A big problem during combat for the game!?

[Guail0]

Hello all Pillars of Eternity players!

 

I have been playing for about 4 hours on normal and its a lovely challenge and had it not been for everything else in this game being so fantastic i would have broken 5 keyboards by now.

 

I chose Dwarf Paladin to start with because i love being on the frontline and have ranged Allies behind me shooting Down the enemy. But i ran into a Little problem, and maybe its because i have missed something or i just suck. When i get into a fight with 2 or more enemies it will be close to impossible for me to win the fight and heres why:
 

As a front line warrior i have no way at all (atleast to my knowledge) to keep enemies attention or just block them off, so they just run straight for my squishy ranged guys, and when that happens i can A: make my character run back and attack that foe (rarely works) B: Let them do as much damage before they die, and death is certain in both cases.

The difficulty in itself is not the problem for me, its the lack of tools/abilities to actually keep aggro on me as the tank.

Please tell me im not the only one with this experience!?


 

[Elethiomel]

When you hit an enemy in melee (or if they hit you) you "melee engage" them. You can take a talent that lets you melee engage more than one enemy, I suggest you take that. Most enemies have AI that won't try to disengage, because you get a free attack on them with bonus to hit if they do.

[Sock]

And have your ranged units target the one unit that you currently have engaged (you can tell by the blue/red arrows where engagement is).

[Guail0]

The problem is not the one enemy, thats easy enough. The problem is with multiple enemies the "adds" run for the ranged dudes, which is fair and clever. But i just dont know a way to get aggro from all besides running around and hitting them and before im done with that the squishy ones are already dead

[Answermancer]

Paladins can only engage one enemy initially, but there are talents you can take to engage more than one enemy. Fighters also have a modal ability they can get that increases their possible number of engaged enemies.

 

If you want to prevent people running past your front line you will probably want at least 2 "tanks," at least that was my experience in the beta.

[CynicalP]

I begin the battle by rushing the fighters types to the enemies then one engaged I move up my wizard. That's been working well for me. Other than an archer keying in on my wizard I had suffered minimal damage from melee enemies.

[Lephys]

Look at all the options available to you. You may have to use other people in a slightly different fashion, in order to hinder or impede those "adds" from getting all the way to your backline people. As others pointed out, anyone can "engage" anyone else, so if you have more melee folk than just your main Dwarf Paladin, you may want to send them up to help with the blockade, .

 

How big's your party, total? If you have 3 or 4 ranged people, you might want to think about having one or two of them use a melee weapon set (or even a shield or something, even if they're not awesomely accurate/damaging with melee weapons, just to hold targets at bay) and engage some folks in support of your Paladin, just until you drop a few foes. Then, when you've thinned their numbers a bit, just have them whip bows back out and fire away. *shrug*

[Guail0]

I might try another custom tanky person to acomodate my dwarf pala because god i hate having all the spells and options to do stuff, but the aggro part is missing! :D

[EmilAmundsen]

I'm experiencing a similar problem where I have a Fighter engange-locking enemies who proceed to ignore him and just run straight for my caster (10m behind him). My fighter can even run after the enemy and reaquire the engagement-lock, whereupon the ai will again break the it and charge my Cipher in the back. It's not even using an ability to do so, it just ignore the engagement with the fighter.

 

This have me wondering how the aggro-mechanics work in this game. Does anyone here know any specifics?

Is the AI able to detect that my fighter has a one-handed weapon and therefore can be safely ignored since they aren't able to penetrate armor in any meaningful manner?

[Tigranes]

Whenever that enemy breaks engagement from your fighter to run off, you should get a free attack on him (check your combat log). And I've been able to have Eder keep engagement on enemies that Eder can't really damage effectively. Is your fighter continuing to attack the enemy? Does the enemy do this all the time, or just some of the time? Are you ever using chokepoints? 

[Enoch]

This have me wondering how the aggro-mechanics work in this game. Does anyone here know any specifics?

