Stealth system, or lack thereof

[Riekopo]

I don't understand the stealth system in this game. I'm not sure if there even is one. Whnever I try to be stealthy it usually doesn't work. The enemies seem to be able to see through walls and crates and stuff.

[MTL5]

AI has line of sight. AI can also hear you moving, but they generally only respond to sound when alerted somehow. They have that Crysis behavior where they blind-fire at places they think you probably are. You can upgrade your boots to make less noise, and your jacket to be less visible when stationary. There are also the noise makers that you can throw to make enemies move away. With silenced weapons, it's often essential to fire a few shots rapidly because silencers halve damage.

Also, AI generally doesn't look up. So you can make use of catwalks and rooftops and stuff to stay out of the AI's way. And if you take cover behind things, you can peek over the top with SHIFT.

It could be my imagination, but it feels like you have slightly more time to kill enemies before there is a general alert sounded after the latest patch.

Vehicles/drones have a very narrow field of vision. You can literally crouch walk alongside a Wolverine drone so long as you don't cross in front of its turret.

Stealth is a huge focus in the DLCs, and the only real design difference there is that the AI moves more predictably and comes from logical places. In the main game, you sometimes end up running into AI that spawned around the corner without you knowing.

Do you have any footage or anything of the AI seeing you when it shouldn't be able to? Because I can't say I've ever been seen through solid objects, and I've never actually seen it happen in footage.

In my experience, stealth is tricky because the AI lacks predictability, but it's very possible to sneak around as you traverse the world, even on Deathwish.

[harmlesshamster]

Hop into the magic dumpster to make enemies hundreds of feet away lose interest in trying to find you. In fact, I had a soldier firing on the dumpster with ME in it and then when the threat level went to zero, he lost interest and calmly walked away.

[MTL5]

Originally posted by harmlesshamster:

Hop into the magic dumpster to make enemies hundreds of feet away lose interest in trying to find you. In fact, I had a soldier firing on the dumpster with ME in it and then when the threat level went to zero, he lost interest and calmly walked away.

Dumpsters are only in yellow zones, so that doesn't work for literally half of the game+all three DLCs, and if the AI sees you entering a dumpster they will try to kill you. You have to break line of sight first.

The thing to remember about this type of AI is that it will keep shooting at where it thinks you might be until it loses interest. For example, if you throw a noise maker up the street, you'll often get the AI shooting in the direction of the noise maker. It doesn't actually "know" anything is there. The AI's trying to simulate "thought I heard a noise, better spray and pray" behavior.

There's a fine line with AI where "it's not a bug, it's a feature" comes into play. There are two possibilities with the dumpster.

A: The AI was trying to shoot you because it could see you, but it was missing.

B: The AI was simply shooting at the dumpster because you'd made noise entering it and the AI has a fallback behavior to shoot at noises, such as noise makers.

C: I remember in the early days you had people complaining about the AI hanging around dumpsters when you were hiding in them, so maybe they patched in a "walk away" behavior to compensate.

[harmlesshamster]

I missed a guy with a crossbow at 100m and they went immediately to code RED over 9k holy sh*t there's something over there!

[MTL5]

Originally posted by harmlesshamster:

I missed a guy with a crossbow at 100m and they went immediately to code RED over 9k holy sh*t there's something over there!

Crytek AI has always been able to recognise that it's being shot at. But if you stay out of sight, it won't necessarily know where you are, particularly if your weapon is silent.

Also, they generally don't react immediately. You've usually got about a second before they notice you.

I think this design conundrum is why you can't put silencers on long range weapons in the campaign. Because you'd be able to kill entire groups of enemies from a distance and they wouldn't be able to figure out where you're shooting from. The crossbow doesn't have long enough range for that to happen.

The flaw with the crossbow is that if you miss, the AI is going to notice the whole "someone just fired an arrow at me" thing and then sound the alert. There's no time for a follow up shot. If you double tap someone in the back of the head with the pistol, that doesn't happen.

[Riekopo]

MTL5 you are very knowledgeable. The crossbow is really disappointing in this game because of the AI. I can never use it effectively.

[MTL5]

Originally posted by Riekopo:

MTL5 you are very knowledgeable. The crossbow is really disappointing in this game because of the AI. I can never use it effectively.

Agreed. The crossbow has two problems.

