First

I hate you. :(

If you guys do end up getting on a test server to test these changes please post feedback over here: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=155703

I hate you. :(

If you guys do end up getting on a test server to test these changes please post feedback over here: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=155703

p.s. I have reports that the police on Duality are shooting everyone in High Sec... and that when they do you get GCC. So yea, we have given everyone what they wanted: A less safe High Sec. ENJOY!

Other than that, all the NPC in the belts, missions, complex, navies, pirate faction, empire faction, and any others I can find will get the newer Level One AI.

How is this going to affect the likes of Logistics ships in high end DED complexes? Are they going to get a lower target priority or are we going to have to roll even more people into the sites...

ME! HUNGRY!

And oh noes no more grabbing aggro and knowing my mining drones are safe!

Freakin Epic.

I've been wanting this for years! Thanks for being awesome. :)

Did i mention how awesome you are?

Edit: seems that i did

BRAIIIIIIINNNNNS BRAIIIINNNNSSSS

This is going to be soooooo much fun. I can already taste the sea of tears

Cool


Only AI, you won't make them stronger like those that use Level One AI atm (sleeper and incursion NPC) ???

p.s. How long will the sanshas try to invade the universe? forever?

A sea of tears over this... you should have seen what else we wanted the NPC to do.

Fantastic.

Also, this means AFK drone ship pilots will have to view their drones as an "ammo expense" much like other combat pilots.

Yeahy! No more boring missions, but wait? When I do missions solo in a Tengu, is there anything changing for me? I fly into the mission and fire my missiles until there is nothing left that was red and blinky...

Please, do it then. Hell, even the current sleeper AI is laughably easy.. I would love to see NPC AI become on par with player skill, therefore increasing the difficulty of missions..

will FW NPCs receive special treatment?

Special in what way? Why would we?

I suppose I will have to jump on the test server to see if this is true or not but here is my question. Will this mean that the NPCs will have an inverse targeting preference. Meaning that if a BS, BC, Cruiser, and Frig all warp into a site at the same time. Will the NPCs start targeting the frig first? Or will the targeting priorities be same class first then lower class if same class is not available? Like if there are no BC class npcs will the next target priority be a higher or lower class of ship?

I am interested to get on and play around with this a bit.

A sea of tears over this... you should have seen what else we wanted the NPC to do.

Maby they should kill low-Sp FW farming alts

What "did" you want to them to do?

Does the "attack ships of the same size as the NPC" apply to wh too?

Pods. Lots and lots of pod kills. That and I heard something about NPC's with cynos when someone bring a capital on the field.

On the point of Logi in DED complexes, again, this is just ramping up the amount of people you'll need in a site as one logi will no longer be enough, you'll need at least two, maybe three when neut towers, webs etc come into play, and don't get me started on level 4 missions where guristas can permajam a person for 10 minutes straight.

It forces people to work in groups, yes, but maybe it's reducing certain group work to lowest common denominator.

Hmm... not that I'm opposed to the idea, but it's going to make it a lot more difficult to bring newer players along on higher level missions. I remember a lot of my first involvement (and making ISK) in the game was running L4 missions with my corp, even though I could barely get through level 3s at the time, combined with the drake resistance nerf that's going to make getting into higher level missions a complete non-starter for a lot of newer players.

So yes, while it won't have that much of an effect on the solo mission grinder, it might actually run counter to introducing newer players. Gone will be the days of tanking a room with a Tengu while so a nooby corp member can get in and shoot at some NPCs in their first caracal or drake as they'd be insta-blaped by NPCs (presuming you don't have 2 or 3 other corp members who're also willing to come along in Scimis).

Be very warey. There's a lot of meta-play around current NPC aggression mechanics.

Will they pod?

No, I did not touch the sleepers. While it is true sleepers have the Level One AI, they have a version of it without any customization. The customization was added when we introduced Incursions.

I'm followed AI changes with some concern over the last couple years. Although my main can use just about every weapon system under the sun, I've always preferred drones because most people preferred missiles.

