AI Combat Issue:

[Derrick]

.. it will ONLY agress (or in the case of healers, res) you when you walk from x to x-1 tiles from the aggress point. teleporting into the "aggressive" area of a deamon will stop it from doing this.

Excelent synopsis. This is true, the source of this behavior is a specific OSI script attached to daemons only.

[Pirul]

I assume you include balrons in the "deamons" class, cuz those bastards sure have a short attention span!

[Faust]

That definitely explains a lot for the change in the deamon behavior since last playing.

Hope the issues with the z axis problems gets figured out now.

[rouss]

Also, I've noticed something: EV only attack a monster it was summoned close to. After it's dead, it does absolutely nothing, but wander. I think it should attack other monsters in the area as well?

I haven't been barding for almost a year and I don't remember this being the case - EVs switched their attention to the other monsters when their primary target has died. Am I right?

[Faust]

The AI change to EVs was based on era accurate information in that regard. The EVs/BSs will occassionally not attack after done fighting but have seen them attack in some cases. This particular change a year or so ago was based on the special AI script from the demo giving them that function. However, something is definitely wrong if this continuation of the Z axis was affected in conjuction with this patch.

Would you be able to confirm that this is an unattended bug and will eventually be fixed Derrick?

[Derrick]

Aye, I also believe it's correct that they should be attacking in this situation. The change in this behavior is indeed related to the application of the OSI AI which is the explaination for the change that Rouss reported, whihc be belive to be correct behavior. They may attack oter monsters/NPC's if they bump into them.

[rouss]

The AI change to EVs was based on era accurate information in that regard. The EVs/BSs will occassionally not attack after done fighting but have seen them attack in some cases. This particular change a year or so ago was based on the special AI script from the demo giving them that function. However, something is definitely wrong if this continuation of the Z axis was affected in conjuction with this patch.

Would you be able to confirm that this is an unattended bug and will eventually be fixed Derrick?

I've been barding all day today, and I can attest this behavior is not occasional, but rather constant.

It certainly wasn't this way on OSI. I mean, you could pull an EV and sit in invis while it cuts through the monsters. Now, once it's done, it just wanders around or attacks you. It seems that recent patches made EVs/BSs' players its primary targets, while on OSI they were "neutral" and attacked other creatures as well.

The normal routine on UOSA comes down to this: you recall to Yew liches, cast EV, cast Invis and wait. Once it kills one lich, it starts to wander. You dispel it (because it attacks you, rather than visible monsters), and cast another one to kill the next lich and so forth. This is absurd and not era accurate to my recalling. As I remember it: when EV killed its target, it stopped for a bit as if it was really thinking who to attack and then rushing to kill another target. Now it just loiters around.

I dont have any concrete evidence rather than my word, unfortunately. Although I dare to say I have a good track record spotting these inaccuracies

Regarding Faust's issue there's this post on newsgroups: https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.gam ... gmwjSyrMIJ

Exploiting monster AI IS casting EV on a ledge while a lich lord cannot
fight back. Exploiting monster AI is NOT casting EV on a hill where
the lich lord can easily fight the EV and dispell it if he chooses to.

If what you are saying was exploiting then ANYONE with ANY high
skill in archery would be an exploiter since they only to gain is from
hitting high HP targets from a hill or other safe location.

"Attacking monsters from a boat is exploiting!!!"

OMG, gimmie a break!!!

Also from newsgroups:

Well, the caster either ran the daemon out of mana, or otherwise used
that "different level" exploit (EV is next to monster, but on a
different level, does damage to monster, but monster can't see to cast
at it) in order to prevent the monster from dispelling the EV. If not,
then these fearsome creatures were actually beaten by poison.
Personally, I wish them spellcasting monsters would cure themselves
every so often....

[Faust]

lol, well my word use should not be taken heavily in this instance... definitely happens more than occassionally that they do not attack.

There is no doubt in my mind that they should be attacking/hitting from a different Z axis. However, the information you just provided pretty much clarifies it up entirely. This tells us something is not working properly with the implementation of the AI script that made them function in the manner of requiring placement precission. I'm not really going to try and argue the patch that made them function in this manner since a lot of the evidence does point to the fact that they should be functioning this way but to what extent/degree is definitely questionable in my opinion. There is something not right with it on the attacking/hitting/damage end of things.


What lead to the changes based on my understanding is pretty simple. The script from the demo functions in the manner it does on UOSA now and it was based on this information. If the script changed from that point on there would have been some information on the change. However, the only mention of it ever changing was this UOR patch. Furthermore, some additional information provided for the change was mentioned on these forums by me and others in the past that was based from UOPowergamers.

^ top-Some official EV & BS news.
[Eric] July 25 - 6:06 PM EDT


Adrick also posted:

Im taking the feedback here seriously and I just concluded a test on the Lake Superior shard. I created a normal lich, I set its mana to 0. I then at 100 magery cast 1 energy vortex and it imeddiately attacked the lich - I timed it in 29 seconds the lich was dead and the energy vortex was the slightest sliver harmed.

Yes there were changes to the energy vortex spell as I detailed in several posts.

1] They now actually fight an enemy in that they can hit or miss.
2] They no longer spend extra cycles evaluating targets - they chose a target and fight it thus reducing lag mostly on the dungeon servers where these spells are common.
3] They no longer poison.

A lich is a mid level creature so my information about the relative strength of EV vs mid to high mid creatures was correct.

Thanks Adrick - I'm glad OSI actually takes the time to report the results of the changes they make. What sucks? EVs no longer poison. Aside from poison though, they seem to maintain their usual strength. If anyone does any further tests (ex. see how EVs/BS's work on cyclops or ogre lords), drop me a line.

Honestly, the script that makes them function oddly in this manner is era accurate in my opinion... but something is not right invovling it that makes them attack/hit/damage, etc... that could be related to a possible LOS or range bug.