it with you'?

d.) ANY human enemy that takes a mag of autoload shotgun to the head, while standing there, and then starts to shoot back. They're on Ketamine AND speed, and thats bad for you.

e.1.) Fire elemental warriors that are 12 feet in front of you, and at right angles to your path, that set you alight in a moment without flaming anywhere near you.

e.2.) Fire elemental warriors that set you alite and THEN explode to the surface. (Yeah, first time I knew I was wrong, the next two times I was insulted).

f.1) ANYthing that spawns behind you in an empty corner that you just checked/cleared.

f.2.) ANYthing that spawns endlessly faster than you can recover from the last batch that spawned there 2.9 seconds ago, and faster than a reload.

g.) Raiders throwing Molotov cocktails with homing units built in.

h.) Blastpods that can both track you AND/OR know where you'll spontaneously bob/weave TO while running an erratic course to or away from.

i.) Any badguy that is a stealth superbadguy. Looks like normal badguy. Blows your a*ss UP like a superbadguy.

j.1.) Crazy super-long slap-reach the spiders use to smack your weapon away. They arms aint that long/quick to do dat. NO arms are.
j.2.) Crazy super-long slap-reach MrTractor or the Smelter use to smack your a*ss into the next map grid.

It's not a 'challenge' when they do those things, they're frustrating cheats.
Somebody needs to look up the definitions of 'Challenging' and 'Frustrating', and do two things with the results:
1.) Write them on stickypad snowflakes and afix them to the middle of the dev's monitor.
2.) Explain to devs that playing the game is ultimately fun. Frustration is not 'Playing', or 'Fun'.
Being frustrated by dishonest manipulation = 'Somewhere else, We'll go'

[squidgod2000]

but personally I prefer difficulty increases to be a bit more controlled than having mobs be 3x harder to kill because you're in the middle of a corn field where you can't see them but then can see you

Man, I hate the cornfield raiders.

[aspekt]

i can get behind this with the exception of the self damage from nades, et al.. they are after all AI and some allowances for that i think have to be made.

[Dragos Drakkar]

Agreed crasher, I can see that the enemies might have to bend some rules since they are computer and can't think like a player usually can, but must they be able to so blatantly break the rules that the players must follow?

[Ryme]

Nice list.
...

a) When you live, eat, sleep, and breath using the 1 gun, and 1 gun only for at least 6 months.

b.1.) Their shields are integrated as part of their cybernetic systems. You can get one like it when you give up most of your organs and squishy bits for cybernetic implants, and are willing to look like a Strogg.

c) I always see them reload. But they could also be using Nomad SMGs. Those things have 80 round clips, base.

d) Probably the same drugs that you're on, so that you don't instantly drop dead once your shields are down.

e.1) Hellbug warriors spit a puddle of whatever element they are, prior to doing their drop attack. The default Hellbugs spit the bio-hazard muck that slows and debuffs you. Other elemental versions just have elemental effects pasted over the default element. So you have fire that shoots out like a puddle and hits much farther than their visible indicators. If this is too much of an issue, Trion's obvious response will be to just remove elemental Hellbugs.

e.2) All Hellbugs warriors and archers explode when you kill them, hitting nearby enemies with their elemental effects. You only notice fire and electric more often because they have the most impact. Most of the other elements you just don't notice you got hit with.

f.1) For the most part, Hellbugs are the only enemies that spawn out of nowhere. Everything else comes from somewhere. The only exception are elevated platforms and sniping positions. Other than that, it's your own fault you got flanked.

f.2) Some spawns are timed, some spawns are triggered events. Unfortunately, you're all playing in the same space. Price of playing a MMO.

g) Never had one track me as I'm moving. If you're playing turtle, the AI will try to flush you out. Solution, move.

h) Lots of blastpods, one you. Likely they were aiming at the guy in front of you, and you followed them into it. Solution, don't be a sheep.

i) The only time enemies unexpectedly get harder is when someone else is in the area, causing enemies to scale up. Price of playing a MMO.

j.1) Maybe if you sucked in that gut, you would be harder to hit. :P
j.2) See above.

1,2) Make sure you find the monitorof a Dev that hasn't been fired already. Maybe none of the feedback is getting read, because no one sits at that desk anymore.

[Ryme]

Man, I hate the cornfield raiders.

Heh, now you know what those children grew up to be.

[Ryme]

Agreed crasher, I can see that the enemies might have to bend some rules since they are computer and can't think like a player usually can, but must they be able to so blatantly break the rules that the players must follow?

I find that most of the complaints about "bad" AI are more an issue because the AI has been set too closely to what players do. You complain about being flanked in PvE. People complain about being flanked by cloakers in PvP. You complain about PvE enemies being too accurate. People complain about anyone who can hit them in PvP must be aimbotting.

Frankly, I find this game to have one of the better AI's I've seen. It is actually set to try and kill you, not just dance around and be an amusing shooting gallery, like enemies are in most other games.

[fmarin83]

They should copy ME3 MP bad guys. See how they all work as a team

[PeterPolaski]