Patch XX - AI combat and maneuvers, boarding behavior, NPC locations and travel routes and all other NPC feedback issues

[admin]

Captains. 

Please provide feedback on AI, Ai behaviour, NPC travel routes and all other issues related to computer managed ships.

[Kloothommel]

Is that besides F11 reports on ships sailing through land in-game?

[Celtiberofrog]

hey,

- Will you manage to adjust NPC to cruze only on water ? so many areas where they happily cross lands...

- I guess better loots might help beginners.

- Any possibilities to find NPC pirates fleets cruzing everywhere with a boosted agressivity, (could they be capable of tagging nearby players, within a BR rules, it would be adding spice). 

[Sir Texas Sir]

If we are going to make the green zones a bit safer I think we need aggressive AI in them.  Sorry for the PvP only guys this isn’t suppose to be your hunting grounds a like other games PVE is apart of both servers as the main is not PVP only.  You want easy targets than your going have to risk it or do your PvP in other waters.  

On of my biggest complaints about AI in battles is they never use battle sails.  It’s worse in Epics where they are tanked out and can out sale you.  AI seem to not be affective by there wood type and builds speed wise in battles.

would love to see random named elite AI in the OW that you don’t know is elite until tagged.  They carry special cargo/rewards.

protected zone ships should be one tier higher other wise you get the problem with requim and 5th rates.  That way if it spawns two 4th rates players actually get some protection if they use them.  The point is to make green zones not gank zones.

this was brought up about PVE server lack of big fleets.  I would like to see more fleet mixes in OW.  Ships that ran solo and some in fleets/convoys.  Some trade ships solo and some excirter. They said they lack 25 man fleets but in 30 mins I did find a lot of 12 ship fleets of 5 and 4th rates.  Fell asleep before I got where I seen 25 man fleets in PvP but will check again.

Edited November 12, 2018 by Sir Texas Sir

[AeRoTR]

I think now, it is time to adjust ai behaviour.

Their angle of cannon fire must be adjusted, it is not good that they can fire from stern stern guns to enemies next to him.

Their turning is super buffed, it needs to be adjusted. Agamemnon with %65 sails turns on a dime, can out turn my 5th rate ship. Sail damage should have more effect on them, they should be turning not so good.

AI sniping super accurate must end. In a battle against AGA in my Frigate, my rudder was red for about 5-6 times. It killed around 100 crew of my ship by single shot sniping, this is very bad.

I also feel in epic missions, some 1st rates are super fast, they can be fast but super fast, and turns very good, it looks like a sports car, driving around.

Some ai traders do not fire back at you, if you hug them.

They should fire some chain on you, they only chain trader ships.

Safezones should spawn buffed ai, another Le Required for Le Troll, or at least uwpind ship like buffed prince, and yes they should chain, not unlimited but some.

AI must make some mistakes time to time, they look like robots, like terminator T-800, very predictable and very perfect on performance.

They are only better if it is a 1 vs 1 fight, they perform bad at group fights.

Edited November 12, 2018 by AeRoTR
grammer

[Lovec1990]

6 minutes ago, Sir Texas Sir said:

If we are going to make the green zones a bit safer I think we need aggressive AI in them.  Sorry for the PvP only guys this isn’t suppose to be your hunting grounds a like other games PVE is apart of both servers as the main is not PVE only.  You want easy targets than your going have to risk it or do your PvP in other waters.  

On of my biggest complaints about AI in battles is they never use battle sails.  It’s worse in Epics where they are tanked out and can out sale you.  AI seem to not be affective by there wood type and builds speed wise in battles.

would love to see random named elite AI in the OW that you don’t know is elite until tagged.  They carry special cargo/rewards.

protected zone ships should be one tier higher other wise you get the problem with requim and 5th rates.  That way if it spawns two 4th rates players actually get some protection if they use them.  The point is to make green zones not gank zones.

this was brought up about PVE server lack of big fleets.  I would like to see more fleet mixes in OW.  Ships that ran solo and some in fleets/convoys.  Some trade ships solo and some exported.  They said they lack 25 man fleets but in 30 mins I did find a lot of 12 ship fleets of 5 and 4th rates.  Fell asleep before I got where I seen 25 man fleets in PvP but will check again.

i agree on this if you sail into green zone any AI combat ship that has visual on you should start to chase you and attack you, but if you leave green zone AI will stop chasing you.For bonus ad ability to AI to join PvP battle in green zone 

[SnovaZdorowa]

7 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

I think now, it is time to adjust ai behaviour.

Ни добавить, ни убавить. И про амфибии выше тоже написали. И про перворейты на эпиках тоже писАли, что они валят против ветра и бордят со всеми своими баффами на абордаж. А вот в абордаже бот плох и неинтересен если у него меньше команды. А если больше, то он звереет.

