Giving Your Enemies Depth And Flavor.

[Onite]

I want to address something that really determines most of the game. And thats the enemies.

Right now they just dont have much flavor or style. They all feel the same and have about as much AI as a cockroach.

 

-(I fully understand that "This is a beta" And that essentially means the game is still a "work in progress" But that doesnt mean you can waive any and all things that can be improved upon or changed at all for the better so the game becomes a better experience. In fact this is the entire point of a beta is later stage game development by developers based on feedback from the players. And this is exactly what i'm doing. So please stop yelling "ITS BETA" as a red card to stop people from giving feedback that the developers themselves need.)-

 

The grineer and Corpus henchmen both seem to all have the same AI. The only depth there is to them is that they use cover briefly, only to just pop out from behind it moments later, fully exposed, pointlessly standing in place.

The MOA all just charge at you and then just stand there like deer in headlights. Casually blasting energy at you.

The infested all just charge at you. Which is fine because they're hive mind pawn zombie sort of things. But even then, their attacks are very bland. They just get point blank and just start slapping your &#!, rinse and repeat.

 

I'm going to use a pre existing game that i myself and alot of you probably found extremely fun: Halo 1: Combat Evolved.

The campaign in that game was very fun because the AI for the enemies was extremely complex for its time. The AI would interact with their environments, cooperate with their friendly AI depending on their type.

 

This could greatly make the difficulty of warframe increase for the better without actually having to jack up the base numbers of stats like an RPG for the difficulty we have right now. Difficulty could instead consist of a formula of enemies that work well together or on their own instead of just: "Lvl1 50 hp.   Lvl 2 100 hp" Because the level 50 enemies you fight end game are the exact same as the level 1 enemies you fought at the beginning of the game. And if your equipment matches their level, nothing has changed and you feel like you're in the exact same spot again on Mercury on Terminus.

 

Let me paint an example of what i'm imagining. On a level 10 mission against the grineer, you start encountering enemies you havent seen before, Ones that are very good at using cover to get closer to you so they can start mowing you down with a Boar (auto shotgun.) This way, the farther you progress through the systems, the more interesting your enemies will become and give you more of a challenge. You'll much more enjoy playing through the game casually instead of farming. The grineer in general would also be aware of their own numbers and fall back into tighter areas when they're losing, Or stronger less common enemies could become extremely aggressive and come after you when they're the last one standing. The advanced grineer types should be in comparison to the elites from halo: They're better at dodging gunfire, quicker to react to your movements, just more combat effective than your grunt lancers. Not necessarily just have more health. Bullet sponges are not fun. They're a pain to deal with and expensive on ammo. Bosses suffer from this effect as well, they're not challenging to combat, just annoying to endure for long periods of time. It would also be great for the grineer/crewman to attempt to slide or jump or get out of the way of threats like ember's bombs, volt's lightning field, etc. (Notice i said try, not "always succeed".)

 

As for specific factions, like the corpus MOA. I think they should become alittle less numerous in encounters than crewman, but most sophisticated. Basically, they're a pair of robotic legs. Having them do things like kick you if you get close, jump on top of things in the environment constantly, or run quickly to get around you to flank you.

Seeing as the Corpus are more of a utility technology race, fighting them should feel different from the grineer. They usually have cameras and turrets in their tilesets. While this is annoying, it could either be replaced or go in conjuction with things like corpus only manual turrets and sort of vehicles that can be destroyed even while not in use.Maybe even manually controlled pods that when the controls are occupied, spit out moa or special moa at a high rate. But only found in corpus setting tilesets. (Or brought in during a corpus invasion.)

 

The infested could use a much wider array of attacks. Some of this is already there but is poorly executed. Like a bull like rush from ancients. You would imagine you could easily dodge this attack but are punished badly if hit. But instead the ancients outrun you at lower levels while having the precision of a cruise missile. (Toxic ancients often one hit kill.)

There is nothing fun about that because its often times just a raw luck chance of survival instead of involving a learning curve and or strategy in order to get away. Corpus runners tend to jump at you but the distance is extremely short for them to engage the jump, This event in the AI also doesnt trigger as much as it should and even when it does, its a very long process before it hits you for minimal damage. The improvements that could be done here are pretty obvious.

 

The difficulty of warframe doesnt have to be, and shouldnt be, just raw numbers. Depth of difficulty in enemy complexity is the key point providing you with countless hours of fun just exploring your enemies you come across with the fights you have. I dont feel like anything i've addressed is impossible or far fetched. Its a very reasonable facet for the potential of DE to step up and polish to really make Warframe from a good game, into the best game.

[LoRDxDeMoN]

But they just recently added more depth and flavor: you can sever enemy limbs.

Edited April 30, 2013 by LoRDxDeMoN

[darkone96]

Devs are too busy making hats for the game instead of fixing it. Too bad they won't listen to you.

[[DE]Steve]

Devs are too busy making hats for the game instead of fixing it. Too bad they won't listen to you.

False. TF2 has this covered, we're working on mitten cosmetics!

[[DE]Steve]

As to the post: yes, AI depth is a concern. Right now the focus is on adding depth to bosses first and working toward the enemies. I do wonder if having more interesting relationships between simple enemies (e.g. shield drone) is better than focusing on a single unit's behavior or subtle ("Fallback") but I agree with you. Generally short-lived enemies don't have a lot of space to be interesting so it needs to be pretty one-note. Right now they are too homogeneous though.

[SFkenny]

The Corpus MOA units certainly remind me of Gekko enough already. If they started jumping around S#&$ would get crazy.

 

Improved tactics for the Grineer would be nice. I did notice how soldiers like to use the shield soldiers as mobile cover. That's a nice touch and more interactions and cooperation between squadmates would be good for the AI.

 

Glad to see DESteve is on top of things and looking at our feedback. It's always nice to be heard at the dev studios. :)

Edited April 30, 2013 by SFkenny

[LoRDxDeMoN]

I actually noticed that the Grineer would begin to close in and swarm my Rhino as my shields deplete, but then would fall back as I pop Adamantium Skin. Is that how they're programmed or is that just a coincidence?

[Slaskia]

I only have one real suggestion for this to add a bit of 'character' to the 'grunts' of the enemy factions.  Namely have them more 'aware' of their environment.

 

For instance, have them stop and inspect a broken crate/opened locker a tenno stealthly broke in: perhaps a VO like 'who did this?' or 'Hey, who took my lunch!?' (obviously this one would be only for unalerted enemies).

 

During hull breaches, the (living) enemies should panic, especially those that don't have a full helmet (infested probably wouldn't care, tbh).

 

Just a couple of ideas.