How Crew AI drops deployables - Solo / Duo play with bots

Learn to get an Armor Bag after every assault! This guide aims to explain the mechanics behind how Crew AI decides what deployables to drop for you after an assault ends, and if to drop you resources at all.

Intro

With proper management of your armor, health and ammo, bots can drop you an Armor Bag every single time an assault ends. This can be very useful on long heists such as Cook Off, but is also useful in general as it can be the difference between having armor and not having it.

The short, non-detailed answer is that bots will drop deployables depending on "what your team currently needs". So for example, if you're low on health, a bot will drop you a Medic Bag. Now, for the long answer...

Explanation of Mechanics

Each bot can drop 1 bag of their choice during a break from assault. Though it usually happens right after the assault ends, it does not have to be - a bot can decide to drop a bag at any point during a break if they haven't dropped one yet, as long as drop eligibility is suddenly met by a player.

If you have 3 bots, up to 3 bags will be dropped during a single break. If you have 2 bots, then up to 2 bags. A single bot will only drop up to a single bag of their choice.

Whether your bots will drop a deployable is based on your current armor, health or ammo status. If multiple players are present, as long as one of the players meets the criteria, a bag will be dropped.
The criteria are:

• For a bot to drop a Medic Bag, a player in team must be below 40% health.
  
• For a bot to drop an Armor Bag, a player in team must be below 50% armor.
  
• For a bot to drop an Ammo Bag, a player in team must be very low on ammo in either the primary or secondary weapon, or both at once (not sure about exact percentage here, my best guess is that it's 25% ammo remaining in one of their guns).

If multiple criteria are met (e.g. low on health and low on armor), bots have a priority that they will always follow: Medic Bag first, Armor Bag second, Ammo Bag third.


How low precisely you are on these resources doesn't matter. If you are at 0% armor and 35% health, and you only have one bot on your team, you will receive a Medic Bag, as it is higher on the priority list. Since there are no more bots, no Armor Bag will be dropped.

There is no limit to how many deployables a single bot can drop throughout a heist. Further, bots do not care how many deployables are already present in the level before dropping one. If you're conservative with using existing deployables, and you make sure to keep your health/armor/ammo reasonably low, bots can keep generating you more resources than you are spending.


As I mentioned at the beginning, criteria can suddenly be met in the middle of a break from assault. If you find yourself with slightly more than 50% armor, and the assault just ended, you can force yourself to take damage (even grenade yourself) to drop below 50% armor, and a bot will suddenly drop you an Armor Bag. During a break, you can also consider dropping yourself from a considerable height to receive a Medic Bag, or firing most of the ammo in your secondary into a wall for an Ammo Bag.

If a bot has dropped an Armor Bag during current break, healing armor above 50% using an Armor Bag or Armor Repair Kit, then taking damage below 50% armor (with e.g. a grenade) may prompt another bot who hasn't yet dropped a different bag to drop another Armor Bag during the same break if enough time has passed between the two drops. I'm short on specifics on this one as I've seen this happen somewhat rarely, but it can definitely happen.

Gameplay Strategy

With bots present, never heal your armor to full, especially if you are close to ending the assault. Healing above 50% armor could mean you will not receive a free Armor Bag from a bot, leaving you a net loss of armor.

In solo or duo play, I recommend you should wear the Heavy Ballistic Lining armor. This is because you want to always be below 50% armor in the eyes of your bots. This will be easiest to accomplish with the heaviest armor, because it means you can freely heal up to 2 bars of armor.

With only 1 bot, all three players should keep their health above 50%, so that their bot doesn't end up dropping a Medic Bag, as it is higher priority over an Armor Bag.

[Star_kless]

if you are usisng the adaptive armor and it have 1 plate are the bots still gonna drop something? or is it always 50% below?

[Gra̶bz]

The point of the strategy is not to fully charge your armor. You permanently run around at half armor or less to make sure bots give you an armor bag every break. With heavy lining, that lets you have 2 bars, and bots always think that you are in need of armor.

That said, you can of course use other armor if you want, I just find it a lot harder to survive with so little.

It overall makes the most sense to use either 4 bar armor, or 2 bar armor, because using an armor bag always brings you to an exact half. You will have issues pulling off the strategy in this guide with 1 bars or 3 bars. With 3 bars you'd have to stick to having 1 bar, at which point you may as well take 2 bar armor instead.

[K4NDR0S]

tbh cant agree for using heavy armor coz even if u ill have plenty armor bags this armor is eating them faster, heavy armor taking 3-4 plates to fully charge when light cost only 1-2

but very good tutorial, always good to know more about mechanics, thanks for making it :)