YAAIT (Yet another AI Thread)

I've seen all of these behaviors happen too. The perma aggro will go away after everyone in the party dies, so if this is going to stay the least we could get is a "feign death" skill - although I hate the idea of burning up a precious skill slot for that. It would be much nicer if there was at least one way to get in and res party members after a near wipe though.

One thing that I have noticed which may have already been brought up is that some of these behaviors seem more prevalent when running some characters than others. Some of them seem to occur no matter which profession I'm running though. I'll try to pay more attention to this and keep track of which ones happen the worst with the different profs.

I've recently noticed that the enemy monks are not (for me) running into other groups of enemies, I've seen them curve their kite path to avoid my heroes/henchies aggroing another group. Myself, I have not experienced any of my heroes endlessly kiting, perhaps it has to do with the fact that I keep all my monk heroes on Defensive instead of Avoid Combat. I have however noticed the enemy monks doing some odd things, for example on the Consulate Docks mission I had an enemy monk near the wall of fire run all the way back to the begining of the mission, before my friendly sunspear archer NPCs killed them. But I have noticed recently that these sort of behaviors are no longer occuring for me (as I mentioned I've recently noticed monk enemies curve their kiting path away from other groups, keeping my heroes from aggroing more enemies... The kiting AI monks makes sense and finally gives a use for keeping cripple/slow spells/skills in your builds for the PVE portion of the game).

I keep my henchies on "defensive" 99% of the time. Maybe that's the cause of my target calling problem. I've had issues lately w/ problems getting my heroes/henches to run in and attack. Since I play monk, I'd like my henches to rush in first. Not as much of an issue when I bring Melonni who i can flag to go in, but sometimes I replace her w/ a Mes hero and need Devona to run in.

But if I use ctrl-shift-space to spam "I'm targeting..." and the mobs are 1 or 2cm outside aggro range, my henchies just sit there. They might even make a false run foward, but if I don't move they run right back. Annoying to say the least. I often have to do a ctrl-space spam "I'm attacking.." to get them to go. grrr. Unfortunately ctrl-space causes my character (a monk) to run in wanding as well.

That's probably the most annoying thing about the AI for me at the moment.
Aggro lock can be a pain.. since it seems to be present almost everywhere from ranges that can include clear across a zone. I'm used to knownig which mobs had aggro lock, mostly in fow/uw zones. And I knew how to unaggro them (generally at least 1.5 radar distances away), and sprinting often helps to shake the aggro. But now, it seems like almost all high level mobs will lock aggro on you permanently, even after a party wipe.

I really think they should clear the aggro lock on your party after you are rez'd at the shrine. Nothing is more of a bitch then having 2 or 3 enemy groups all camping the shrine while the rez counter counts down.

Another difference I've noticed is that before, when you have a minion "train" .. as usually the minion master is slower, and the minions will trail behind in a long train.. sometimes you may skirt by the patrol w/ the party, but some of the minions either try to shortcut to you, or they're to slow and get caught by the patrol. It used to be, they'd be slaughtered mercilessly by the patrol, and that would be it. You'd be 2-3 aggro ranges away by then and the laggers would be dead.

But now, if your lagging minions accidentally aggro, you could be fighting more than halfway across the radar, and the enemy mob that disposed ot the lagging minions will come running for you, to track you down due to those minions. It's somewhat silly and a bit of a pain.. I used to just sacrifice the minions for speed when avoiding mobs, but after too many instances of extra enemies that have come running into the fray due to some trailing minions, I pretty much have to destroy every group I come in range with.

There is no more running/fleeing combat in nightfall. You can't, because most groups will pursue you to the ends of elona to smack you down with their wand.

um, I can only play at weekend these days...so maybe they had change this one already.