One, the drop-off is crazy. Cook's meant to be a weapons wizard. Why is his crossbow so lame?

Two, it doesn't guarantee a one hit kill. (The pneumatic pistol, on the other hand, is a OKH.)

I think the crossbow is presented as being a super stealth weapon akin to Crysis 3's crossbow, but the problem is that it is too difficult to aim at sort of range, and even if you hit an enemy with it, unless you hit them in the upper body, they'll survive and sound the alarm.

Homefront: TR does have a stealth system, and does work pretty okay at times. (Especially in the DLC. The stealth-based encounter design is MUCH better in the DLC.)

But the way the game handles ostensibly "stealth weapons" is pretty awkward and somewhat non-intuitive.

I wish modders would take a look at making the game load modded script files. Then someone could tackle making stealth way more viable.

[Riekopo]

You should post your feedback on the official forum. Maybe they will update the game again.

[MTL5]

Originally posted by Riekopo:

You should post your feedback on the official forum. Maybe they will update the game again.

I have posted some of this stuff on the forums in the past, but although the devs do actually listen to feedback and have made some changes in the past, I think the devs are primarily interested in fixing bugs, rather than rebalancing gameplay.

At this point I'm just hoping for one more bug fixing patch before they end support for the game, because there are a few rare-ish game breaking bugs still left in the game. I dunno what's going on behind the scenes, but they should at the very least fix the remaining crash bugs before they move on.

[HunterKiller]

Too many AI when they're alerted. This game has overdone that bit. They never stop. I killed at least 150 last night while on a rooftop. They just kept coming and coming until I just quit. Run out of ammo, jump down, take hits, run like hell get back up, heal myself, run out of ammo again, rinse and repeat. It's stupid and this is on Easy so I can go for the achievements. Took me well over an hour to get to the Safe House. Once in, I logged out.

[MTL5]

Originally posted by HunterKiller:

Too many AI when they're alerted. This game has overdone that bit. They never stop.

That's kind of the point. You're supposed to be hopelessly outmatched. Fighting back is supposed to be suicide. (Although you can stay alive indefinitely if you're clever.) Once the general alert is out, and you've got an airship involved and stuff, your only choice is supposed to be to run away. In GoldenEye, enemies would keep coming once the alarm was sounded, and wouldn't stop until it was shut off.

[Sinner]

Originally posted by MTL5:

Originally posted by HunterKiller:

Too many AI when they're alerted. This game has overdone that bit. They never stop.

That's kind of the point. You're supposed to be hopelessly outmatched. Fighting back is supposed to be suicide. (Although you can stay alive indefinitely if you're clever.) Once the general alert is out, and you've got an airship involved and stuff, your only choice is supposed to be to run away. In GoldenEye, enemies would keep coming once the alarm was sounded, and wouldn't stop until it was shut off.

Red faction comes to mind. And so does this little skit about it,

https://youtu.be/QvKoBH3PA2s?t=50s

Homefront does the same thing. A few of the hearts and minds setups are pretty much suicide missions if this wasn't a videogame, where you can run faster than an olympian in full combat gear.

[Hookworm]

Originally posted by MTL5:

Originally posted by HunterKiller:

Too many AI when they're alerted. This game has overdone that bit. They never stop.

That's kind of the point. You're supposed to be hopelessly outmatched. Fighting back is supposed to be suicide. (Although you can stay alive indefinitely if you're clever.) Once the general alert is out, and you've got an airship involved and stuff, your only choice is supposed to be to run away. In GoldenEye, enemies would keep coming once the alarm was sounded, and wouldn't stop until it was shut off.

Then why we have so many good weapons right from the start? Basically the resistance has better geared up than the KPA. And we can easily capture ground from them by activating a radio in a ruined house? Even if i dont kill a single enemy? lol. And the numbers, the resistance spawn rate is insane (not in combat or during alert ofc) Im just walking the streets and i see usually 1-2 korean patrol with smg, next corner, 10-15 resistance soldiers with rocket launchers, snipers, sometimes i wonder where is the guy with the radio who can call air&artillery support immediately if needed. (hard difficulty)
I dont feel at all this uprising feeling. More likely we are the ones who capture korean cities and slaughtering a bunch of defensless civilian with our unlimited resources.
And the endless enemy spawn is hilarious and not in a good way. Every dev realized this after the call of duty 1. If they wanted to force the player to a much more stealthy way, why dont they just remove most of the weapons and give as only shiv knifes, screwdrivers and other homemade weapons, mid game some pistol and bad smg-s and hunting rifles with an extremly limited ammo?
And the stealth is so bad and unpredictable. Sometimes they ignore me even if im close sometimes i throw a brick in front of me to the grass in somebodys garden and they start shooting me from 50-100m distance. They see across the walls and shooting it continuosly. (thank god its not cs go walls because this would increase the difficulty to super hexagon levels)
My only luck is that im not a stealthy man so i dont care too much with all the flaws, but still some missions require the sneaky way and its only based on luck.

