targeting idea

I have this completely crazy idea. How about actually having henchmen and heroes attack the target I designate? Woah! Perhaps too revolutionary?

Warning: The following is a gripe session meant for the eyes of GW programmers.

Yes, those buffoons (my henchmen and heroes) attack my target about 80% of the time, but... why not 99% of the time? I click the target. I call the target. I manually designate the target for my heroes. I try the aggressive setting. I try the defensive setting. I make sure they have a clear line of sight. I make sure nothing is blocking their charge. I call the same target 20 times over. What happens? About 20% of the time my glorious dummies attack something else. They seem to think enemies that are obstructed behind walls are a greater threat than what their Castellan Sunspear leader is calling as a target.

I really had a blast with heroes and the new control system when Nightfall was released. It was pure joy. I found out rather quickly, however, that henchmen and heroes were still rather daft. Ok no problem. The game had just been released back in October.

Now it's April. Going on six months, ANet. How about fine tuning those henchmen and hero codes so they actually attack the target I call? Or I could keep logging in every few weeks, keep getting frustrated, and then go find something less annoying to play. Over and over and over.

I think that if henchmen and heroes were smart enough, we wouldnt need to control them at all...

But as theyre not, i think itd be good if they attack the target we designate.

And id also like them not to just attack everything i attack, but to stick to their target...

Or... what about a command extention to designate a target FOR your henchman/hero. Such as... CTR+1+click = First henchmen in your party's target. And having the normal targeting command being changed to a "Master" command, causing all henchmen/heros to switch to that target immediately. Any thoughts?

I never have problems with them...They always attack the targets I call. Ofcourse they sometimes Powerspike something else that is casting a spell, wouldent call that not listening though...Maybe you are doing something wrong?

A while back, I had an incident where for a whole week they did not follow my target. Ever. They attacked whatever they wanted. I even locked the heroes onto my target and it did not work.

I personally think there needs to be a "master target" or something that they CAN NOT change targets until the master target is dead.

But yeah, after that one week, it seems they listen to me about 80% of the time.

Never had problems with them...

Maybe I just play the way developers thought people would play.

They just simply go for the target I was going to go... and do was I want them to do...

Norgu forgets about the current target and interrupts dangerous enemies...
Koss, having a fire weapon.. goes first for the enemies with Mark of Rodgort... and such...

I also found that, hwn going with other player's heroes... they do not obbey him as they obbey me...

Maybe is related to skill position or weapons equiped...?

It's a mystery for me... a real mistery... maybe I'm just a bit lucky.

you do realize that the little crosshairs button in the hero skill bar lets you set a specific target for that hero right?

Thank you all for your input.

Oh yes! That's what I meant by "manually designate the target for my heroes". And perhaps this is part of the problem. Having that tool causes me to expect them to obey. That expectation is met with about a 5% failure rate. (Please note that when I said 20% earlier, that was including all forms of designating a target for heroes and/or henchmen). Now within that 5% I notice the heroes sometimes have pathing issues. They're obstructed by several mobs between them and their target. Obviously this applies mostly to melee fighters. For these cases I really do appreciate that they switch to a nearby target and keep fighting. Well maybe 2 out of 3 times they keep fighting. See a couple years ago when we had painfully dumb henchmen, they would never fight when encountering a pathing issue. Still there are times when a hero will inexplicably NOT attack the target I have set in their crosshairs DESPITE not having any obstructions. It happens rarely enough that I wouldn't mind... BUT with all the other targeting problems it's like more fuel in the fire.

Yes, I certainly could be doing something wrong. Heck if I have any idea what it might be though. I've tried mouse clicking on a target (left click for attack on my mouse), ctrl + mouse click, scrolling through targets and hitting the space bar, ctrl + space bar, setting crosshairs before the fight, setting crosshairs during the fight, calling the same target multiple times when heroes and/or henchmen don't respond properly, switching to a new target and then back... ugh. Let me emphasize the issue I'm harping on is that I expect them to obey this simple concept - "attack my target" - 99% of the time unless there's an obstruction. Having about a 20% failure rate to obey your commander's orders would normally result in a court-martial (although a hanging would be my sentence at this point).

Glad I'm not the only one having this problem. And what you describe is what I took as an indication that the coders were fine tuning hench and hero behavior. I thought they'd eventually work most of the obnoxious kinks out. I'm concerned they may have shelved this now so I'm beating a drum and trying to draw attention to the fact that their work is not yet finished.

Play the way developers thought people would play... ? So developers didn't think players would call a target and expect their heroes and henchmen to obey? I don't mind if they switch targets to cast a special spell or toss in an interrupt, and I love that they do this, but what I'm seeing is ALL of their attacks going to something other than what I'm calling. And again this is occurring about 20% of the time I go after a specific target.

