NWN2's AI from hell

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I have by now progressed my aasimar paladin to Neverwinter, where she is to clean the warehouse. Some pretty tough fights there. I know because I'm going there the second time. The first time my party was wiped out.

Before the warehouse we met Neeshka's old buddy and two goons, all melee fighters, and Qara casted Spellshield or some spell like that on herself, to protect herself from putative mages ... At that time I only wondered. Just two minutes later I discovered that there is method to this madness.

I lost my party when Khelgar saw some enemies in the warehouse while stealthy Neeshka was scouting the aerea. It is probably very much in character for Khelgar to do that, but I am roleplaying, not the AI. Indeed, the sole purpose of scouting is sort of moot when behind the stealthy scout there follows a very visible dwarf with a falchion. As a matter of fact scouting is moot when you cannot conduct it in a sensible way.
When then all hell broke loose, Quara just stood there, held her staff and got whacked (I later discovered that I had to set her to 'do cast spells' and not to fight with the staff she was holding. Of course. I should have thought of that right from the start.). All the while Neeshka just stood around and did nothing, and when I ordered her to move and engage, and switched back to my main char, she continued enjoying the spectacle. And so I watched my party getting mauled, while making frenzied attempts trying to control my party, cursing.

Now, after re-loading, I found that after my first two fights, the only way to gather my party for the next fight was to leave the building and re-enter it. Unless I did that, Qara and Khelgar could not be persuaded to move.

Heck, the AI in BG sucked, but at least you had control. You could give a char simple orders, like: 'Stand here, defend', 'stand there, fire arrows, and when attacked in melee, draw your sword, and when threat's over, use your ranged weapon again' or 'stand back, while I scout'. Even in NWN you could tell your NPC quickly over the much missed radial menue 'stand here, don't move, do nothing'. Not so in NWN 2. I find it excessively work intensive to control my party, and I find it increasingly annoying.

Maybe the silly AI is a game ballancing technique: Punishment for the players as to compensate for the overpowered characters. They game would clearly be too easy otherwise.

I just alt-tabbed from NWN2 to vent, I will play on now.

NWN2 has a nice story so far, and prestige classes are nice, as are the 3.5 E rules, graphics are sweet, but interface and AI are among the worst I've experienced in a long while

 

Even though the radial menu is gone, the dropdown menu (hold down the right mouse button or press shift and the right mouse button) has the same commands.

But yes, the AI, like in NWN, is idiotic at best.

 

I heeded BTA's advice and switched off 'defend boss' or what's it called.

Since then they don't follow my main char indeed. My main char follows them She is basically running back from the point where I just sent her to whenever I tell the other characters to go there, too. That is especially funny when my main char is in a fight and I want to send my NPCs to join it, and main char inevitably runs away from the fight to renedvouz them. Let's just say it makes moving the party through the rooms of a warehouse arduous.

Why, oh, why can't I just select the whole bunch in drag and drop and make them move as a unit, maybe in formation?

 

My spider-sense tells me it has something do to with KotOR.

 

Yeah, my advice has already been posted. When I couldn't figure out what was going on, I went back to the start of the game and ran through the tutorial again. It helped...A lot!

The only problem I found when I selected 'Do Cast Spells' in the NPCs behaviour, I found that they casted exactly what they shouldn't be...Like casting Entangle centred on me (a rogue at the time who needs to move). Or casting a magic-protection spell when none of the enemies are spellcasters. Errrgh.

I've always wanted a click-and-drag select-all type function. It's annoying to have to go through them all seperately. Better yet, an Auto-Pause option when Action X takes place (Like in BG/IWD) would make controlling the party about four times easier.

~ Cheesegear

 

Aha, my reply didn't send. Combat AI sucks. Mages stand around doing nothing even if they don't suck in physical terms relative to the enemies at hand. The protagonists often stops attacking and starts enjoying the view.

Rags, maybe you need to turn Puppet Mode on? That at least gives you control.

And matko5 is correct.

It looks like they didn't build on NWN1's engine and revamp it etc. It looks like they just merged a heckload of KotOR stuff into it and they hoped it would work swiftly and no one would ever find out. Probably that's what's responsible for the lag as well.

Thing is, in NWN1 it worked. In KotOR, it worked. But in Neverending Knights of the Winter Republic, it just doesn't work.

 

... geez, the warehouse is cleaned out, and now I'm to rescue that trader and when I entered his house my first reaction was "No! ... not another warehouse. The same arduous procedure again ...!"

Chev,

Tell me about it. I'd love to give my chars something as simple as the BG AI skript I used for my cavalier: 'Attack nearest enemy in melee'. Should work like charm for my pally and Khelgar. So they usually waste something like 10 attacks per fight.

PS: I do have 'puppy mode' switched on. I don't find it adds significant control.

Cheasegear,
as for 'do cast spells' another nicety to cast is haste on the party and then fear on the enemies. With AI on that will disperse your party as they will chase the enemy they're just dealing with into the darkest corners of the dungeon within seconds, which it is a sure way to stir up additional enemies, and usually results in your party getting wiped out. It is also the reason for my most recent reload.

I'm relieved that I used a scroll for haste and that that sorceress does not have it memorised ... horrors ...

[ January 02, 2007, 02:18: Message edited by: Ragusa ]

 

If you think haste causes problems, you should try giving her fear.

 

Four suggestions:

1) Download the better AI mod from nwvault.com

2) Put Qara into puppet mode so you have 100% control over her

3) Dump Qara from the party and take the wizard (who you get later) and fill his spellbook with non-area spells

4) Download the UI mod from nwvault.com that puts the command bar right on top of the screen, making it much easier to issue commands to your party ("Follow me," "Hold your ground," etc)

 

Sir Fink, you're my man. My choice is #4. Just installed xUI and tested it. It's a huge leap ahead. Thank you for pointing me to it!

I still have to kick them to do what they're supposed to do, that is, they still stop fighting, or stand around stupidly, but I now can rally them in a much less work intense way. I recommend xUI highly.