[3.1] enemies on potd are being pulled too easily?

[thelee]

On 3.1, people are finding it more likely that when you aggro one enemy, you may end up pulling several rooms worth of enemies on PotD: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/106547-any-thoughts-on-post-31-potd-balance/page-2?do=findComment&comment=2110445

 

At first I thought this was part of the mid-late game rebalancing mentioned in the 3.1 patch notes, but the above linked thread talks about this happening in the sea cave at Vilario's Rest, which makes me wonder if this is actually a bug?

 

List of examples from that thread:

1. Fighting beetles in sea cave results in skeletons and other mobs from the far right being pulled in (?? intentional or not??). Used to be distinct encounters.

2. Ashen Maw Jagged Keep (the one where the altar to Magran is), aggroing the first rathun going up the main corridor results in pulling every rathun in that main central corridor in each room. (Whereas pre-3.1, even on Berath's Challenge mode, while I wouldn't leave combat after clearing one room, I had to manually run up into the next room to pull more enemies.)

3. Kapanga Palace Second Floor during "The Final Maneuver"-- every single enemy on this floor gets pulled into the fight.

 

Would be helpful to get a confirmation yay or nay on intended behavior.

[thelee]

Even if it is intended, it seems to render Berath's Challenge partly redundant. What does it matter if combat won't end if enemies are still nearby if every enemy and their friend is already charging into your fight.

Edited October 29, 2018 by thelee

[thelee]

Some more examples added from that thread:

 

4. The Drake fight at the Engwithan Dig Site. Every creature gets pulled apparently.

5. Old City where the spirits and blights are. Everything gets pulled. "But i was surprised of a specific encounter in the old city (southeast of the map), where i always pulled the group of blights together with all the spectres, shades and skeletons. It wasn't only an unbelievable difficult fight but also a nightmare from the performance perspective."

[Silvaren]

1. Fighting with 2 beettles pulled few skeletons, revenant and rotghast at the same time (those monsters were guarding bottom right corner of the map on the platform with locked chest.

 

After dealing with that group I noticed that combat music didn't end. I run to Beodul.

 

2. Skeletons (those who guard wooden bridges in the cave) were attacking Beodul, so I rescued him but he just said the thing he is saying when you deal with the traps and left the area, while the traps were still there.

3. Engaging in combat in flooded street area in Port Maje pull all groups together.

4. Engwitan digsite ended up pulling all boars, panthers, wurms and drake at the same time each time I tried split-pull enemies. Using choke point near the ladder makes that combat doable but it's still a nightmare.

[thelee]

1. Fighting with 2 beettles pulled few skeletons, revenant and rotghast at the same time (those monsters were guarding bottom right corner of the map on the platform with locked chest.

 

After dealing with that group I noticed that combat music didn't end. I run to Beodul.

 

2. Skeletons (those who guard wooden bridges in the cave) were attacking Beodul, so I rescued him but he just said the thing he is saying when you deal with the traps and left the area, while the traps were still there.

3. Engaging in combat in flooded street area in Port Maje pull all groups together.

4. Engwitan digsite ended up pulling all boars, panthers, wurms and drake at the same time each time I tried split-pull enemies. Using choke point near the ladder makes that combat doable but it's still a nightmare.

 

I completed Act 1 on PotD (with hylea and rymrgand challenge on) in 3.1 and I can't reproduce #2, 3, and #4.

 

My technique for split-pulling Gorecci Street still works fine (using sparkcrackers or traps)... without them they would pull together but this has always been the case pre-3.1. For digsite, I was able to split pull the boars+wurms and the wurms+panthers+drake just fine (even with an accidental force of anguish knocking a boar back down the stairs after I led it up).

 

I suspect there's no bug and the cases where I did see a huge mass of enemies was an intentional change in the new mid-late PotD rebalancing.

[Silvaren]

Yeah I managed to split-pull 2 panthers with 1 wurm and drake at the same time then finish the rest at the center of dig site.

[MountainTiger]

The vessels getting pulled to the beetles is quite nasty

[SChin]

Hello everyone!

 

Thank you for reporting this!  The team is aware of the issue and are currently investigating to figure out what is causing this to occur.  If you discover more, please continue to post it here as they are looking at this thread as a reference for additional information.

 

Thank you all for helping with this

[Givemedanger]

The beetle fight worked fine for me after the last patch. I killed the beetles and the fight ended even with the Berath's challenge enabled.