A little drone hate is nice to keep the drone pilots from falling asleep on missions, but too much drone hate completely invalidates them as a practical weapon system. That's why you see hoards of Drakes & Tengus and not many Ishtars/Myrmidons in Wormhole space.

What I keep wondering is if/when we'll start seeing some anti-missile systems aside from Defenders. There's Real-World examples of anti-missile systems, and numerous suggestions on the forums over the years. If all NPC's now are going to be more aggressive in targeting drones, then it's only logical they should be more aggressive with anti-missile defenses as well.

I tried man, I tried. :( Something about us losing subscribers or something about angering our players instead of making them happy.

Can you teach NPCs to suicide gank too? ty

Thank you FoxFour.

I love the changes. I hope this is just one of several to the NPC AI as it is very much in need of an overhaul. I had put up a discussion about making a few sites out in null to be more like incursion sites to break up the boorishness of running anoms but this is a great first step.

While we are talking about Brains. Can any of you comment about the brain in a box idea talked about at fan fest will we be seeing this in the winter to at a later date.

Special in what way? Why would we?

Ok, now that you are making normal NPC's more interesting. When are you going to finally make something that will make things fun for ratting in Capitals? There are plenty of people that rat in carriers in Null Sec, that are fighting waves of NPCs that can be taken out in a single battleship. When are we going to start to see NPC capitals on the field or new sites in 0.0 that will make things challenging for someone in a carrier again?

The horde sites in the drone regions used to be decent because you could pop all the bunkers and have enough NPC dps to actually threaten your carrier if you wernt careful. Now its just a joke. There are many missions where NPCs are building capitals but we never see them to shoot them. And for those who will moan at grinding NPC capital HP, you could always continue with the current easy mode sites.

Which brain in a box idea is this? I have heard of a few...

i suppose they have now jobs like defend the beacon, don't interfere with pvp etc while still being able to kill pve fitted sigtankers.
or am i wrong?

otherwise people will just use two alts to farm them. one to pull the npcs away and one to orbit the plex. (if they switch targets, switch jobs)

What about sites like Dread Guristas Fleet Staging Point 3?
There is a Guristas Fleet Stronghold that launches Citadel Torpedos every 30 seconds. It will obliterate any subcap support for the capital already required to tank it if it switches targets.
Or is it expected some sites become cap only?

Which brain in a box idea is this? I have heard of a few...

The one that was geared at our skill set causing lag when docking/undocking and jumping through gates.

What will happen to the risk reward balance of high, low and null sec NPCs?

Making NPCs harder sounds like fun but the extra time and effort required to kill them needs to be reflected in their value.

To be honest I am not familiar with this site and will have to test it.

I tried man, I tried. :( Something about us losing subscribers or something about angering our players instead of making them happy.

L1 AI in L4 missions? ... ahaha ... it'll be very bloody the first few weeks

This should not really make them that much harder to kill, actually it is not changing their tank or DPS at all. So killing time should not change.

To be honest we need to make our PvE content more enjoyable for everyone first. While this step will hopefully help, there is a lot more work to be done. Continuing the honesty I don't think the ratting capitals are our highest priority. Hopefully we can continue to make changes that effect most everyone though and not focus to much on one segment.

This should not really make them that much harder to kill, actually it is not changing their tank or DPS at all. So killing time should not change.

L1 AI in L4 missions? ... ahaha ... it'll be very bloody the first few weeks

As for the drones issue, you have a mechanism to save them (by re-calling and re-launching) but it's too archaic/clunky/fidgety for extended use.
Fix this and it'll alleviate some of the major issues facing drone boats. I propose an auto-recall function when drone hits a user specified amount of dmg but keep the launch/re-launch manual.

Edit: This also looks like another indirect nerf to L4 income if it changes L4 missioning in such a way that it affects the avg pilot's completion time.
The lessons from the incursion changes are still fresh in mind.

Why? IMO what makes Sleepers and (Incursion) Sansha more dangerous than the usual pirates are their stats: Speed, Health and Damage. That's nothing touched by just switching the underlying AI, considering most people run missions solo or in small groups only anyway. It might screw up people flying AFK drone boats, but at the same time it's something you shouldn't do anyway (why pay to play a game, when you don't even play then?).