Is the AI able to detect that my fighter has a one-handed weapon and therefore can be safely ignored since they aren't able to penetrate armor in any meaningful manner?

That would actually be pretty awesome.  It'd create a reason to build balanced characters, as opposed to the aggressively min-max'ed defenders and damagers that the system presently favors. 

 

(I haven't observed this behavior, but my play-time has been sadly limited thus far.)

[EmilAmundsen]

Whenever that enemy breaks engagement from your fighter to run off, you should get a free attack on him (check your combat log). And I've been able to have Eder keep engagement on enemies that Eder can't really damage effectively. Is your fighter continuing to attack the enemy? Does the enemy do this all the time, or just some of the time? Are you ever using chokepoints? 

 

I didn't really check the combat log for the free attack, but the point is that a good tank won't also be a good damage-dealer. Even naked monsters like the Skuldr have metal-armor DR or better, making only the attacks from the heaviest weapons relevant at all. If this game was multiplayer tanking would be ignored because the free-attacks from engagements don't cause meaningful damage. Tanking only work at all because the AI is programmed to adhere to engagements..most of the time. But when it doesen't, every non-tank gets killed in short order. I'm considering trying out semi-tanks with two-handers, and having all non-tanks 20 resolve and perception to make them survivable. But I'd rather find out how aggro works, so I can avoid this behavior in the first place. Do you know how aggro works in detail?

 

My fighter is continuing to attack the enemy and I see the green engagement-line between them. The enemy doesen't ignore the engagement all the time, but it seems to happen under fairly consistent conditions. The incident I'm referring to here is the Skuldr-King and his 3 accompanying Skuldr in the sun-god temple-ruins at the start of the game (on hard difficulty). I'm spelunking with a 2nd level fighter (not Eder) and a 3rd lv Cipher. I approach the king with the figther, planning to spam soul-shock once he is surrounded. I break from the plan and choose to mental bind them instead (because even tho all targeted the fighter, some of the Skuldr refused to surround him) The mental-bind hits 3 of them, but the last one, whom is engaged with the fighter now aggro on the Cipher and proceed to ignore the fighter through two engage-locks.

 

I do regularly  use choke-points, and I tried that for this encounter aswell. It turns out a 3rd lv Cipher and a 2nd level fighter doesen't do enough damage to take down the king even when I get to engange the Skuldr one at a time, but that's another matter entirely.

 

 

 

This have me wondering how the aggro-mechanics work in this game. Does anyone here know any specifics?

Is the AI able to detect that my fighter has a one-handed weapon and therefore can be safely ignored since they aren't able to penetrate armor in any meaningful manner?

That would actually be pretty awesome.  It'd create a reason to build balanced characters, as opposed to the aggressively min-max'ed defenders and damagers that the system presently favors. 

 

(I haven't observed this behavior, but my play-time has been sadly limited thus far.)

 

What's a balanced build to you Enoch?

[Tigranes]

I don't know MMO language, so I may be getting it wrong, but:

 

(1) Just checking: you do know that 5 skuldr bashing Eder doesn't mean Eder is engaging them all, right? To begin with Eder is only able to engage one enemy; he can make this two with the defensive stance; he can make it three with a talent; and so on. Enemies engaged by Eder is noted by the green line between their selection circles. If a monster is bashing Eder but not engaged by him, he can break off at any moment without penalty. This is what makes a large number of even weaker enemies dangerous in a different way than a single monster. 

 

(2) I've noticed some enemies break engagement and just go for weaker characters, but in those cases, the combat log will show that they suffer a free hit from the engaging character. Well, that's just how it's meant to work - and you can do this too, by the way. If monsters NEVER broke engagement combat would become far easier and also more boring. You need to have strategies for dealing with that. 

 

For example, Alroth can invest in Grimoire Slam, which pushes back the enemy - giving him a free broken engagement and letting him run. Rogues have Escape. You can paralyse or knockdown enemies then get away in the meantime. Or, sometimes, you might just run and take the free hit from them. Every character has some way to get out of engagement, though of course there's costs to everything.

