Stop walking into hazards

[Smartik1]

I'm really really sick and tired of the "AI" in this game. The team keeps walking into known traps, fires, acid and whatever other environment thanks to tethering, even when there are perfectly fine, safe paths around. Half the fights end with my own party tethering to me and getting crushed by cloud of daggers or some other effect that decides to persist. I just finished a really long fight at moonrise towers, and the celebrating allied army decided to run into a cloudkill zone and turned hostile. That's yet another fight I need to redo, because pause does not exist and neither does any resemblance of common sense in this game.

Either do it properly or give me back my full control. This half baked implementation is a nuisance.

[Friends with Benedicts]

I just wish we could set multiple waypoints for them to follow

[robilar5500]

Originally posted by Smartik1:

Originally posted by KingOfFriedChicken:

Press G then move them manually or disarm the traps. They will jump with you hut only if they see it as needed. Sadly traps do not trigger the "as needed" part for them lol

There is no multi select or custom pathing like BG2 had. Going back to path each of them one at a time is a waste of time. I'd expect game logic to...at least match something made 23 years old, not be inferior to it.

Ungrouping doesn't change the fact that you have no control over allied non-party NPCs so they walk into hazards anyway, like the moonrise tower fight.

Plenty of workarounds that could be implemented:
1. Walk AROUND a hazard if you can or stop in front of it if you can't (this should have been native tbh).
2. PAUSE after combat ends if there are hazards on screen so you can turn them off where possible.
3. Create an actual pause button. The half baked "turn based" toggle is useless, because it has a cooldown and it's not a true pause. For example, NPCs that are out of range when you toggle it happily keep walking around and can actually walk into your range and get affected anyway. I also tried toggling it post combat, but it can't be toggled fast enough before everybody starts killing themselves for no reason.
4. Add a setting to auto-turn off damage zone concentration spells if you don't find it necessary to persist them.

Pathfinding in BG1 and 2 was and is also abysmal.

[Friends with Benedicts]

Originally posted by robilar5500:

Pathfinding in BG1 and 2 was and is also abysmal.

Yeah I recall every rpg having that problem in hazardous areas.

[TFFCChara]

My main gripe with their pathfinding is when combat ends and they all run straight into Gale's Cloud of Daggers. Like, they walk around fire just fine, so why?

[Friends with Benedicts]

Originally posted by TFFCChara:

My main gripe with their pathfinding is when combat ends and they all run straight into Gale's Cloud of Daggers. Like, they walk around fire just fine, so why?

prolly due to fire being surface coding wise and cloud of daggers being an instantiated object. Probably not in the group of stuff pathfinding identifies and acts accordingly. I know it sounds easy to solve, like just make cloud of daggers a surface too but we dont know how that would impact their coding so... I dont think we'll see this changing.

[KingOfFriedChicken]

Originally posted by TFFCChara:

My main gripe with their pathfinding is when combat ends and they all run straight into Gale's Cloud of Daggers. Like, they walk around fire just fine, so why?

Press G as a fight starts then they won't lol I just got into the habit of this

[Smartik1]

Originally posted by Friends with Benedicts:

Originally posted by TFFCChara:

My main gripe with their pathfinding is when combat ends and they all run straight into Gale's Cloud of Daggers. Like, they walk around fire just fine, so why?

prolly due to fire being surface coding wise and cloud of daggers being an instantiated object. Probably not in the group of stuff pathfinding identifies and acts accordingly. I know it sounds easy to solve, like just make cloud of daggers a surface too but we dont know how that would impact their coding so... I dont think we'll see this changing.

You make it sound like rocket science. It's a danger zone circle with fixed radius. Virtually all AoE spells are circle with fixed radius. They already use the logic to calculate whether you are getting hit or not. Use the same logic to not walk into something that will hit you. In most games characters run out of these circles so why run into them.

Originally posted by KingOfFriedChicken:

Originally posted by TFFCChara:

My main gripe with their pathfinding is when combat ends and they all run straight into Gale's Cloud of Daggers. Like, they walk around fire just fine, so why?

Press G as a fight starts then they won't lol I just got into the habit of this

That's a sad workaround that should not be necessary. It also doesn't help with summons that still tether to you or any other allied/neutral NPC on the map that you can't control.

Honestly, a by far simpler workaround would be to remain in turn based mode until the AoE zones are switched off or you manually switch out of turn based. They already did it for one of the endgame fights with the wall fire spitter traps near you. I'd rather have that as the default than having to redo entire fights because of this.

[KingOfFriedChicken]

Originally posted by Smartik1:

Originally posted by Friends with Benedicts:

prolly due to fire being surface coding wise and cloud of daggers being an instantiated object. Probably not in the group of stuff pathfinding identifies and acts accordingly. I know it sounds easy to solve, like just make cloud of daggers a surface too but we dont know how that would impact their coding so... I dont think we'll see this changing.

You make it sound like rocket science. It's a danger zone circle with fixed radius. Virtually all AoE spells are circle with fixed radius. They already use the logic to calculate whether you are getting hit or not. Use the same logic to not walk into something that will hit you. In most games characters run out of these circles so why run into them.

Originally posted by KingOfFriedChicken:

Press G as a fight starts then they won't lol I just got into the habit of this

That's a sad workaround that should not be necessary. It also doesn't help with summons that still tether to you or any other allied/neutral NPC on the map that you can't control.

Honestly, a by far simpler workaround would be to remain in turn based mode until the AoE zones are switched off or you manually switch out of turn based. They already did it for one of the endgame fights with the wall fire spitter traps near you. I'd rather have that as the default than having to redo entire fights because of this.

You can untether summons to, not with g sadly I just click on the button on screen for that. It's not "the best" but I got use to it with my 19 summons druid lol

[Friends with Benedicts]

Originally posted by Smartik1:

You make it sound like rocket science. It's a danger zone circle with fixed radius. Virtually all AoE spells are circle with fixed radius. They already use the logic to calculate whether you are getting hit or not. Use the same logic to not walk into something that will hit you. In most games characters run out of these circles so why run into them.

The pathfinding alogrithm might not take into account such active AoE Objects. Pathfinding usually do not take dynamic objects into acc for most games afaik iirc.

[mike.strom]

Ok someone explain the rationale behind why a party member would walk into and stop on Lava everyone can see and would feel when there are spaces that would not have lava. Even if I individually control my party members I can't control every step and am not aware that they will make the most brain-dead choice imagional. The fact that they would even do this breaks the game's realism as it points to bad AI that no living organism would ever choose as the evolutionary process would have eliminated that bad gean long ago.

[Steven]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.