And those who cant throw a brick (because its disappearing), if u hold the LMB right after u pick up and running like that this will prevent the brick from disappearing and u can throw it later safely without any problem.

[Hookworm]

Originally posted by MTL5:

Originally posted by harmlesshamster:

I missed a guy with a crossbow at 100m and they went immediately to code RED over 9k holy sh*t there's something over there!

Crytek AI has always been able to recognise that it's being shot at. But if you stay out of sight, it won't necessarily know where you are, particularly if your weapon is silent.

Also, they generally don't react immediately. You've usually got about a second before they notice you.

I think this design conundrum is why you can't put silencers on long range weapons in the campaign. Because you'd be able to kill entire groups of enemies from a distance and they wouldn't be able to figure out where you're shooting from. The crossbow doesn't have long enough range for that to happen.

The flaw with the crossbow is that if you miss, the AI is going to notice the whole "someone just fired an arrow at me" thing and then sound the alert. There's no time for a follow up shot. If you double tap someone in the back of the head with the pistol, that doesn't happen.

In practice, u miss, enemies become alerted. Endless spawn rate start around u (no matter if they spot u or not) and start attacking u. :D
and what will happen if a sniper spot u? map alerted, no enemy spawn (why? he/she dont use radio?) u kill him/her, everything back to normal, sometimes 1-2 korean spwan because of the weapon sound. but if u dont shoot back, there wont be any enemy spawn at all! this is surrealistic :P

[MTL5]

Originally posted by Hookworm:

They see across the walls and shooting it continuosly.

In the Crysis games, the AI blind fires at walls based on cues such as the player making noise. Just because they're shooting at you through walls doesn't necessarily mean they can actually see you. At least in the Crysis games. Considering Homefront's AI shoots at noise makers, I think it's safe to assume they shoot at places they think the player is located, such as through walls. Of course the problem is that bullets don't penetrate a lot of surfaces -- but ironically, I think players would complain more if they did. They'd talk about the "cheating" AI with "X-Ray vision".

Originally posted by Hookworm:

If they wanted to force the player to a much more stealthy way, why dont they just remove most of the weapons and give as only shiv knifes, screwdrivers and other homemade weapons, mid game some pistol and bad smg-s and hunting rifles with an extremly limited ammo?

They're not really trying to force players to be stealthy. The game's core gameplay is designed around hit-and-run attacks, not stealth. Stealth is just a part of it. Stealth allows you to carry out the hit and run attacks better.

That's what the first mission tries to teach. You see the KPA, you get into position stealthily, blow them up, and then you run away before the air ship shows up.

If this was a Vietnam game where you played the Vietcong fighting the Americans, the bulk of the gameplay would be leaping out, shooting up the technologically superior Americans, throwing some grenades, and then running away before they start dropping napalm.

Originally posted by Hookworm:

In practice, u miss, enemies become alerted. Endless spawn rate start around u (no matter if they spot u or not) and start attacking u. :D

As a general rule, the AI only spawns endlessly if there's some sort of alert. If you immediately kill everyone in sight, there sort of "stage 1" alert will immediately stop.

That's why you can be spotted by an enemy, run towards them, stab them in the face, and then the first stage alert stops.

Originally posted by Hookworm:

and what will happen if a sniper spot u? map alerted, no enemy spawn (why? he/she dont use radio?

Game probably uses a group system just like Far Cry 1 and Crysis. In those games, enemies were given group numbers that marked them as part of a group. Alert one member, all other group members would immediately be alerted.

The snipers will likely be in a different group to other types of KPA. So snipers only alert other snipers when they see you.

Maybe the problem with Homefront: TR is that they're put Far Cry 1-style AI into a Far Cry 3-style game, and most people don't seem to remember how Far Cry 1 played.