Pods. Lots and lots of pod kills. That and I heard something about NPC's with cynos when someone brings a capital on the field.

To be honest one of my concerns is people abusing the target switching to take even less tank into the mission.

That is a typical response that I would expect from CCP by this point. I received the same type of answer when the drone regions lost drone alloys and they were not replaced with anything at all. "Right now we have better things to spend our time on than spend 1 day to create or copy a loot table." Just one more instance of making a good iteration on something and then leaving it done half arsed.

Capital pilots aside, since you are making changes to the AI again why can you not make an AI for NPC capitals and make some more interesting content? There are too few missions / complexes that require more that 1 person in a sub cap to complete.

Shift+R recalls drones... I do agree though that system needs some work.

And could lead to hilarity regarding ninja salvagers, canflippers and suicide gankers when the rats attack them...

thusly making Hi-Sec safer yet?


TIME WILL TELL!

We can adjust their hatred of drones though which is why we are asking for feedback when this hits a test server.

Q) Will NPCs do any new ewar?

A) No. Their actual weapons and effects will not be changing.

There are ways to tank this with a subcap ship you either need small sig and speed or a Command Ship or Heavy Dictor with logi support. I am sure there might be other ways but these are two ways to deal with this. The capital is just the quickest way as you have enough damage to kill it quickly.

Currently rats mostly use their EWAR at the start of the engagement and then only occasionally. Will they use their EWAR more? If so that will impact certain complexes and missions very heavily.

So basically you're nerfing nullsec personal income again.

Q) Will the NPC's switch targets now?
A) Yes, yes they will.

Q) Will NPC's kill my drones?
A) Yes, but they don't hate them nearly as much as sleepers. I ran 9 level 4 missions and lost 2 drones.

How is this nerfing nullsec income?

Excellent and long overdue!

As a part of this, has there been any thought to go through the NPCs and give them more GÇ£realGÇ¥ weapons? ECM was a classic case of the NPCs cheating but not using the ECM rules until that one was fixed, for instance, and while they may use the same hit and damage rules, a lot of rats still fire rather improbable weapons (150km torps, grid-wide webs and tracking disruptors, 90% webs, etc.).

After all, if the idea is for them to behave more like GǣrealGǥ enemies, taking away their h4x might be a good idea as wellGǪ

Special in what way? Why would we?

It makes exploration considerably harder (repping ships are more likely to die now). Most sites (which will, doubtless, not be redone) also rely on being able to carefully control aggression.

If you are a solo mission runner using turrets or missiles, this is a virtual non-change. It only impacts drone users and fleets.

What about sites like Dread Guristas Fleet Staging Point 3?
There is a Guristas Fleet Stronghold that launches Citadel Torpedos every 30 seconds. It will obliterate any subcap support for the capital already required to tank it if it switches targets.
Or is it expected some sites become cap only?

You're more than welcome. If possible we would love to get some feedback from people testing this on the test server. While we are working fast to make changes and we are testing this stuff internally there is only so much testing we can do. That and you guys always find ways to break our ****. :/

It makes exploration considerably harder (repping ships are more likely to die now). Most sites (which will, doubtless, not be redone) also rely on being able to carefully control aggression.

Right, precisely this. The result is less incentive to live in nullsec which is the opposite direction CCP should be going.




Except wormhole pilots have access to far higher incomes and are working together, whereas the stuff we're talking about is solo content. Two completely different things.

After all, if the idea is for them to behave more like GǣrealGǥ enemies, taking away their h4x might be a good idea as wellGǪ

A sea of tears over this... you should have seen what else we wanted the NPC to do.

Except wormhole pilots have access to far higher incomes and are working together, whereas the stuff we're talking about is solo content. Two completely different things.

It makes exploration considerably harder (repping ships are more likely to die now). Most sites (which will, doubtless, not be redone) also rely on being able to carefully control aggression.

Our ultimate goal is that PvP and PvE fits should be the same and a lot of the thought process should be the same. That is... a long way off though.