Большой вопрос, насколько сильным должен быть AI. С одной стороны он нужен, чтобы тренироваться, с другой стороны если сделать его хорошим, то это может сломать пве. Лаборатория AI нужна. Сразу на весь сервер распространять изменения AI имхо стремно.

[Slim McSauce]

not enough NPC's in general, more OW AI, more variety of fleets.

Trader fleets escorted by combat ships.

AI Indiamans

[Karpfanger]

Hi,

in my opinion there are still some issues with the contracts. In the swedish port of Saint Johns for example the expected goods are not dropping and contracts are not fullfilled after 1 week.

The OW seems to be empty if I login late in the evening. May be AI Fleets doesn't spawn correctly?

Its ok that there are mostly warships of own nation near by national habors but there should be also also some enemy AI ships and traders.

 

Edited November 12, 2018 by Karpfanger

[Lovec1990]

21 minutes ago, Slim McSauce said:

not enough NPC's in general, more OW AI, more variety of fleets.

Trader fleets escorted by combat ships.

AI Indiamans

I agree, but can servers handle it?

 

I belive tbrigs,tsnows and LGVs should be solo but ai Indiamans should have escort plus also expensive cargo

[Slim McSauce]

Just now, Lovec1990 said:

I agree, but can servers handle it?

 

I belive tbrigs,tsnows and LGVs should be solo but ai Indiamans should have escort plus also expensive cargo

yeah that would be cool.

[Lovec1990]

2 minutes ago, Intrepido said:

AI get always stuck on land.

AI attacks forts for no reason and getting stuck in land in the process.

AI traders always go downwind no matter of there is land right in front of them.

AI reinforcements in safe zones are a joke, the enemy player just need to chain/demast them to escape or sink the attacked player.

AI going through land on OW.

 

 

this one should stay its too funny to just fix it

[Ortac]

If battle is near a shoreline, the AI quite often get stranded in the shallows on the shoreline, unable to manoeuvre out. Sometimes half a fleet can do this.

[HamBlower]

AI is weak in tactics and strategy. Even as reinfocement in safezone they can easiley played out. They attack a ship of the line like they attack a frigate. They only use balls as canon munition. 

But it seems the AI ships aren't affected from damage on sails, masts or hull. 

An AI-ships turns without bowsprit much better through the wind, than a full fitted Player could do this. It seems they don't lose speed if their sails are only up to 10% damaged. 

It would be cool to see mixed fleets with trading ships that were escorted, but not the leading ship should be the trader.  

In the meantime it's a running gag, that AI-ships in Naval Action are amphibious vessels.  

 

[Holm Hansen]

To the AI behavior:

 

The most annoying problem with the ai behavior is for me, that they do not seem to pay attention to the wind direction during their sailing maneuvers. When they sail backwards, sometimes they do not care that they do it until they sink. That takes sea battles a lot of dynamic. And I do not think that it is realistic.

Also they do not care if they strand in in their maneuvers if land is nearby.

 

[LeBoiteux]

In combat instances :

• harder/smarter AI : more tactics and strategy such as demasting.
• Some bots should have stronger hulls under canon fire.
• Several levels of difficulty ?

The following additions in OW would be nice :

• AI aggressiveness for warships (bot chasing and tagging human enemies)
• AI traders leaving their OW route and fleeing (maybe to the nearest port) when human enemy is nearby and going back on track later.
• Several kinds of traders : some alone / some in a group of traders ; some with a warship escort, some without.
• A bit more solo bots in OW. 
• More regions across the map with 7th-6th rate bots  (right now, there's only the Bahamas).

Edited November 12, 2018 by LeBoiteux

[Sir Texas Sir]

1 hour ago, Slim McSauce said:

not enough NPC's in general, more OW AI, more variety of fleets.

Trader fleets escorted by combat ships.

AI Indiamans

They could make another epic or even put them in them and have the Indiamans carry the loot.  You can either bring your own and take the cargo or you can capture the ships and try to take them back to port.  Though the missions are never close to ports proper of other nations so you have to go through enemy waters to get home and players can tag your group and try to win back the fleet ships.

Prob would need chest that can't be put on normal war ships.

[Draymoor]

Combat and maneuvers: 
AI hardly uses anything that isn't ball ammo, would love to AI using all types of ammo.
Would like to see the effects of damage on AI, they seemed to not be very affected by anything until they are near sinking. 
Removing marines from AI ships, at least from the lower rated ships, maybe adding them randomly. A higher percentage of a chance of an AI warship having marines depending on their rate. A 1st rate 100% chance, 2nd rate 90% chance and so on. 
AI attempting other strategies like going for masts or sails or even grape and boarding. 