[SKull]

I would recommend not moving around in party formation when you`re exploring. If you move out with the tank on his own so the tank engages everything first the enemies seem to lock on to the tank a bit better. Then either move the ranged up in support carefully or flee back to the ranged with the tank, depending on circumstances, to minimize loose mobs hitting your ranged characters. This seems to work fairly well most of the time. At least enough to get past fights, although it`s still a little unpredictable and sometimes an odd ranged character gets knocked out.

[Gairnulf]

Watch this and the other "beginner's guide" videos on the same channel. I wish someone would make a thread with them and have it stickied.

 

[EmilAmundsen]

I don't know MMO language, so I may be getting it wrong, but:

 

(1) Just checking: you do know that 5 skuldr bashing Eder doesn't mean Eder is engaging them all, right? To begin with Eder is only able to engage one enemy; he can make this two with the defensive stance; he can make it three with a talent; and so on. Enemies engaged by Eder is noted by the green line between their selection circles. If a monster is bashing Eder but not engaged by him, he can break off at any moment without penalty. This is what makes a large number of even weaker enemies dangerous in a different way than a single monster. 

 

(2) I've noticed some enemies break engagement and just go for weaker characters, but in those cases, the combat log will show that they suffer a free hit from the engaging character. Well, that's just how it's meant to work - and you can do this too, by the way. If monsters NEVER broke engagement combat would become far easier and also more boring. You need to have strategies for dealing with that. 

 

For example, Alroth can invest in Grimoire Slam, which pushes back the enemy - giving him a free broken engagement and letting him run. Rogues have Escape. You can paralyse or knockdown enemies then get away in the meantime. Or, sometimes, you might just run and take the free hit from them. Every character has some way to get out of engagement, though of course there's costs to everything.

Yes, I know the rules of engagement in PoE. There was a green line between my fighter and the Skuldr in question, which means he was engaged. The Skuldr also stopped when he was re-engaged, before starting to move again.

 

You seem to be under the impression that I'm complaining about this ai-behavior. You'd be wrong.

What I'm asking for is the specifics of the ai aggro-mechanics. That is, how does the ai decide who to attack? Period.

[Enoch]

What I'm asking for is the specifics of the ai aggro-mechanics. That is, how does the ai decide who to attack? Period.

 

We don't know.  Hopefully, it's not entirely consistent, varying by type of opponent (dumb zombies v. smart tacticians?), possible random factors, etc.

 

The point of the game (i.e., the fun) isn't to abuse tics in the AI programming, it's to react appropriately using the tools available as simulated opponents (yes, AI-driven) create emergent situations.  If the characters can't read the minds of their opponents, why should the player be able to?

[EmilAmundsen]

 

What I'm asking for is the specifics of the ai aggro-mechanics. That is, how does the ai decide who to attack? Period.

 

We don't know.  Hopefully, it's not entirely consistent, varying by type of opponent (dumb zombies v. smart tacticians?), possible random factors, etc.

 

The point of the game (i.e., the fun) isn't to abuse tics in the AI programming, it's to react appropriately using the tools available as simulated opponents (yes, AI-driven) create emergent situations.  If the characters can't read the minds of their opponents, why should the player be able to?

 

Oh, so -that- is the point of the game.. Never mind my question then, I'm gonna retire and completely re-evaluate my outlook on gaming and life in general. Thank you for saving me, Sir.

[Tigranes]

Yes, I know the rules of engagement in PoE. There was a green line between my fighter and the Skuldr in question, which means he was engaged. The Skuldr also stopped when he was re-engaged, before starting to move again.

 

You seem to be under the impression that I'm complaining about this ai-behavior. You'd be wrong.

What I'm asking for is the specifics of the ai aggro-mechanics. That is, how does the ai decide who to attack? Period.

 

I'm under no impressions - I was trying to answer your questions. But as for the actual code that drives AI selection of targets, I have no idea, so I can't help you there.