AI hostage trading? Really?

[Schmuddel]

When the clue about trading popped up in the Road to Crimefest, I was certain it would be item or mask trading, a feature many have wanted for a while and that mods like GoonMod enable. Instead, we got an "AI fix" which absolutely no one wanted or needed.

I made a mod called Better Bots. It's the most downloaded non-HUD BLT mod on LastBullet, and it makes offline play with bots (rather than braindead pubbies or, worse, F2Ps) a worthwhile experience. As such, I'm pretty keenly aware of what the bots are and are not capable of, and what they SHOULD be able to do. AI hostage trading is such a non-issue that, despite BB being out for MONTHS, the idea of giving the teammate AI that feature NEVER came up. I got more requests to give the bots the ability to pick up loot than I did for hostage trading (considering the requests for hostage trading was ZERO, that wasn't difficult to achieve). Here's a list of things BB changes that Overkill won't add into the game for no apparent reason (get cozy, this is a long one):

1. Three bots rather than two. PD:TH had this and the claims that using three bots would cause bugs or problems are demonstrably untrue; I don't know of anyone who has run into issues using three bots with BB or any other mod that achieves the same effect. The game is designed for four player co-op; if the resulting "players" in offline mode is actually three, then that designation of being "single-player" on the store page needs to be removed.

2. Targeting of Snipers. Overkill claimed some time ago that the bots would be optimized for attacking Snipers and that simply isn't the case. By default, the bots' weapons don't have HALF the range they need to take out Snipers, and if they did, they wouldn't be even remotely accurate enough for the task. More often than not, bots will mark the Snipers, point at them briefly, and then do nothing. If you are playing offline on, say, any Transport heist and you don't have weapons to deal with them, then there's no logical way to complete the heist. This is yet another problem that online players don't have to deal with, so the idea of PD2 being "single-player" is, once again, laughable.

3. Targeting of Shields facing away from you. One of the recent updates of BB included some code by TdlQ that gave bots the ability to target Shields as a priority IF the shield was facing away from them; otherwise, the bots would target pretty much everything else first. It was a pretty simple piece of LUA, only three lines long, and yet it increased the bots' efficiency by many magnitudes. So why hasn't Overkill, the developer, implemented anything close to that? Surely they know their own game, the code, and the language better than we do.

4. Reviving bug fix. This is, without a doubt, the biggest problem with the teammate AI. If you go down, they will stop and start reviving you ad nauseum, and their ability to treat the revival of you as a priority is pretty nonexistant. Above all other issues with the AI, this one makes offline play the most unenjoyable. You simply can't go down or the heist might as well be over, ESPECIALLY in front of a turret, which brings me to the next point:

5. Removal of "stunlocking." The teammate AI uses almost all of the same code for the cops; it would be accurate to describe them as Jokered cops with a lot of health. As a result, they have to deal with the same "hurt animations" that the cops do. However, they also don't have a "damage cooldown" like the players have. The result is that too much damage from too many sources at once (the most obvious one being the turrets) will "stunlock" them and they won't be able to do anything. This further compounds the problem with reviving you. If a bot goes down, it should be because they've taken too much damage and their health is gone, NOT because they were tossed around like a ragdoll. Once again, this is not a problem that the PD:TH bots had.

6. General improvements to their aim and damage overall. The vanilla bots will do 35 damage at close range and 5 longer than that. That's pathetic, that's barely excusable for Normal difficulty and not at all for higher than that. Their weapons will regularly be unable to break 15% accuracy; even point-blank targets can go as low as 70%, and because of their aiming and focus delays, it will take them a while to even reach that. They can't melee at all, so they won't be able to handle close-range targets particularly well, even though the cops can all melee for 150 damage regardless of difficulty. If you want the experience of playing with a crew who can take out cops and live to tell about it, offline mode simply doesn't qualify.