Skill position and weapons are not an issue with henchmen. I do notice it makes a difference with heroes. I have tried a LOT of different skills and weapons though I like to think I mostly use a standard "nothing fancy" layout.

Look <speaking directly to GW programmers now> I don't want to do a bunch of experiments with skills, weapons, what kinds of targets I call, the position of the moon, etc. I just want the tools I've been given to work in a very basic and reasonable manner. Resolve this aspect and then build up the complexity. Right now I lead a group of heroes and henchmen who, for no recognizable reason, refuse to even glance at my called target (primarily the ctrl+attack method) about 20% of the time. It's very frustrating to be told "you're the leader! hooray!" and then my followers do not follow.

I don't see why people think the heroes and henchmen are so bad. I was using them last night to farm lightbringer points outside of Dzagonur, and we were ripping through mobs in about 30 seconds, with no stopping in between.

I get problems with hero/hench targeting but its not all the time. I just get little "hicups" of stupidity. And i have seen the AI ignore the crosshairs. Other days we mulch through the enemy. Consistancy would be nice. esp if its for the targets being focused on.

~the rat~

sigh, angry rant thread. The heros and hench work fine.

sigh, cool ppl...
If they work fine, why do I have to move them manually so they will get out of the meteor shower or well of sucking that degens them to hell?

give them powerspike or w/e ^_^no need to move them out then

I think the OP is forgetting reaction time. Heroes and henchies do not always immediately do the things they're supposed to, just like pets. Sometimes in HvH, it takes about 15 seconds for my melonni to finally target her own designated target.

I rather have an update for pets and how fast they react to targeting...
But henchman aren't smart... duh? But they'll eventually get the job done... Though you may die once or twice before that.

I like the idea. I don't think it would help with the problem I'm describing though. It would be adding another layer of targeting options while the problem I'm describing is a frustrating failure rate for existing targeting methods. If this problem is fixed, then yes I'd want the option you describe.

Oh I don't think they're bad. They're vastly improved over how they behaved when Prophecies was released. It's just driving me crazy that I supposedly have more control now, but the goobers keep finding their own thing to do. Also, if you're ripping through mobs, it probably doesn't matter if they're disobedient. What about extremely difficult situations where you need them to take out your called target asap? Then disobedience rears its ugly head.

Angry rant? Yes. And I indicated it as such. Heroes and henchmen work fine? Not for me. Not for several players if you read this thread. Thank you for contributing nothing. Not.

Hmmm... now this is intriguing. I think I'll play around some to see how long it takes my misguided hench/heroes to switch over to my called target. Perhaps I'll bring a small group that's healer heavy so they can't kill their target, but have plenty of time to smarten up. Thanks!

Well... I'm currently gathering titles...
Some days ago, I wnt for Protector of Elona.
I was missing Dzagonur Bastion and Domain of Fear.
So far, Dzagonur Bastion was the only one that I have to do with other players.
The others were cheap.

And yesterday I went for the Canthan...
I only needed other players for The Eternal Grove, Raisu Palace and Imperial Sanctum.

And ALL the Prophecies Missions are easily doable with Heroes and Henchmen.

So... it can't be that there's a problem with them...

I understand what you’re saying. If most of the missions are doable with just heroes and henchmen, there’s nothing that needs fixing. I’m not, however, talking about my progress in the game being impeded by heroes and henchmen. I’m talking about my enjoyment of the game being diminished by less than ideal coding.

Eric Flannum is an ArenaNet Game Designer. And I didn't add those brackets, PCGamer did.

So I'm concerned all the focus will be on GW2 now. They still have ten heroes to add to Eye of the North, but will they improve their behavior? I dunno.

*back to testing response times*

Hm... I think that your problem may be with moving a lot in the battleground...

I've been lately playing with my Elementalist a lot, so I could not notice it...
But in some areas (not all) they seem no to like to work correctly when the leader moves a lot around, like melee classes do.

They seem to spread much and kite more than is needed.

The thing is that henchmen/heroes DO attack what you are attacking, but spellcasters don't focus their spells on your target. My heroes, for instance, go crazy when they see a ranger monster. they just can't help blasting him with SF until it (or themselves) are dead.

No and no. Not the problem I was experiencing, but thanks for the feedback. In some recent testing (just before a recent update) I stood still (when you move, yes, your hench and heroes back off) and observed both my spell casters (casting spells AND firing shots from wands and staffs) and my melee fighters attack an enemy which I was not attacking nor at any point had called as a target for several minutes, not just a few seconds. This extreme example rarely happened, but it did demonstrate part of what was driving me nuts. Hopefully a moot point because...

Thank you.

I've had minimal trouble with the heroes, but nothing that makes me want to rip my hair out. On occasion they seem inept, but for the most part they do what I want.