I recall Heros dont attack the asign target the other day= =;
I order Koss to go 1 on 1 with a warrior boss, and I clean the small fries myself(I am working on survival, I dont want to die=P) but Koss keep running back and atk the small fries with me when ever I atk.
And it seems I cant order Heros to atk some one that is out of my aggro circle either, Koss is running back and forth with in my aggro circle= =;

Those groups with Kournan Spotters are the worst, they can even "spot" me when they are walking in the opposite direction, from the secret eyes they have in the backs of their heads. I've also had the Super-Aggro happen from other enemies, mostly boss mobs, so far a beetle/grub boss and a corsair elementalist boss. I'm going to try areas with Jade Brotherhood or White Mantle tomorrow and see if they also have super-aggro now. If anyone else feels like trying that in the meantime, I have a feeling it will produce interesting results.

I've had most of these problems happen to me at one point or another. The main problems I've seen since the NF update are the mobs that run away across the map, henchies that don't listen to your target calls, and henchies that target mobs really far away.

I was fighting corsairs in Istan, so I was fairly confident of an easy win. I targeted a corsair, and went to grab a soda. When I came back, my henchies were mostly dead, and I somehow was REALLY far from where I started... still chasing that one corsair.

Recently, I decided to cap boon signet for my monk. I took a full henchie team (my heroes were low leveled still) and went out to fight the annoying healing boss. I brought the two fighters, the two monks, the one rit, Cynn, and the dom mesmer. I was a healing monk. I targeted the Dredge Gardener first, and kept the target call throughout the fight. The two wars kinda listened to me, but kept running away every so often even though they had full health and everything. I kept wanding the gardner, wondering why i wasn't doing a lot of damage, when the assassin and war dredge that had been wailing on me drop dead. I then noticed that all my casters had been ignoring my target call and attacking everything else. It all worked out in the end (the gardener was the last to die) but it really annoyed me that the henchies completely ignored my target call.

Once, I was getting ready to cap Avatar of Balthazar i think it was for my derv. I was just finishing off one of the patrols outside the fort, when Koss suddenly decides to take off running with sprint. I wasn't sure what he was doing, but I thought it might've been one of the weird AI issues that came with the update. However, I realized that he somehow was targeting a mob INSIDE the fort, about two whole agro bubbles away. Suffice to say, Koss died a horrible death. And to this day, I don't know what caused him to be so suicidal.

There was the one instance, way before the nightfall update, when I was capping SoJ with henchies for my monk. I had just suffered an almost complete party wipe, with me, the healer henchie, and a fighter left versus a lone avicara guile. The guile just stood there, running away a bit whenever someone got close. Deciding he wasn't worth the effort, I rezzed my party and moved onto the next group. The guile however followed my party, casting a few spells here and there. I eventually cornered it against a wall and beat it to death, but I'm fairly sure that's an AI problem.

Just a few examples of my experiences with AI problems.

QFT

I have experienced most of the problems listed. Some say they like the scattering and insanity of the mobs but i have to disagree. Most games agro control is a basic function of the game, some have skills to atract the agro to player x while using skill x. This game seems to discourage using any skills at all, because as soon as u hit them they start running like tards. Give warriors an agro shout that causes all enemies within x distance to target and attack said warrior. Its not that hard and anet is really messing up this game by trying to be different than other games.

The current problems compound upon each other. When a target goes running crazy into another mob u end up with 2-3 mobs, but also they are spreading out everywhere and often each person in the group ends up with 1 or 2 enemies attacking them. Maybe we should run a team of 8 wamos and everyone just solo whatever portion of agro goes to them

It takes so much longer to gain exp now, Gold is harder to farm now, and skills still cost 1k. I now value each skill point i have and pretty much given up on unlocking ALL skills on my war and ele. (wish i could farm more troll exp )

Excellent post. The AI hasn't bothered me much, but I see many of the problems that are described here, specifically Aggrolock I. If this is a bug, it needs fixing. If its WAI, they need to reconsider it for a number of reasons (eg Use of Rebirth).

Actually who is to say that "permanemt agrolock" is a "bug" and not an intended feature?