These are all features that are just in my mod. There are many other features that COULD be in the game if Overkill bothered to do something other than churn out more paid content, like the aforementioned bag carrying or perhaps fixing a drill or two. Another popular teammate AI mod, Keepers, allows you to tell the bots to hold a position until you call them again. Another, Bot Bullet Collision Fixer, keeps the bots from absorbing your bullets if you accidentally shoot them. These were all made by hobbyists in their spare time, many (like myself) who can't actually read LUA and just change a value here and there. ALL of this is made worse by the fact that they completely broke modding in the Crimefest update, and whether or not it was intentional is disputable. Overkill is staffed by people who once made the Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter games. There is, without a doubt, no excuse for how bad the teammate AI is in this game and the absolute gall on their part to claim giving the bots the ability to trade hostages fixes a damn thing is downright insulting.

[Bongwater Pizza]

引用自 Bloodninja：

Wait, did they use the term "AI Hostage Tading" themselves?

That sounds a lot more impressive than it is.

Yes it does. I haven't played at all (and won't till they fix the balance), and based on the description they gave I assumed it ment the AI would physically go up to hostages to trade them.

[Karthul]

Very good post! Overkills "AI upgrade" is a scam and they should get called out on it. The AI isn't even affected by it, it's just a script that gets you out of jail if certain map conditions are met. There are much more pressing issues with the AI than hostages trading, indeed.

Also, I haven't used Better Bots before, but when modding capabilities return I will make sure to start using it.

[Hoxi]

Just a comment about point .5

Did you ever tried solo (both offline or online) with bots? For some reason, bots will tank Turrets like they're nothing, and yes, they will not be stun-locked and dead after being shot for 3 seconds. They can even revive you while being shot by a Turret as long as you're not at it's maximum damage range, even cops will kill them faster.

Why this not a thing when playing with at least one person is beyond me, because it would instantly fix the bots vs Turrets issue. Removing the hurt animations except for "Light Hurt" and greatly increasing their speed is not the way to go imo. I like some of the fixes though.

[Htipper]

引用自 Coookie：

You seem to forget that the bots are not there to replace hardcore players, but rather assist casual players. The point of the game isn't to hide behind an object and have the bots do all the work, but you actually playing the game while they sponge up some damage and give a slight feeling of giving assistance. :extrastrongcoffee:

The problem is that it was added as a reward for people working for the pre-crimefest challenges. I would not call such a simple change a reward if people actually had to invest time into earning that change.

[Goathead]

Just wanted to show some support here for the OP and the Better Bots mod. I play exclusively in a group of 2, and the difference between playing with and without that mod is absolutely night and day. It's not about having bots do all the work for you, but rather bringing the experience of playing with fewer than 4 players back up towards something that isn't a total exercise in frustration.

Everyone that ends up playing with bots has their own reasons, and it's totally fine that the experience isn't a replacement for a full team of players. You are already reducing the number of viable approaches to a given heist by a lot just due to having limited choices of equipment to bring with you. But when you add the total ineptitude of the current bots to the mix it's a real headache.

The revival issue is by far the most pressing, and it actually wasn't really present at launch. I remember the bots being fairly reliable at revives back then, but I guess Overkill figured they were too much of a crutch, or they just broke it and never paid enough attention to fix it again.

If they just fixed the revival interruptions then 'A.I.' trading wouldn't even be necessary because at that point you only have yourself to blame for having the bots outlive you anyway.

Note that I'm mostly talking about deathwish, and I get that a lot of people would consider playing deathwish with bots to be self-defeating to begtin with, but it's not too much to ask that they occasionally manage a revive. As of right now the most useful thing the bots can do is to get stuck on the other side of a wall, continuously going down and distracting the cops while you pick them up with inspire.

If Overkill somehow manage to address this ungodly crimefest mess and cure the bad taste they must have left in the mouths of a lot of modders i hope to see the Better Bots mod back in action as there are some of us that do appreciate it a lot. Likewise the Bot Bullet Collision mod, as even that tiny change is a big relief.

[Jay Lay]

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ you nailed it right on the head man. I agree full heartedly. The bots are absolute ♥♥♥♥. Your mod makes them actually good to have on. Thanks man!