[Frak]

The beetle fight worked fine for me after the last patch. I killed the beetles and the fight ended even with the Berath's challenge enabled.

Seems to 'work' if you let the beetles see you and then pull them west before engaging. I get the impression it's about where engagement starts.

[TheWeaver]

 

The beetle fight worked fine for me after the last patch. I killed the beetles and the fight ended even with the Berath's challenge enabled.

Seems to 'work' if you let the beetles see you and then pull them west before engaging. I get the impression it's about where engagement starts.

 

 

Not sure how far west I need to do this.  Every time I engage the beetles I get everyone else on that side of the bridge (3 skellies, revanant, rotgasht).  Not cool

[TheWeaver]

FWIW, for me it is better on Veteran, but still not as it used to be.  I engage the beetles and still get the skelly that is at the base of the platform.  He never used to agro at that point (and I engaged the beetles west of the bridge to the north).  However, on Vet, that's not a real problem (just not as I assume is intended).

[Archaven]

i can confirm this. seems that it happens everywhere. some sort like global. was in gullet old ruins. skuldr, rotgast, darguls all pulled together. making fights very difficult early game. although i still managed with a level 9 party.

[MikeMaximus]

I've encountered this problem at some of the same points others have mentioned.

 

The worst example for me so far was during "The Shadow Under Neketaka", when you go down the steps and encounter the first group of Naga + Slimes.  While fighting in this room, it also pulled the entire group far to the south with the Naga Shamans / Elementals.  I wasn't able to replicate it again unfortunately.

[Frak]

Some more elaboration on why I find engagement point to be "interesting".

 

In the beginning sea cave. Coming from the north, going south after having killed the construct.

 

Triggering the lone skeleton on the south. He runs north towards us and engages a bit northward into the north-south tunnel. Dies fast

 

Combat state persists. Seems we pulled something more. Moves a bit southwest in preparation.

 

Sure thing. We also triggered the 2 skeletons with guns, the revenant and the rotghast from the east.

 

Here's the kicker. Eder and MC is clearly in sight (to the west), yet both skellies, revenant and rothghast insists on moving north to the point where we engaged the previous skeleton, before acknowledging our presence. It's like they are programmed to go to that specific spot as a first priority.

 

 

Had the same occurene with pulling far-off mobs in Gorecki Street. They will seek out point of first engagement, before engaging in combat. Very strange. 

[Guest Psychovampiric Shield]

I think beetles on Oathbinder's Sanctum's 3rd floor also did not come all at once in my previous games, though the battle was more intriguing this time around because of it.

 

Actually I am surprised why is this not in some tweaked form employed deliberately. See, most battles start with all participants already present, which makes window for just right difficulty relatively narrow. Too many enemies will wipe the party with initial volley of attacks and basically beg for partial pull, too few will feel like trash mobs. If some enemies arrived later (but not too late, which would make it a sequence of discrete battles), they would increase difficulty without adding to the initial volley and make battle undecided for a longer time (thus more interesting).

[tonpix]

Plugging in, after 2-3 months of break, I started game again on Potd + berath's 2+ to all attributtes + scale everything, up + deadly deadfire mod from nexus. Noticed I couldn't split enemy group on gorecci street and engwithan site top room (traning room with various skeleton enemies) anymore (positioning far behind, sending scout with range weapon to provoke few enemies to come to my group).

 

I know people are probably asking for more difficulty, but 5-10 enemies attacking my lvl 2-3 tank is a kind of stretch :D

[thelee]

Plugging in, after 2-3 months of break, I started game again on Potd + berath's 2+ to all attributtes + scale everything, up + deadly deadfire mod from nexus. Noticed I couldn't split enemy group on gorecci street and engwithan site top room (traning room with various skeleton enemies) anymore (positioning far behind, sending scout with range weapon to provoke few enemies to come to my group).

 

I know people are probably asking for more difficulty, but 5-10 enemies attacking my lvl 2-3 tank is a kind of stretch :D

 

are you trying anything to separate enemies on gorecci street? I've always had to use a trap or sparkcrackers or something to manually separate them before combat starts or else I pull everyone.

 

Can confirm on a post-3.1 update that the training room with various skeleton enemies everyone comes now. Would have been particularly brutal except a different bug meant that I was a higher level before than when I would normally be dealing with the skeletons.