If your party screws up to the extent that "a monk runs away and tried to rebirth", let's face it, you screwed it. Now, I am not one who advocates runners, and I don't like to see idiots teaming with me at the end game. If the new AI presents itself as a Darwin Sieve then so be it.

What to get to the end of the game, work for it

The new AI has not bothered me at all. If not for all these whine threads I wouldn't even notice it.

The ai hasn't bothered me much, though I imagine it's the way I play. I take one group at a time and if one enemy starts heading for the hills, I just switch to a different target and finish the group.

If the group I'm after is too large, I just pull a few to a safe area and kill those , then I take out the rest of the group.

I would like to point out a few more bugs if a may. I have taken this quotes directly from anets website.

Very healthy monsters will run from aoe damage.

Lets say if your in the middle of a mob.. and your tanking lets say minos outside of elonas reach.. if you throw meteor shower up.. the baddies will run the second one hits the ground..

so they are running when they are still at 100-90 % health.. this qualifies as very healthy.

If your tanking and you have another person throw sv or av on you... those spells will instantly break aggro no matter what.. this should not happen. its not sustained aoe damage (a fix is to have the tanker put it on himself.. and he will not have aggro break)


Your henchman however did not get this update.. they will stand in aoe damage live dying or dead.



Also i did not see the bug about the constant speed boost that the ai now has.. this relates to perma aggro but is a slightly different bug

No matter how fast you run the ai will always be right there with ya.... ( im suprised no one stated this one yet)



this is all i can think of for bugs that have not been mentiond already..

I have found that its removing a flag that can cause problems, the dbl click speed is one completely alien to my fingers.
Unfortunately I put full team flags down alot to prevent monks kiting too far and stop others chasing after the priest (which is trying to pull your men away from you .. the boss! well its a nice thought.).

Sometimes you need to remove a flag quickly to get a desired result .. just doesnt seem to work that often.

Anyone know a way to change this in game.

From some some of the post's I've been reading, I think some of you are rushing through the areas. Try it this way: encounter a group o enemies, the area behind you should be clear.

Take out your long/flat bow and pull the group towards you. -If the group is too large, target the healer if it's close enough. They sem too always charge your group and is easy to take out. the mele characters never seem to pull, so check and see if there is a boss character to pull, they seem to always pull easily. then finaly pull the mele characters.

I've had one or two of these problems... in FoW :P

Anyway, perhaps a simple, if not a little boring or predictable, is for every mob to have several randomly spaced concentric circles around a point, and as each circle is passed the behavior changes slightly, for example the outermost circle will drop aggro altogether, therefore they won't chase you past that point, one of the inner circles will cause them to lose aggro on you if there is a more 'stationery' target, a middle circle will cause them to stop actively chasing you down, but to remain 'suspicious' of you. Perhaps the more you re-enter these circles after fleeing, the circles become larger, mimicking the enemy realising your plan to hit-and-run.

These circles should constantly change to keep the game fairly random, or else people get to know where aggro drops off.

The hero's can have it too, you, or the flag if you have put one down, would be the centre of the circle.

I dunno if this would work, but it seems a simple implementation when compared to revamping the whole system.

Any, my two cents.

I've experienced all of the above, and wanted to add:

Inherent speed boosts

What is happening: Some monsters can keep up with a sprinting warrior with no speed boost skills of their own. While this makes sense for certain enemies (I don't believe it's unrealistic for a centaur to be able to run down a human, for example,) it seems as though nearly every caster can run just as fast as a speed-boosted ranger or warrior, sticking with them over long distances.

Resurecction lock-on

What is happening: The party near-wipes, but the mobs are finished off or break aggro. Hero and henchman heros refuse to rez anyone except the other monk or ritualist, even when the other monk is out of range, and there are dead party members at your feet.

While making the healers rez the other healers first is generally good policy, and they no longer try to rez in the middle of a fight that's going against you (if they need to heal and rez, they heal first- bravo,) they should weight their choices by proximity as well as profession. Rez the warrior in spell range before the monk at the outer edge of the radar screen.