[FR Mathlaguerre]

I played with this mod only and now I almost don't play the game because the bots are useless.
Thank you for this mod!

[Ferrum]

引用自 Htipper：

引用自 Coookie：

You seem to forget that the bots are not there to replace hardcore players, but rather assist casual players. The point of the game isn't to hide behind an object and have the bots do all the work, but you actually playing the game while they sponge up some damage and give a slight feeling of giving assistance. :extrastrongcoffee:

The problem is that it was added as a reward for people working for the pre-crimefest challenges. I would not call such a simple change a reward if people actually had to invest time into earning that change.

Anything that could be implimented for free by the community in spare time, is not particularly grounds to reward someone with after a contest.

[Boy]

引用自 Schmuddel #Pay2WinDay：

Above all other issues with the AI, this one makes offline play the most unenjoyable. You simply can't go down or the heist might as well be over,

Now you can! Yay! Pretty disappointed you didn't think of such an obvious solution as AI trading to be honest, I mean, this issue is the one that makes offline play the most unenjoyable.

[Ferrum]

引用自 Boy：

引用自 Schmuddel #Pay2WinDay：

Above all other issues with the AI, this one makes offline play the most unenjoyable. You simply can't go down or the heist might as well be over,

Now you can! Yay! Pretty disappointed you didn't think of such an obvious solution as AI trading to be honest, I mean, this issue is the one that makes offline play the most unenjoyable.

There isn't AI traiding tho.

[Miles Bluefalls]

You know, I haven't played the game since Day 1 started, but when I think back on it...

Even if I'm playing with just one other person, I cannot think of a time where we failed the heist due to getting downed that didn't involved "because we got horribly overrun in the open" or the like. In a case like that, the AI can't fight their way out of a wet paper bag anyways, nevermind the idea that they're going to carry things until the end of an Assault.

And if I fail in solo mode, it's usually due to being Cloaker-jumped unexpectantly, which is usually followed by that death-spiral of the AI being too dumb to shoot the cloaker first before attempting to revive.

[The Righteous Bison]

i will definitly keep better bots in mind IF the game isnt destroyed before that. i generally dont like playing pubs too often so that will actually help me, unlike overkills needless 'addition'

[Straffe]

I knew not to expect a lot from payday2, but giving you minor minor updates that should be in a bugfix or just a small patch is not a reward. I have no idea how much work it takes but thanks for lighting it out that confirms my expectiations.

Not only do we have microtransactions but also fake rewards.

[Maboi Laurence]

引用自 Pozzer：

I knew not to expect a lot from payday2, but giving you minor minor updates that should be in a bugfix or just a small patch is not a reward. I have no idea how much work it takes but thanks for lighting it out that confirms my expectiations.

Not only do we have microtransactions but also fake rewards.

Pretty sure they would have added those as hotfixes if we didn't complete the challenges.

[Malidictus]

引用自 Goathead：

Just wanted to show some support here for the OP and the Better Bots mod. I play exclusively in a group of 2, and the difference between playing with and without that mod is absolutely night and day. It's not about having bots do all the work for you, but rather bringing the experience of playing with fewer than 4 players back up towards something that isn't a total exercise in frustration.

Same here. The Better Bots mod is one of my favourites by far. I usually play with 2 players + 2 AI and knowing I can rely on the bots to at the very least not get themselves killed constantly makes me very happy. That + Keepers + Movable Intimdated Cop made Payday 2 a LOT more fun to play, and it's a cryin' shame they don't work. Busy seems to have gotten BLT working most of the way so there's still hope for lua mods yet, and Better Bots is the first one I'll be going after if/when that happens.

Realistically speaking, I'm of the opinion that Overkill will do best to just work WITH mod-makers, if not implementing their fixes directly then at least basing their own work on the mods in question. Credit the people who made the mods, put them into the game and fix everyone's experience without having to deal with ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ claiming it's "cheating."