Instances of Funky Hero AI

Please use this thread to post specific observations you've made of heroes doing their own thing.

I've noticed that some builds are extremely hero-friendly and others are not. This has been addressed elsewhere on the forum, but I'd like to get into specifics. Perhaps there should be an option for players to set skill chains that their heroes should follow, so that the heroes do things in a logical order. In any event, the AI needs tweaking.

A/R Hero: Critical Barrage build works great

I set Zenmai up as an A/R Critical Barrager. She maintains her three enchantments at almost all times, spams barrage otherwise, and occasionally interrupts with a savage shot. I don't have to babysit her.

N/Mo Hero: MM does not use Blood of the Master enough

Olias is another story. As an N/Mo MM, he makes flesh golems first and then starts generating bone fiends. That's good, but when there are no corpses around, he rarely if ever uses Blood of the Master. I gave him Karei's Healing Circle and Heal Area to compensate for the heavy loss of health that usually comes from Blood of the Master, but he just likes to spam KHC and HA to heal his minions out of battle. Needless to say, that was ineffective because he lets them die. Another problem with letting him function on his own is that Olias doesn't always make a new Flesh Golem when one dies, and leaves the corpse unexploited. This might be because I was walking and heroes have the henchmen way of following like dogs. The AI should include exceptions that allow heroes to stop running to cast spells if it means maintaining their functionality.

N/Me Hero: Arcane Echo>Reckless Haste instead of Arcane Echo>Spiteful Spirit

Then I tried using Olias as an N/Me Echo SS. He actually chained that perfectly until it came to arcane echo. He usually casts Reckless Haste after Spiteful Spirit, which is nice. Sadly, even with Arcane Echo right in front of Spiteful Spirit, he chooses to SS, Arcane Echo, and then Reckless Haste... RH is an AoE, so it's literally pointless to re-cast it.

N/Mo Hero: BiP Support works fine

So now I use Olias as battery support for monks in my party. That works extremely well. He maintains Awaken the Blood and then spams Blood is Power and Blood Ritual across the party, which even helps Zenmai spam a little better (I haven't given her new armor or a zealous bow yet, so she can run out of energy). With high blood magic, he likes to sacrifice, but with high death magic and no blood, he doesn't.

E/Me Hero: Glyph of Renewal>Fire Attunement instead of Glyph of Renewal>Meteor Shower

Judging by Olias's inability to understand skill echoing, I decided Sousuke could never, by himself, echo chain Meteor Shower. I figured that he could use Glyph of Renewal and get MS out twice every now and then, but it doesn't work. He uses Glyph of Renewal on Fire Attunement and then casts Meteor Shower. Maybe it was because Fire Attunement has a long recharge, but the hero doesn't understand that one can maintain FA all the time as long as it isn't removed. The heroes lack priorities in this way. If ANet fixes Echo, Arcane Echo, and Glyph use by heroes, it would either be in a way that specifically accomodates well-known builds, or by writing a bagillion conditional statements for every possible logical skill chain.

These are all I've noticed so far. Another neat idea would be to let players babysit heroes for a while so that the heroes could recognize patterns in the play style and mimic them later. Sortof like how voice recognition software doesn't really recognize your voice until it listens to the way you read a lot of little sentences. Then the play styles could save with templates. I mean, just defining skill chains for heroes doesn't really work, because you want heroes to behave certain ways in battle and sometimes differently outside of battle. Having that as an option would be nice, and then players that don't want to invest that time can still have heroes that use the regular AI.


Anyway, post funky chains your heroes use in this thread, or reply if you've seen inconsistencies between your experience and the things I've noted.

I just wana point out that Awaken the Blood on a BiP necro is the worst idea ever. Take it out. Take it out now!

There's nothing wrong with Awaken the Blood with Blood is Power. As long as the necro stays back, the health sacrifice won't hurt you all that much. Combine low health (runes) with Awaken the Blood, BiP, and Blood Renewal, and you have a never ending cycle of health to energy. That said, I dunno if the hero necro knows how to stay back, so it might not be the best idea.

Theres not much use of it though... you waste a lot more health for +1 energy regen that doesnt get used anyway (max 10 regen), most classes have +4 natural regen. so really you're killing yourself for no benefit at all. (assuming blood magic at 13+)

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just to add: i made my Zhed Shadowhoof a Starburster. works really good, though he doesnt shadow step in the battle... that doesnt really matter though, its not pvp. anyway, he did good dmg

Only 2 problems I have seen and quickly remedied...

Aura of Displacement on the Sin...He ends up so far away from the party it's actually pretty funny.

Arcane Echo...Without manually choosing the skill to be echoed, there really seems to be no rhyme or logic to what the hero chooses. I've seen Parasitic Bond echoed :s

I set up Master of Whispers as a WoH healer since I transferred from Cantha and all the primary monks are too low leveled. I added Infuse Health to the build to make up for the lack of Divine Favor, but he seems to spam that more than WoH. I might substitue in Glimmer of Light to see his results.

I set up Zenmai with Palm>Ox>Spider>Fang and the lady executes it PERFECTLY! She even goes Palm>Fang when the enemies are grouped to where she can't KD.

Koss fights with me on Mending/Vigorus Spirit/Live Vicariously. He puts it on everyone but himself.

Acolyte Jin...Never seen her use Charm animal. Odd.

if you disable the enchants and put them on manually Koss can't take them off, also you have to tell the hero's to charm a pet.

jin occasionally runs off to attack an enemy she's seen way in the distance

Switch her to Guard Mode. She won't do that anymore.

Well i have complete different matter of AI problem: Heroes getting caught in endless spellcasting loops:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...php?t=10067979
Seems to be Signets and Glyphs which cause severe problems for the AI.

Jin is Interrupter Supreme. Practiced Stance, Choking Gas, Distracting and Savage. She managed to interrupt 3 RoFs while hunting Kournan military.

Heroes are great, but... I' fear they will lessen the gaming expirience because everyone will be running around with them instead of people. Two days ago my guildies and I went out to kill the Drought. The balthazar-cursed beast pwnz0red us in a matter of seconds. Okay, this *was* our first ever go at the mission so we didn't know what to expect but still... Anyway, I went in yesterday. Took Jin, set up the Master of Whispers as N/Me with Inspiration-based interrupts and curses, gave Koss Savage slash. They killed the Drought and the Droughtlings in about 30 seconds. Alas, the great beast fell last so I didn't get the chance to cap. So many interrupts must have been an overkill.

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Inspired Hex is awesome on a monk hero.

He removes a hex from an ally (usually it's parasitic bond) and then start spamming it on the enemy with 0 points in blood magic until his energy is 0.

I don't know if it's just my Koss, but he doesn't seem to comprehend knockdown combos. I tried making him a W/E with kd/as but he just ran in and used aftershock before he even attacked . Similarly, I've yet to see him use Crushing Blow after a knockdown.

Balance stance are rarely used by heroes with drunken blow and desperation blow.

Heroes don't interrupt as often when they are set in "guard mode" or "avoid combat mode".

Heroes in guard mode set trap very well.

Heroes ele won't use attunement as first spell if the attunement is on the later end of the skill bar. (haven't bother to try to move attunement to forward end yet)

Heroes with more than 1 glyph will waste glyph usage before glyph ability run out.

Heroes use conditional skills quite well. (glowing gaze etc)

Heroes practically do not use speed up/damage stance by themselves. (rarely use it)

Heroes protective spirit usage against spike is almost as good as their interrupt.

That's it for now.

I've been suprised how stupid heroes are with Arcane Echo.

Echo + Attunement?

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