Just a short note: I'll be updating the first post to reflect the newly posted behavior quirks when i get a bit more time on my hands, should be in a couple of hours.
On another word though, i have to say that A-Net actually reads a lot of these threads and answers to some. While we can't direct them to a certain thread, if they read a thread that has a lot of aggressive posts in it, well... will they read on? Probably not, time is rare after all.
So this basically means posts like "a-net sucks" or "they'll never read this" aren't helping on the matter as they most probably will lead to a closed thread (and i'm not referring to a moderator's close).

This thread worked too and it was also one of several threads about the problem and i had many people tell me that this would never work. So this tells us that there is a real chance on getting an answer or letting them know about some of the strange behaviors if only we can keep it civil and organized.

You've grouped actual bugs with normal 'AI' behaviour as if they both need the same fix. They don't.

Only the de-aggro bug(s) deserve mention here. These are clearly instances of the AI not working as intended, and this should be addressed.

The kiting from AoE and the caster kiting from assault are fine. They made dealing with mobs harder, yes. Snares and KDs are in the game for a reason, and it's not just PvP. Deal with it.

How about no thank you, everyone keeps saying bring snares and well, no. I'm not bringing snares or KDs just simple as that. I'm going to use my same old made up warrior build that I've been using since they don't target me anymore and actually getting somewhere because I'm not wasting my energy and time snaring and still chasing not killing anything. So take that argument and throw it out the door. It's easy enough to just re-target something else.

The aggro lock is a bug, some of the enemies actions on kiting against certain enemies and they way some enemies kite is also a bug that needs to be fixed.

LOL please don't bring snares then! Whatever you fancy. Just know that is why you keep losing and having problems killing monsters, "so take that whining about it and throw it out the door."

Just look at what you're saying. Your old warrior build is sacred or what? Anet has to make it so that your sacred build will work forever? You find it reasonable for a squishy target to stand firm while you beat it to the ground, rather than it trying to avoid damage or even !beware! alert his friends in the area?

This change is good... embrace it.

That's just it I'm not losing or having problems killing monsters at all, and I'm not bringing snares, they don't run away from me. If they do I target something else and kill that. Just people keep telling everyone to bring snares and well that isn't the solution, it's to target something else besides what's running away from you because focused damage=overpower monks heal.

What I'm trying to say is snares for a warrior don't always work out as well, there are two snares I can take, Hamstring or Crippling Slash. CS is an elite and reduces my damage capability cause the elite I use is Dragon Slash. Hamstring costs 10 energy and well not only does it take off one of my damage slots, it costs 10 energy. When you're in torment lands it's not nice to have a 10 energy skill, with another 5 energy skill, with 27 energy and QZ. But like I said none of those enemies run away. I'm tired of this snare/KD argument, not everyone wants to bring that stuff with them.

The new AI bugs or whatever you'd call it actually don't bother me in the least most of the time. There are some things like the not being able to rez, but it's just ridiculous seeing a Mursaat caster group chasing a runner 5 aggro bubbles ahead of them, for 10 radars.

Cass
Please stop heating up the discussion by subliminally insulting people and throwing in elitist attitude. Your point is valid as it is your opinion, but sentences like "Deal with it!" or "Embrace it" and your general choice of words is aggressive. Keep it civil.

Thank you.

I honestly do not see the insults in "deal with it". Telling me that I have an elitist attitude is fine?

Anyway, just to give you some background. I have obviously also noticed the change in kiting behaviour. So when I took my warrior into Elona (where it seems to happen more, but maybe I am imagining that) I did encounter the problem of running after (speed-boosted) foes and being unable to kill them effectively. This also tended to result in over-aggro, just as others described here.
As I see it, there are two choices then. One is to come here and whine about this supposed bug. The other is to realize the change is intentional and reasonable from a gaming perspective, so you adapt a little. I did that (it's not so hard, really) and simply took Bull's Charge to boost my own speed when chasing and causing KD on running foes. This trades some dmg output for stopping power. This is just one solution. You could also take a crippling skill. A hex. You could place traps. There are many ways, you just have to be open to them.