[tonpix]

 

Plugging in, after 2-3 months of break, I started game again on Potd + berath's 2+ to all attributtes + scale everything, up + deadly deadfire mod from nexus. Noticed I couldn't split enemy group on gorecci street and engwithan site top room (traning room with various skeleton enemies) anymore (positioning far behind, sending scout with range weapon to provoke few enemies to come to my group).

 

I know people are probably asking for more difficulty, but 5-10 enemies attacking my lvl 2-3 tank is a kind of stretch :D

 

are you trying anything to separate enemies on gorecci street? I've always had to use a trap or sparkcrackers or something to manually separate them before combat starts or else I pull everyone.

 

Can confirm on a post-3.1 update that the training room with various skeleton enemies everyone comes now. Would have been particularly brutal except a different bug meant that I was a higher level before than when I would normally be dealing with the skeletons.

 

 

No, just placing trap in front of my team and provoking fight with bow/gun was enough to make gorecci fight into 2 phases (v2.0 and pre at least)

[tonpix]

What's the latest version that doesn't have this AI behaviour? I might try switching from steam to gog to rollback to older versions I want and avoid such unlucky patches. This bug seems to be easily reproduced, yet 2 weeks passed and no hotfix, not comments from devs on progress/patch eta. Enough of waiting for me Like the Arcane dampener bug interection with nalpazca that been reported 4-5 months ago multiple times

Edited November 13, 2018 by tonpix

[r0ckhat]

I can't say I've seen this behaviour (though, if I'm honest, it's likely it did happen and I just thought it was part of the game); but one thing I have noticed, which is really grating, is that enemies tend to swarm my character, even if there is a pair of tanks standing in their path, brandishing weapons and looking generally mean and tanky.

 

I haven't yet decided if they swarm my character because it's the "player" or if it's because she's basically a dedicated healer (Lifegiver/Priest (Eothas) with a number of AOE DoT/Buff spells) and the AI wants to get rid of the "biggest" threat -though I'm inclined to believe it's the former.

[thelee]

I can't say I've seen this behaviour (though, if I'm honest, it's likely it did happen and I just thought it was part of the game); but one thing I have noticed, which is really grating, is that enemies tend to swarm my character, even if there is a pair of tanks standing in their path, brandishing weapons and looking generally mean and tanky.

 

I haven't yet decided if they swarm my character because it's the "player" or if it's because she's basically a dedicated healer (Lifegiver/Priest (Eothas) with a number of AOE DoT/Buff spells) and the AI wants to get rid of the "biggest" threat -though I'm inclined to believe it's the former.

 

enemy AI will frequently target lower health, lower deflection, importantly casters/healers, much like a player would. it's not a preference to go after the player character specifically.

 

if you want to stop enemies in their tracks, you should make sure your mean tanks actually have engagement (unlike PoE1 melee characters don't start with any engagement to begin with).

Edited November 14, 2018 by thelee

[Guest Psychovampiric Shield]

Or just stand still until their attack animation starts, then move a bit (no worries about disengagement attacks, enemies are mostly just as bad at it); they will miss (ou of range) and waste attack/resource. I do not know what they were thinking when they removed PoE 1 style engagement (video).

 

EDIT: in the Sea Cave, monsters from the far right can be drawn out by attacking the beetles, albeit incosistently; sometimes nobody is pulled and beetles are left to their own devices. On the other hand:

 

 

 

2. Skeletons (those who guard wooden bridges in the cave) were attacking Beodul, so I rescued him but he just said the thing he is saying when you deal with the traps and left the area, while the traps were still there.

 

...is probably unrelated, because I saw skeletons attacking Beodul way back in 1.X. But only once, so it happens rarely.

 

On Gorecci street, thugs seem not to respond to baiting with traps or explosives (except sparkcrackers) unless they are already in hostile state (to switch them to hostile state, simply show yourself and stealth before they finish their line about not leaving witnesses). I am not sure if they behaved differently before. Anyway, once hostile, they can be easily pulled in piecemeal. I usually set up one trap, then when they come to it, set up another further away to increase distance between those pulled and not pulled and ensure they will not aid each other.

 

No problems on digsite (1, 2). Overall I think this is an improvement; monsters in the same pack should come all at once, unless extra effort is put into pulling them in smaller chunks.

Edited November 17, 2018 by Psychovampiric Shield