Ally-Neutral-Enemy mechanism in TDS (or city battles). - by 242
242 on 5/11/2006 at 14:00
Yesterday I experimented a bit with city battles just because it was quite funny, and I wanted to know more about how those sudden bursts of angriness amongst various factions function and here is what I discovered. I think TDS AIs are really well developed, at least they're more sophisticated than T1/2 ones that's for sure (the fact that they don't cheat, don't see 'hugwalled' Garrett, relatively quickly give up searching procedure doesn't mean that the AI is bad). Well, to the mechanism:
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1) It seems each TDS AI deems all other AIs + Garrett either Enemy, Ally or Neutral. For City Watch and Bandits it's like this:
City Watch Allies: City Watch, Citizens
City Watch Enemies: Garrett
City Watch Neutrals: Bandits
Bandits Allies: Bandits.
Bandits Enemies: -
Bandits Neutrals: Garrett, Citizens, City Watch
2) If AI finds a body of allied AI, the first neutral it sees WHILE it's in the most alarm state (weapon is drawn) becomes enemy.
If AI finds a body of neutral or enemy AI, it becomes alarmed but doesn't attack neutrals.
AIs never attack allies if they find a body.
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Using these 'rules' you can easily understand and foresee actions of AIs when they fight on streets.
F.e. - City Watch AI finds dead gemcutter (he is Citizen and therefore allied AI), if it sees a Bandit (neutral AI) while still in the alarm state, it attacks the Bandit. If Bandit kills City Watch and another City Watch appears on street and sees the body and a Bandit while still in the alarm state, he attacks the Bandit etc. etc.
Istvan Varga on 5/11/2006 at 14:17
However, once I got attacked by some City Watch guards in Auldale, and lured them into the park with the pagans, to see if they attack the guards (I was allied with both hammers and pagans). It took a while, but eventually the guards and pagans did fight; what is interesting is that later I have become an enemy of one particular pagan, even though I did not do anything that would explain that. I think it happened because of finding a dead pagan - killed by the City Watch, but then it means that the AI may indeed become hostile to allies when finding a body.
242 on 5/11/2006 at 14:31
Quote Posted by Istvan Varga
However, once I got attacked by some City Watch guards in Auldale, and lured them into the park with the pagans, to see if they attack the guards (I was allied with both hammers and pagans). It took a while, but eventually the guards and pagans did fight;
City Watch will never fight Pagans without reason (Pagans are Neutrals for City Watch. If they attacked pagans there certainly was a reason for that (f.e. they found a body of ally - city watch or citizen- either in the park OR before park and in the park something put them in the alarm state [noise arrow f.e.])
Quote:
what is interesting is that later I have become an enemy of one particular pagan, even though I did not do anything that would explain that. I think it happened because of finding a dead pagan - killed by the City Watch, but then it means that the AI may indeed become hostile to allies when finding a body.
May be your status changed to Neutral for them by that time? Then it's understandable why they attacked you. If you're sure that you still was ally for them and they attacked you after finding an ally's body, then Garrett's fraction status must be independent from the general ally-neutral-enemy system...
Istvan Varga on 5/11/2006 at 14:43
Quote Posted by 242
City Watch will never fight Pagans without reason (Pagans are Neutrals for City Watch. If they attacked pagans there certainly was a reason for that (f.e. they found a body of ally - city watch or citizen- either in the park OR before park)
Well, I read somewhere that if I ally with pagans or hammers, they will become hostile to those characters that they see attacking me. So, I wanted to see if this is true. While I do not know for sure if the guards never saw a body earlier, I surely did not blackjack/kill anyone in the pagan area, and did not even use a weapon in any way. In fact, the fight between the pagans and City Watch did not begin immediately, only after some time of running around in the park with the guards chasing after me.
Quote:
May be your status changed to Neutral for them by that time? Then it's understandable why they attacked you..
No, I was 100% allied with both the pagans and the hammers, and, as already mentioned, I did not attack anyone, used weapons, or stole anything in the pagan area. It just happened that one single pagan became hostile for some reason.
RavynousHunter on 12/11/2006 at 00:38
kind of the same way i have one Ordinator in Morrowind who wont NOT try to kill me, even when im not a criminal or wearing Ordinator armor. I think the reason may lie in the code for the spawn point of the NPC itself. If the AI settings are altered in respect to one instance of a particular NPC, when it respawns after death, it may retain that "disposition."
least thats my take on it.