This is going to ruin the standard plexing setup in 0.0. Now you are going to have to have ships that can tank the site on their own which will mean lower dps and end up means taking more time to complete. I hope you are going to increase something to compensate for this, higher bounties on rats or a better drop rate of deadspace mods. It is going to be near on impossible to do the higher end plexes that require over a certain amount of dps unless you bring a fleet of friends with you but when the drop occurs it wont be worth peoples time as the share will be so low. In the end people are going to stop doing them and the price of deadspace loot is going to sky rocket. I can see the need to increase the rats AI but doing this will have a serious impact on peoples ability to earn isk on their own. I could see people unsubbing accounts over this I am afraid as they just wont be able to afford to keep them if they are paying by PLEX.

Logistics ships do generate a lot of threat as far as the NPC are concerned and will probably switch to them pretty quick. As for exactly how this will change your strategies, well that we shall have to wait and see.

This is one of the reasons we are trying to get this out on the test server now and feedback on it. What we actually hope happens, due to ships wanting to kill ships of their own size, is that newer players can come along in frigates and deal with the frigate NPCs.

As for the Logi question, this will take a lot of testing. We were still able to complete missions internally with a single logistics ship, it took some effort but we did it.

To be honest I am not familiar with this site and will have to test it.

If this change applies to the npc stations and rats at the end of 10/10 and 9/10 complex, those plexes just became totally undoable. EVERY plex strategy in plexes with the "super torps" revolves around getting "boss aggro' to the one ship fit to tank the torp.

I can't imagine how you'd do a Blood Raider 10/10 now.

To be honest one of my concerns is people abusing the target switching to take even less tank into the mission.

I can't imagine how you'd do a Blood Raider 10/10 now.

Can defenders kill citadels? If so, that might suddenly have a use for the aggroed ship.

A sea of tears over this... you should have seen what else we wanted the NPC to do.

This should not really make them that much harder to kill, actually it is not changing their tank or DPS at all. So killing time should not change.

Smartbombs can ;-)

Our ultimate goal is that PvP and PvE fits should be the same and a lot of the thought process should be the same. That is... a long way off though.

Let's pretend I stopped caring about running beltrats or anoms in nullsec years ago because the effort/reward ratio made running L4s in hisec a better proposition. Why should this make it worth it, to me, to move my isk-making char back to nullsec?

Shift+R recalls drones... I do agree though that system needs some work. We will be keeping an eye on the income generated from L4 missions as we do have graphs and statistics for this. :)

My ignorance is showing, but I'll risk the nudity:

Can defenders kill citadels? If so, that might suddenly have a use for the aggroed ship.

Our ultimate goal is that PvP and PvE fits should be the same and a lot of the thought process should be the same. That is... a long way off though.

This is one of the reasons we are trying to get this out on the test server now and feedback on it. What we actually hope happens, due to ships wanting to kill ships of their own size, is that newer players can come along in frigates and deal with the frigate NPCs.

Forcing us to basically bring a gang of logistics or spider tanking battleships just to do high level DEd plexes is a big nerf.

The NPCs across eve might be the same, but the situations you find them in is not. While this might be a minor nusiance in a lvl 4, it becomes a game ending nightmare in the monster DED complexs that ALREADY damn near require at least dual boxing to complete.

This is the problem with the "broad brush" approach (don't get me started on what another part of CCP is thinking of doing with Heavy Missiles lol), change one thing, screw 10 others, PLEASE consider this carefully.

Or, take citadel torps out of DED plexes and just add more npc ships. Some of us REALLY don't want to have to avoid DEd plex escalations because of this.

I think its great the AI will be updated, but if you are going to require us to manage our drones more, it would only be appropriate that the drones interface/control get an upgrade, especially for pilots of gallente ships who depend on drones as a primary damage source.

As it stands, the drones interface is not in any way intuitive, and anyone who doesnt do the gallente intro missions won't even know drones exist, much less how to control them properly.

And even experienced pilots all agree the drones interface needs an upgrade. Either make the new AI not target drones, or update the interface.

Just my 2 cents.

I do welcome the AI change, and hope it turns out well. But if it needs to be postponed until the appropriate systems are in place for it to be optimized, then so be it.