I agree there, that de-aggro problem is a bug. The kiting is an intentional change and not a bug.

Kiting don't bug me cause spirits (I use rit hero) have long range attacks and well nothing runs from me, and monks stop running after a while, although a Forgotten Sage didn't want to so I just gave up on it. Cause it's not every enemy, that's what is weird. I noticed the more enemies you aggro at a time, the higher the chance for a Sage to run. Regardless I rather not bring a snare or KD so I'll just let them run or forget about them and move on. I can out damage any monk healing in PvE mostly so if they follow, well I'll get them eventually.

A lot of times I will only read the first post or even just glance over it to get the gist of what the poster is saying. This time I went and read the whole thing, and the original poster has a few very good arguments. My main character is an original Profecies Elementalist that I truly enjoy playing (I like to watch things walk and run around on fire),letting this bit of info out I have also noticed the extreme lengths that some mobs will go after certian classes of players. I personaly have had several enemies in nightfallen Jahai chase me down even to the res shrin then procede to kill my group as soon as we were resurected which should not happen. There are quite a few flaws within this new AI which should be fixed or at least toned down, as it is extremely hard to complete several quests while the entire map chases you around.

Mega Mouse

Woah was trying to cap a boss Elite skill in realm of tormet and am reminded how gay the AI is all over again. Only thing i can say is, my frustration level is building up again and i have completed NF once already.

I can really see why "replayablity" isnt a strong selling point for Nightfall.

Time to add more wasted time of my life into the realm of torment again Weeeeeeeee.


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Why blame Anet for removing the need to farm when you grind to play game normally.

Oddest AI quirk has to be the behaviour of sub lvl 20 Kournan Priests - they will happily run off and leave their group to die. Kiting is all very well, but that's just silly

Corsair Bosuns are another odd one. I have regularly experienced something very similar to 'Aggro Lock II' whereby, the bosun, and only the bosun will folow me to the ends of the earth. If I stop, they will too and more often than not they will just sit there doing nothing unless I actually physically engage them in combat... The most common area this seems to happen in is Barbarous Shore - in fact, after our ill thought out 5 man, half hero group got wiped, except for me and our MM, even the mesmer boss down there acted the same way - chased us all the way through the cave, after which I happily pinned him and Sandstormed him to death with no-one else in range (no green tho )

Restless Dead in Fahranur do this too, but they will act aggressively when they catch you. The two instances in which the Restless are most fond of doing this are in the passageway that leads to Gedoss Windcutter, with the res shrine. (The most direct route to him coming from Jokanur Diggings.) There are 2 mobs of 2x Relentless Corpse and 1x Restless Dead that spawn there and the Restless are very cagey...

Anyways, thats my experience, hope it helps.

A note about Restless Dead: They have Deathly Swarm, which in my experience, can greatly extend the casters aggro range, (especially if it hits you once you start running, so it may just be that, but it seems strange, nonetheless)

i've experienced some strange behavior that hasn't been mentioned. several times after de-flagging my henches, they've run off in the opposite direction. they either run off as a group, or just one monk will take off. the first time i noticed this was in the Desolation. i had them flagged and the party wiped, but i forgot to remove the flag. we ressed at the shrine and the henches immediately started running in the opposite direction of the flag (sissies). it's only happened a few times, and it's easily resolved by flagging my current location until they come back and "regroup". it only becomes a problem when they run off into a mob. i've seen alot of the other strange behavior mentioned here too. the perma-lock can be annoying, having to intentionally wipe the party because you can't rez fallen henches, and the AI crossing the line from kiting to griefing. overall the new AI doesn't bother me, when it works it works well, but when it bugs out it gets a little frustrating.

