[Guide] Fixing Your Sentinel's Ai - Especially Dethcube.

[Arsonide]

This is a guide regarding sentinel AI. It applies mostly to Dethcube for reasons I will explain, but it should also apply to Wyrm and Shade.

I noticed that my Dethcube was shooting at things until they died, before reacquiring a new target, and shooting at it until it died...etc. This caused it to rarely use Vaporize, which is a great skill. The only time it vaporized anything was in the millisecond time span between shooting things - even if things were meleeing my face. I thought it was stupid, and that it should vaporize the minute anything gets within five feet of me, and shoot when it has nothing better to do. That's when I learned something.

The sentinels have a priority list of which skills they use at what times. This is EXTREMELY IMPORTANT and not very apparent in the UI. Essentially, the higher ranked skills are more important, and the lower ranked ones it does whenever it has nothing better to do. Each point on the list corresponds to a power slot in the corner of the sentinel's powers. If you have your sentinel's attack AI card in the top left corner, it gets HIGHEST PRIORITY, meaning things like saving your life with Guardian are only done when it's not shooting something. Shooting is more important. On Dethcube this is particularly bad, because it's gun never stops firing while something is in range, while the others stop occasionally.

I made an image to illustrate this point more clearly: http://s22.postimg.org/3n6m2o3ox/sentinel_Priority.png

You will notice in my image, the correct setup has Guardian FIRST, because my life is more important than anything. Then I put vaporize, because it is the sentinel's active skill. Then Regen, though I imagine this could also be last, since the sentinel isn't firing when it is dead. Lastly, I put the attack AI card. My sentinel now vaporizes the second anything gets near me, and only attacks while vaporize is on cooldown. I also expect I'll be getting more shield refills from now on.

TLDR: Sentinels have a priority queue. Do not put your attack AI card in the top left corner, or your sentinel will perform sub-optimally...especially if it is Dethcube. This has been a public service announcement by Arsonide.

Edited May 30, 2013 by Arsonide

[Blyr]

Oh wow, that's fantastic, so glad someone figured this out!

 

This should be stickied.

[Quetzhal]

Holy - the sentinels have that much depth to them? All of the yes.

This is awesome. Thank you for sharing.

[Theodorick]

Thank you, this is great indeed.

 

+1 for sticky thread.

[Shion963]

My shade has Ghost, Regen, Guardian, Revenge. No wonder it doesn't heal itself as often, it prioritises in HIDING me rather than HEALING ITSELF!

 

OP should get a Platinum medal for figuring this out!

[Dilbe]

This is very nice to know!

[Zurakci]

Being able to decide where skills should be sounds awesome. Prioritise skills on sentinels is even better. Cause I need my Wyrn to do more of the shockwave thingy rather than not giving literally a flying F about anything.

[MetalGerbil]

i think regen always triggers regardless of where you put it.

ive always had it in the lowest slot. never gave me any problems. same for guardian. only time it never triggers for me is when its on cooldown.

[Nuko_Miko]

Yup Yup :D

Like them priorities :D

Thanks for sharing

[Arsonide]

i think regen always triggers regardless of where you put it.

ive always had it in the lowest slot. never gave me any problems. same for guardian. only time it never triggers for me is when its on cooldown.

Regen will always trigger, because the sentinel can't fire when it's dead. Regen does not heal your sentinel's HP, it brings it back from the dead.

Edited May 28, 2013 by Arsonide

[Namacyst]

Regen does not heal your sentinel's HP, it brings it back from the dead.

Wrong. It's called Regen not Revive. When your Sentinel drops to a HP level where the next hit would kill it Regen will trigger and replenish Sentinel's HP so it won't die. You will see a Green glow when it does. Sentinels don't explode and then come back.. that's not how Regen works.

Edited May 28, 2013 by Namacyst

[MetalGerbil]

Wrong. It's called Regen not Revive. When your Sentinel drops to a HP level where the next hit would kill it Regen will trigger and replenish Sentinel's HP so it won't die. You will see a Green glow when it does. Sentinels don't explode and then come back.. that's not how Regen works.

this. ive only ever seen a conflict with dethcube. i never noticed it on my shade because i always had ghost first. so it never gave me problems.

but i did have dethcube not use his vaporize. only realized the conflict when somebody made a post about it. now it works great.

going to try and test with shields and his attack mod. get myself low and see if it wont heal my shields. but i think shield boost and regen are both highest priority, regardless of placement. not sure about shields tho, need to test.

[sGs.salp]

Nice one, this might also affect the problem a lot of people (including myself) had with the Wyrm not wanting to stun.

 

Great work finding this out and thanks for sharing.

Edited May 28, 2013 by sGs.salp

[Arsonide]

Wrong. It's called Regen not Revive. When your Sentinel drops to a HP level where the next hit would kill it Regen will trigger and replenish Sentinel's HP so it won't die. You will see a Green glow when it does. Sentinels don't explode and then come back.. that's not how Regen works.

Ah, well then I learned two things today. You will want Regen to be second priority in that case, as the time span to cast that before he dies sounds very brief.

[Loser_Prime]

Thanks, you've just made everyone's lives much better.

[rlro]

Congrats for discovering and sharing this.

[d1ru]

this is going to be amazingly helpful

[Reamar]

This is super helpful, thanks for sharing!

[DarkStyle]

Can only heap praise on you for this discovery, as everyone before me. It's kinda inconceivable though, that it took months until someone figured this out. 

Edited May 28, 2013 by DarkStyle

[Elendien]

I thank you for going through the trouble of figuring this out, but on a more important note, thank you for sharing it with the community. This will be a huge help to many looking to increase their performance with their sentinel and I know I will personally use this from now on.

[kLai]

Does this mean I'll actually be able to see my sentinel regenerate?

+1 for sticky :D

[MexicanCatFarm]

+1 for sticky

[Kantazo]

To the OP thanks very much for the info, now a question is this setup all work for weapons? I mean the 1,2,3,4 order of use of abilities? Like if I want my damage from my shotgun to cause, (in my case I have fire damage, ice damage etc) certain damage before the other, sort of a cycle like fire first then ice etc

[Tazmanyak]

Thank you!

Now, time to play with sentinels skills prioritizing ^^

[Centaur]

You sir win warframe.