Edit:
The other caveat I do have is that... depending on the AI's predilection for changing targets, this could make it significantly harder for a new player in a salvage boat to participate in higher level missions.

Not that salvaging is necessarily the most compelling gameplay, or that missions are either.... but it would most likely relegate them to coming in after the mission is over and not even getting to see the action.

It's easy, all ships just have to be able to tank the torp, deal dmg, rr and not be dependent on cap.

...oh wait....

So you say, there are DED Plexes that are soloable, but only very tight and are very close to requiring at least 2 chars in it and are stating that these plexes won't be doable solo anymore if the new AI hits TQ?

Well, according to the Dev-Blog, the NPCs will get a target switching AI. They will still have the same dps, speed, optimals, tank, ewar. So ... If doable solo before the change, i can imagine no reason why it wouldn't be doable solo after the patch. For one Pilot doing the site, nothing changes unless you rely heavily on drones.

To be honest I am not familiar with this site and will have to test it.

[...] the only thing missions teach you about EWAR is that you can feed your capacitor indefinitely by pointing a NOS at a nearby rat. [...]

That one with aggroing drones is not good.
Let's say i have a ship which only has drones like carrier... or dominix on which all high slots are used for ulility..
If npc's kill all of my drones then scramble me i can't warp out and i can just sit there indefinitely can't warp out, can't do nothing.


I support this change but please program npc's to leave drones alone.

Tested 2 weeks ago in a curse. Does not work.


@ Jenn aSide:

Allright, I've never done the highend plexes before. But maybe the solution will be not to bring a Logi and T3s, but to bring spidering Battleships. I could see a bunch of Sins (reliying on drones lol) performing ... acceptable. Marauder Gangs. Or the fact that 9/10 and 10/10 are no longer designed for one or two guys multiboxing, but as a Fleet-PvE adventure much like Incursions. Share the wealth ;)

Or yeah, adjusting the Sites to new AI in terms of DPS might also be a good idea.

Standard combat pilots have ammo costs ( excluding t1 crystals ). Drone pilots will now have ammo costs.

FYI, drone launch button would actually be pretty easy to implement

The current issue (I assume, at least) is "how do you decide what drones to launch when the hotkey is pressed"

The solution is simple -- allow us to drag a drone group onto the hotbar. Then, the existing [ctrl|alt] F1-F8 keys can be used to launch drones, removing any ambiguity in the command.

It's not really the same is it? Rats don't kill missile launchers, when you kill a drone you're removing DPS entirely from the fit. The only way to lose DPS on a missile boat is to run out of ammo. If not perfectly balanced you could lose your whole DPS from a drone wing in minutes.

Now, i don't agree with this part, a carrier can mount smart bombs and neuts, hell I've ECM-bursted my way out of level 5s in a carrier before just to see if I could do it.

The problem I have with switching aggro to drones is just the shear tediousness of having to do it over and over again. That's not fun, pve should at least be somewhat enjoyable.

We'll see how it pans out.

Let me tell you why I will quit this game if this changes will go live:

I play eve since 2004 and I am not a big fan of gangs, fleets etc.
Because this game is sandbox, it gives us free choice what to do. My choice is SOLO, period, and here's why it will kill 95% of my fun:

I do fly Assaults and other small ships ships in null / low sec. to catch belt, anomaly, mission hunters on small ships and then kill them when they don't pay enough attention to local and d-scan. Now, killing drakes, ravens, dominixes and other hunter will be impossible on small ships, because I won't have enough time to kill them before NPC's will trim me off.

Or be a non-drone combat pilot that is ECM jammed 30 seconds at a time (possibly until your tank snaps), dampened and webbed to under 4k lock range (no point in having turrets for some situations), and similar scenarios.

good work.. it will cover "player drone ai" too, wont it?

To be honest I am not familiar with this site and will have to test it.

Wait, WHAT? I totally missed this.

You're thinking about making changes to content you're not personally familiar with?

In a game as big and as complex as a MMORPG noone can know everything. I've played Dark Age of Camelot for 7 years and yet I only knew about one third of all contents.

