Pondering Hero AI

Well, we've heard some basics about the new Hero AI for nightfall. With the bit that we do know, I was wonder what people thought were on how we might control them. We've heard that we can command them to wait, follow, attack and defend thus far. But, how do you think they will impliment this? How much control will we REALLY have? Forgetting about setting skills, weapons and armor pre-battle, how will they impliment, in the heat of battle any of these commands?

*Right click menu in the party window
*Text commands
*Seperate command window
*Direct conversation, click a hero, dialog pops up with commands to select from

Any others you can think of?

I hope they took the key command system from games like Tribes or UT:

You highlight a hero in the party window, then hit a key to make a small menu pop up, then hit 1 or 2 more keys to select what you want, in a tree structure.

The 3-keystrike-system from Tribes was pure genius. It was very quick to memorize the codes, and once you had the hang out of it it was faster than any other system to give orders and to communicate in a team (for bots as well as human players).

Another thing i'm wondering about is, if you make them equip charm animal will you have to help them cap a pet or will they have their own?
Speaking of which i hope we get the same controls for our pets as we get for our hero's.

But on topic more, yeah that system would be great i think Tetris, the thing is will it get to complicated and end up being harder to play your own character as well?

According to PC Gamer, there will be three modes you can set your Hero on: Agressive, Defensive and Passive. You can direct them to certain areas by placing flags on your mini-map.

That's just like the minions in City of Villains!

Are we even sure that ranger heros are an option? Do we know if you can change thier secondaries even? It could very well be a primary only hero just like regular hench are now. We also don't know if we will be able to take hero's to cantha or tyria...

If it is moded like it mentions in PC Gamer, do you set them pre-battle? During battle? I know we'll just have to wait and see, but it's going to be an interesting adjustment to have controlable heros on top of running your own build effectively. My personal opinion is a right-click option in the party windo would be the best, quickest way to command a hench to change tactics. I'd love to have a "disengage" option so they wouldn't just stay back and fight to thier death during bad aggro. ahhh sooo many questions i can hardely wait to get answers!

PC Gamer says they can have secondaries.

I would think all classes will be available (with the possible exception of Assassins and Ritualists).

Don't know how you set their "modes", don't know if they can travel with you.

I hope i can set the necro hero as an MM, that will be awesome

I rly do hope heroes to maintein the intuitive play of Guild Wars.

I would like them to be costumized & i would also like them to be good at what we whant them to do.

By what i know placing flags its easy, just click for the Heroes to go & secure the surounding area & the path untill they reach it.

I rly hope heroes to be what i think of them & i cant really explain cause if that happens they will rule, but other wise, ihope they dont simply suck

More details people search!!

I was under the impression from previous posts that you basically had to choose your three different heros as you progressed in the game... as in you needed to do NF with multiple characters to use all of them...

From the PC Gamer article, it says you will need certain ones for certain missions/quests...

I wonder how this will all play out.

I am still praying to the unholy devs of gw to give us CE ppl a special hero, it wouldnt go flashy in town like previous ones... but any group would be like :OOOH DANG WHERED U GET THAT HENCH:

Horseman of War, you my friend deserve the 'Best Idea Of The Week Award' for that, that would be awesome!

Of course the "thinking" and keystrikes that you do for controlling your heroes deducts from the time that you have for yourself. But as the team becomes more effective it is worth it. Keep in mind that you will have a maximum of only 3 heroes. Anybody who has commanded a team of bots in an FPS game like UT or Tribes, and anybody who has commanded an army in a RTS game knows that it's well managable.

Well, if you feel that it's too complicated you may always let the heroes do what their default AI tells them to do. I assume they'll be at least as smart as the henchmen are now, which is okay, especially if you give them a good set of skills and weapons to work with.

Well, they can at least be sent to areas on the map on there own, a huge improvement on henchies right there.

I must say, after reading the descriptions of the Heros in PC Gamer, I'm a little worried. There weren't any Monk sounding Heros. Now, I don't want to start a rumor ("Mordakai said there's no Monks!"), but I'd sure feel better if I knew the classes these heroes would be.

12 Heroes, 8 professions (supposing some are Paragon and Dervish)....

I've been a little worried about how they'd work too, but I just try to keep telling myself that it will probably turn out all right in the end. I'd be willing to bet that ArenaNet did their homework before implementing Heroes. They probably studied succesful FPS and squad-based action games to see what other people have done that works before coming up with their method. I'm sure it'll turn out all right.

As for what I'd prefer, I never played Tribes, but the 3 key strike method that Tetris mentioned sounds like it'd be great to me. I could easily get used to something like that.

I just want to know if you can move them to get out of the way for a screenshot. That'd be awesome...at least, for me it would.

Sounds to me like you can, since you can click a space on the map to have them go there. Just click a space that's not in the area of the screenshot.

Henchway buff !
, n__n

Well, under a week till we get to see the hero AI for ourselves. Once I get bored with the preview, I'll do my best to break the hero AI.

do they get drops like the normal hench. say if u go out alone with 3 heros do u get all drops?

Yes, you can choose whatever secondary you want for them (according to some people that read teh pc gamer magazine). And I really, really hope they can come to cantha and tyria, enspecially if they are better than regular henchies.

Why not give them an assassin or ritualist secondary? As long as only accounts with factions can give it to them, why not?

Maybe thats the special ingame content! I need to get collectors edition if it is!

I don't know. They seem like they are super henchies right now, so I don't think so....but it would be nice!

I can't wait for the event next weekend! There super henchies are probably one of the first thing I'm going to try to find!