Boarding behavior:
The AI just seems to have cheats for boarding, they always have better damage and firepower even if the player has a larger ship. 
AI should change their attack at the last second rather than the current, which is at around 3 seconds left of a boarding action. If it can afford the preparation, it should wait until the last second. 
AI traders should not have any marines, not 6th rates at least.

NPC locations and travel:
There seems to be a lack of AI ships and fleets in the OW, most stay near coasts, but the OW are very empty. You can sail for an hour and longer and not see any AI.
This is in a form of a question, will the number of AI be increased if the players numbers increases? cause at the moment in a fairly small server, there's hardly enough for the 500 players. If we had 2000 players, there would no AI for most of them to hunt. 
Indiaman fleets should be added, with escort ships.

General Issues:
AI is too passive in the OW. They should attack enemy nation's players if they have an equal or higher rated ship. 


 

[z4ys]

Bahamas feel less populated by AI. To less small AI grps.

[Guest]

Think this one is funny.

AI changes ammunition mid broadside

[Macjimm]

NPC travel routes:

I'm enjoying the atmosphere in game.  Rather than finding enemy NPCs everywhere they seem to be more concentrated in some locations.  Some ports appear to have high traffic, and other ports are quiet.  The NPC patrols seem to stay near to coastal waters and ports.  NPC traders appear on routes between ports.

Trader players can now find passive areas with very few foreign NPCs (and enemy players).  I've heard players chatting, in game, that they cannot find NPCs of a suitable rate or number, and other players reply that there are lots.  I read chat reports of player's finding hot spots with many NPC traders carrying White Oak, Live Oak and Teak.  Other players text that they sail for hours without seeing a proper target.  Players now need to know where to hunt or trade.

The general feel of OW has been improved.  I like that enemy warships are not common deep within my nation's waters.  It seems less like a homogenized, continuous, combat simulator and more like a variable open world.

It is very good there are lots of NPC ships concentrated in strategic spots, and they are not spread out everywhere.

I hope there are locations with a greater number of small ships, for newbs. 

[Sir Texas Sir]

1 hour ago, Draymoor said:

Boarding behavior:
The AI just seems to have cheats for boarding, they always have better damage and firepower even if the player has a larger ship. 
AI should change their attack at the last second rather than the current, which is at around 3 seconds left of a boarding action. If it can afford the preparation, it should wait until the last second. 
AI traders should not have any marines, not 6th rates at least.
 

AI trends to have all the best mods and no penalty to reload and other things that is effective when your full board spec as a player.

The boarding thing about last minute change does not need to be changed.  Some of us that have crappy pings have to go on the 2-3 second and not the 1.  I lost a good number of actions I shouldn't have in  boarding cause of the last 1-2 seconds ping.  This from some one with only 120-130 ping.  Now take into account some one from SEA regions that have 300-600 pings.

I get AI has those perks cause even a player with no mods can just Attack/Broad side until the moral is down and than take the ship.   The only thing I hate is it seems to have maxed out mods and no penalities to thins like reload and such.  They also never run out of Double ball/charge/chain

[Barbancourt]

4 hours ago, admin said:

Captains. 

Please provide feedback on AI, Ai behaviour, NPC travel routes and all other issues related to computer managed ships.

AI traders should stop being passive loot pinatas and instead always have a potent warship escort consistent with the value of their cargo.  They should come in fleets instead of single ships, and they should also be aggressive, instead of sailing passively like they don't care. 

 

[Draymoor]

31 minutes ago, Sir Texas Sir said:

The boarding thing about last minute change does not need to be changed.  Some of us that have crappy pings have to go on the 2-3 second and not the 1.  I lost a good number of actions I shouldn't have in  boarding cause of the last 1-2 seconds ping.  This from some one with only 120-130 ping.  Now take into account some one from SEA regions that have 300-600 pings.

I don't know if the game should be tailored to players with 300-600 ping though. I'd rather the AI is challenging cause it's 'smart' rather than cause it has a lot of bonuses. You will have to face that kind of tactic in pvp anyway. 

[Guest]

>NPC locations<, from a British perspective.

Most 7^th and 6^th rate NPCs are no longer in range of new players, which are the very NPCs that are needed! Except Bahamas bordering nations, for other nations, they have to travel through another enemy nation to get to the Bahamas, so therefore they're at an disadvantage.   

It’s all ass-about-face, the very NPCs that new players need are the most further away and the next tier of skill, of NPCs, 5th, 4th and 3rd's, are nearby.

Though the “Melting Pot” syndrome is by design, it’s not supporting/helping new players learning the game, raiding, at an NPC level, outside the Bahamas area.  

Edited November 13, 2018 by Guest