Opening Post has been updated. Should i have overlooked something, please send me a PM about it. I'd also appreciate it if you could provide glitches in a similiar form as i did.

In short:
Description/What is happening
Why this is a problem
Your suggested solution to this

Thanks again.

To clarify- both of these bugs happened when skipping the elimination of those Ele-spiker beetles. Although, all they are are water and i think *earth* magic prone, so I don't really see how a non-specifically labeled thing could possibly aggro like that, especially since all the other ones I've killed have aggro'ed like they should every time. Another complaint- the spawning of things from underground. I don't really think it's very plausible, to when you're killing a mob of lets say, those mandragors or those elementalist bugs, have another mob of 8-16 pop out from underground and whipe your party (man, they spike well). It isn't a random spawn either, as I tested in the Seborhin Garden (pre-nightfallen), so I think ANet is controlling those spawns and should take note that they are almost garunteed to completely own you, no matter what the build/how many monks (I always run 1 per 3 people, so 2 monks in my group).

Good re-creation of Heroe AI being retarded as ever. I was in that mission killing droughtlings and when u meet the last boss to fight, my henchies decided to not heal me at all and let me wipe completely. As a result 3 henchies immediately ran around in circles and died when a monster was sitting right in front of them yet they refused to acknowledge his existence. So i flag them away and i told Dunkoro to res ME first. Guess what he does, he ressed everyone BUT me, even though i commanded him to do so. Then when i was the only left to res, he would go near range and then immediately cancel and waste him nrg down to 0. Took his braindead self 5 tries to finally res me. Talhkora did this also when we were inside that cave mission with the kournan archers up top at the end.

Dont even get me started on the Aggro-lock syndrome.
Heres a few ways to re-create the problem in many different areas:

1. Chestrunning in Ice Floe:
Use a mo/r or mo/w w/ SB, run around the area and watch how those mursaat never break aggro. They will follow you across the entire map giving one hell of a time everytime they reach casting range to give u spectral agony and e-surge. Thats not bad, but when u accumulated 8-10 mursaat mesmers, e-surge will wipe u out.

2. Solo-ing Whitmans Folly:
Use whatever solo build here u want, aggro some grawls within the area just straight ahead out of Port Sledge, run away so that you dont aggro too many grawls and watch those grawl crones follow you to no end. When u stop, they stop, doing absolutely nothing. So you figure kill em right? The moment u target them they start running around in circles, literally. It gets so bad to the point where-in they run around so much that somehow they telepathically call upon their buddies with hammers and they all aggro you in the end with around 10-15 or them chasing you.

3. Solo-ing Arborstone:
Use whatever build here if you want. Mostly likely warrior or something that negates cripple. When trying to run across past any of em, youll notice that they eventually give up chasing u right? No, the moment you stop and take one step back, they come after you even if they were out of your radar.

4. Running Tascas Demise:
Running build here, whatever build you prefer. Try running to get to mineral springs, and every group of summit that has a gnasher will begin to follow you non-stop throughout the whole entire map. They will keep up with u even though you have sprint or whatever running skills you use. You rack up nearly 5-6 gnashers all the way to end where the mineral springs portal is at.

5. Mineral Springs, Talus Chute:
Basically any place that has Avicaras, i dont even think i have to illustrate my point here. Pretty much everyone knows about these birds having fast enough speed boosts to even rival dodge and dash. And these guys follow you forever. Until you rezone of course.

There are so many other areas, but i got tired of typing. Anyone who says they havent experienced those problems can take a look themselves. Developers ecspecially should take a look at those areas. unless it was "intended".

Thought I'd go ahead and try to test some of these comments, so I took my Ranger with running build to Mineral Springs. After successfully aggro'ing a group of Avicara, I took off back along a clear path to see if I could shake their aggro.