NPCs switching targets in some of the more difficult complexes is going to be troublesome for sure.
I know lots of folks rely on being able to manage who the structures/npcs are shooting at.

Sites like

• The Maze (final room)
• Dread Guristas fleet staging point (final stage)
• No Quarter (final stage)

put out an astronomical amount of DPS. A dedicated tanking ship is usually required.

The tank-ship (often a pimped-out Tengu or a capital ship) typically sacrifices dps for tank.
The high-skilled tengu-tanker takes the aggro and lower-skilled players warp in with whatever dps ships they have.

Managing who that structure fires its Citadel Torps or Siege Railguns Batteries at is pretty key.

It is going to be interesting to see how this works out. We're going to have to come up with new techniques on the double.
Hopefully it won't lock lower-skilled players out of participating in these harder plexes entirely.

On a related note: Along with the heavy missile dps nerf this is another hit to nullsec player income. We could sure use an isk buff out here!

Our ultimate goal is that PvP and PvE fits should be the same and a lot of the thought process should be the same. That is... a long way off though.

Right, precisely this. The result is less incentive to live in nullsec which is the opposite direction CCP should be going.

In a game as big and as complex as a MMORPG noone can know everything. I've played Dark Age of Camelot for 7 years and yet I only knew about one third of all contents.

Also, they don't claim these changes are final, nor that they've tested them everywhere. They especially asked us to test these, because we might play completely different, do different things, etc.

These feedback threads are there fore such things. See something the devs didn't think about? Tell them about it and they'll most likely be happy to look at it.

Modifying a game like Eve it's impossible to keep every possible mission, constellation, etc. in mind. It's just astronomically (pun intended).

But isn't the real key of carefully controlling aggression something that should be based on observing the behaviour of the opponent and adjusting your behaviour to suit?

Not just carefully observe the opponents behaviour over a couple of runs and set down a strict tactic that will always work for a given scenario?

I do agree that it will be harder to grind out isk in null by using a well established tactic, but it will at the same time also be harder to grind out isk using a well established tactic everywhere.

However, I do think that forcing people to engage their brain to grind out isk instead of following a given manual is a good thing.

I just tested rattlesnake with heavy drones on DUALITY .. i lost all my drones then got scrambled and couldn't do s*it.
With cruise missiles / torpedoes you can't kill scrambling frigates so i am stuck.
I can just sit back and relax.

I just tested rattlesnake with heavy drones on DUALITY .. i lost all my drones then got scrambled and couldn't do s*it.
With cruise missiles / torpedoes you can't kill scrambling frigates so i am stuck.
I can just sit back and relax.

Hmm, just had a similar result with a Rattler, some adjustment in tactics will be needed ;)

But scrambling rats tend to die quite fast to a flight of light drones.

And with 400m3 drone bay one can carry more than one set of drones.

Its almost like you could add a target painter and a web to a Rattlesnake to make killing tackling frigates easier

When npc's are 70km away... it's hard to recall drones faster, so you loose all heavy drones.

Hmm, just had a similar result with a Rattler, some adjustment in tactics will be needed ;)

But scrambling rats tend to die quite fast to a flight of light drones.

And with 400m3 drone bay one can carry more than one set of drones.

Every mission is the same so what is the point of adding new missions

Well new tactic is to dump rattlesnake / dominix and train for another more usefull ship.
Rattlesnake / Dominix becomes obsolete.

Well right now on the test server they are just killing everything and if you fight back CONCORD smacks you. So we at least tried this. Turns out most our players don't like it.

So if i get stuck like that on TQ ... can i petition GM to "unstuck me" ?

Drone boats desperately need a way to launch drones with a hotkey. And not just a "Hey CCP pick some random drones and throw them into space! Heavy armor maintenance I's and a EV-900? Solid choices!" crap shoot like you get executing "Launch" on the root of the drone tree, but the ability to assign different hotkeys to different drone groups.

This is something that should have been done years ago, but being as we're apparently dead set on making cycling drones an exciting new facet of the engaging PvE experience a new flavor of tedium in a never-ending, soul-crushingly dull grind I'd say it now rates as pretty critical.

you're trapped and out of luck.