I ran this test a dozen or so times, all occurances resulted in exactly the same situation:

1. That most of the Avicara broke aggro and returned to their starting position when a distance of 1.5 to 2.5 aggro bubbles was reached from the starting position. They did break pursuit slightly faster if a running skill was used.

2. The Avicara Ardent (Monk) of the group did not break pursuit at all, even at distances of 2 or more radar circles.

3. The Avicara were able to maintain pursuit at a constant distance (just at the edge of my aggro bubble) regardless of running skill used. I was using Storm Chaser, Dodge and Charge! The obvious conclusion is that the NPC was shifting from 100% to 125% and to 133% speed in conjunction with my skills, since he neither caught up or fell behind. The Ardent used no speed buffs of his own.

4. When I stopped, the Ardent would attack but when attacked, kite off in a random direction in large arcs. At this stage, speed buffs allowed me to catch up with him.

5. If the Ardent was killed, upon returning to the starting position of his group, the enemies would be moving towards me when I got into 0.5 to 1 radar range. This also counted for groups without a chasing caster.

I'd be interested to know if anyone else could replicate this experience in other areas, maybe it is continent or area specific as suggested previously...

Noticing that it's mostly casters that never break aggro as well. Usually monks. Was running a Canthan char to Ascalon earlier so she could start on Protector of Tyria, and some casters never broke aggro. In fact, they kept up with me across entire zones, despite the fact that I was constantly moving 25% faster than normal. Got so annoyed at some Charr Shamans/Overseers that I started to attack them, figuring if they won't stop, I'll just kill them. Problem was, they wanded me a couple times, got off a Bane Signet or Banish, and started heading back to where they came from. I figure, tch, fine, they'll leave me alone now. No - as soon as I start heading towards the next zone again, these red blips appear on radar, heading towards my position... those damned psychic Shamans knew I was in motion again, and decided to stalk me some more. Eventually, I killed them and moved on, but it's just annoying as hell. It's much worse in areas where the enemies are level 24-28, and actually pose a serious threat.

I don't mind enemies chasing me - it's fine. However, if I'm moving 25% faster than normal, and one keeps up with me across an entire zone, there's an issue. What's the point in a speed buff if it does nothing for you, because the enemies refuse to lose aggro? Why do some enemies move at accelerated pace without speed buffs? >_>

RE: Permanent Aggrolock II

I have an anecdote to share, and even a hunch about what's happening.

A few days ago, I noticed I still had a bunch of shiverpeak keys sitting on my ranger and I decided to run around Mineral Springs for a bit to spend them all. I ran through several groups of Stone Summit (on my way through Tasca's Demise) and several groups of Avicara in Mineral Springs proper. Nothing funky so far, everything happened as it always did before, no funny aggro mishaps at all.

The first chest I came upon was guarded by a mixed group of Avicara. No sweat, those are easy unless there's one of the nasty bosses with them. I rushed in, got my prize and rushed out, taking minimal damage. This time, an Avicara Ardent decided to stick with me. I ran and ran and ran and couldn't get rid of it. Then I thought: "Hell, this is a pathetic monk chicken, why am I running?"

So I stopped. It stopped as well, right behind me. I walked up to him. It clucked and repositioned to put itself in more or less the same relative position to my facing as he had before. I shot my bow at it, for all of 3 damage. (I hadn't put points into marksmanship ) It cast Shield of Judgement, ran a few paces and then put himself back into its by now familiar position, behind me, about 7 o'clock.

It struck me that it was acting more as a henchman than an enemy.

I decided to experiment a bit and went back to its group of friends. When I got within a certain distance, they all came for me. Or so I thought. I now think they actually came for my Ardent friend. They sensed he was aggroing an enemy and they rushed to his aid. When I turned back, my friend kept following me, but the others (its 'former' friends) went back home, apparently because they wouldn't stretch beyond a certain distance from their home spot.

Completely proper behaviour, except for the single very confused Ardent, suffering from what I'll be calling 'mistaken partymembership'.

A small definition: 'Mistaken partymembership' causes a mob to consider itself member of a party it doesn't really belong to. This phenomenon does NOT change a mobs hostility status, it merely affects its movement patterns.

And now I'm thinking, perhaps the first type of Permanent Aggrolock has the same basic bug at its base? Perhaps the monsters that come rushing in as soon as players enter the extended area they're allowed to move in (usually a modest distance from their home point, but possibly the whole area for a patrol!) see these players as part of their party. Suppose the oft-mentioned wannabe-rebirthing monk is considered part of the party of enemies, what would/could happen? His monstrous 'mistaken partymembers' might have a permanent sense of aggro pouring off the poor monk, because he himself sets off the 'partymember engaged with the enemy' on a permanent basis, being a hostile unit within his own aggro range! Thus, every time he moves within the extended movement area of the monster party he is inadvertantly considered part of, all the monsters come rushing in because they think one of theirs (the monk) is engaging an enemy (the same monk!).

Thoughts?

I didn't see it mentioned; but the insta-monk aggro which triggers some of the other "side effects" that are listed.

Monk begins to flee instantly (heroes, henchies and mobs) and since the aggro doesn't break off the AI begins it's congo-line style of play.

I understand that "going for the monk" is a vvalid PvP strategy; lets keep it there. Termites and other "creatures" should have no idea what a monk is... this "feature" removes the immersion and illusion of a living world. When all mobs act the same, it's a constant reminder that instead of an adventure filled world, we are battling bots in different skins... further, the AI is unable to adapt to changing situations; which puts the AI into situations as already mentioned.

nice thread

i would like to affirm the strange behavior of kournan priests.... they seem to kite (in the correct direction mind you) whenever a character approaches (scenario: me (dervish) moves in to attack an enemy paragon, and the priest starts to move away)

also, warrior henchmen and fighters seem to be a bit thick and slow in terms of orders... scenario: me moves in to attack on enemy paragon, then noticed a patrol is soon to arrive, and would complicate the matter, so moves away when i am 1.5 aggro bubble away, whereas the hence rushes in and engage the enemy...

scenario 2: i am running away from a mob after engaging since a patrol is coming... all casters follows my orders, yet melee henchmen and heros seem to still be fighting (or got body blocked)

NPC Body blocking

In the quest A Deal's A Deal Palawa Joko will bock block resulting stopping you from attacking a target.

Yeah, the body blocking really does get annoying. Takes away ability to get to minion-swarmed targets and such. Is that an AI bug really, though?

OK, reading some of the earlier posts I was thinking none of this is happening to me, but I see now. The problem is mainly effecting people running thorugh an area to get to chests or a certain boss for green farming or capping.

The way I generally play is to simply kill every group I encounter until I reach my destination. I suppose the difference is if you're questing/miissioning or chest/green farming.

When I engage a group for battle, sure I have to deal with the monk running off, but so far that has just made it easier for me to beat that group of enemies.

P.S. I didn't read most of the posts, so if I'm missing the point of the thread topic, my apologies.

If your too lazy to simply flag the hench/heros away manually then you've got nothing to complain about.

Remember, hench only stop attacking if you kite things, not flee the battle.

Actually, I make it a practice to always kill everything in an entire zone, and I have encountered the Permanent Aggrolock and Super Aggro and Endlessly Fleeing Monk stuff just from playing normally. Sometimes if I'm getting my ass kicked, I have to run away, and that's when I sometimes get unlucky and have Permanent Aggrolock on me from one of the enemy casters.

If you hit the key that does a 180 and take like two steps fleeing the battle, the henchmen stop attacking immediately and run away with you. Like they cancel the spells they're in the middle of because they follow you to run away, that's how much of a priority it is to them. At least, that's what always works for me, and I'm glad that's not screwed up with the new AI. It seems a lot easier to try and get them to stop attacking if you kite now, where before they would usually ignore you backing off from the enemy and keep hacking away at the enemy.