BG1:EE I play with AI on mostly, turning it off when I want the party to wait somewhere for something to happen (eg, enemies to approach me). I mainly use the ranged attack or standard attack scripts.
BG2:EE I've nearly given up on the AI, it's terribly buggy in comparison to BG1:EE. I am trying with just the "Custom (Default)" script at the moment, which helps a little bit in that my characters will attack nearby enemies but don't really try to do anything else. With any of the other scripts, I find my characters completely ignore any orders I give them so I stopped using them. For example telling a mage to move away from melee, the mage would take a half step then turn around and attack again. Or if I told a caster to cast a spell, it would appear on the portrait as the next action, but then the caster would immediately start attacking again without casting the spell etc.. very very frustrating.
I give everyone the "attack on sight using equipped weapon" script (The top one... is that AGEN or something?). I turn it off for two reasons. 1. casters who do not have appropriate weapons to fight foes (immunity or insufficient enchantment) or when I want to control their casting (buffing/debuffing/damage). 2. when I want to prioritize enemies (since the agressive script retargets when the character has been hit)
BGEE - yes, all the time. In early game it required some directions from me, but later on I could just leave my party to lay waste to enemies unless it was boss.
I play with party AI on almost 100% altho there are some occasions when I turn it off briefly. Most of my team just gets standard attack AI so they attack on sight and don't just stand around if I had not given them specific orders which is what I do most of the time (pause and give orders - unpause let the orders play out - pause and give orders - wash rinse repeat)
I am however a huge fan of the new controlled thief and controlled bard scripts and always have them on my main thief and any bard in the party!
I pretty much never use any script that entails automatic spellcasting as I tend to be VERY conservative with spells and don't want the AI "wasting them"!
That of course carries on to potion and wand use as well both of which I tend to stockpile - find storage units for and let them sit there collecting dust until I REALLY need them only to discover they are still in the storage unit and unavailable at that time. ;-)
AI on most of the time but modded scripts for casters, because vanilla AI is rubbish. I still pause before combat and reassign orders to party members, in case they have mutinous thoughts.
But there are few things as spectacular as watching an Improved Hasted Mazzy tear through a horde of hobgoblins at a rate of 10 goblins/round... It's just not the same when you have to assign her a new target after every swing.
You don't have to assign her again and again. Even with the AI off, the NPCs will still attack the next closest monster in range. They just won't do weird things like switch weapons or charge or use items with the AI off. It's really the best of both worlds.
For me personally, I'd love to see another turn based game like ToEE. That would be 'The Best' of all possible worlds for me. I have endless fun tactically planning out the battles in that game. It really allows you to make the most out of what you have. Or is that just me?
For me personally, I'd love to see another turn based game like ToEE. That would be 'The Best' of all possible worlds for me. I have endless fun tactically planning out the battles in that game. It really allows you to make the most out of what you have. Or is that just me?
ToEE is amazing for a lot of reasons, and that is one of them.
The thief script to constantly look for traps or hide in shadows is so useful... Hell, I use the same script for Minsc so he can hide as well.
The Cleric script that allows the turn undead ability to only turn on when undead is nearby is also very useful, all my clerics use it... Even Dorn, when he is in my party.
Mages get the ranged fighter script, keeps them out of trouble. Lets you overide when casting spells and forgoes the need to look after them once the spell is cast as they will go back to ranged attack and even run away from being attacked... Although, I once had Neera spawn a whole map of woopass, as she was hasted and ran away only to spawn monsters, that she would run away from, causing more... Anyway you get the picture... But then I turned the AI off and had Neera run back to my party and we had an Xvart death party. The kind of party where you can never leave blue!
However, I will shut the AI down when I need to fight an enemy in a tricky location (enemy surrounded by traps), I wish to carpet bomb the areas with napalm (lets chuck all our potions of explosions and fireball spells here!) or the monsters require a tactical engagement to remove them from the face of faerun quicker (we need to take the mage / the guy backstabbing me first).
But the AI stays on... My AI is powered by Cauliflower...
But there are few things as spectacular as watching an Improved Hasted Mazzy tear through a horde of hobgoblins at a rate of 10 goblins/round... It's just not the same when you have to assign her a new target after every swing.
You don't have to assign her again and again. Even with the AI off, the NPCs will still attack the next closest monster in range. They just won't do weird things like switch weapons or charge or use items with the AI off. It's really the best of both worlds.
Strange, it doesn't work for me... when the AI is off the characters literally do nothing unless I explicitly tell them to do something. Which is a good thing; sometimes I don't want characters attacking at all so I turn off AI.
The thief script that constantly detects traps is very useful with high detect illusion. A walking true sight that has no cast time. The other new scripts are pretty useful too. But I generally take AI off for any battle requiring any sort of thought.
If only we could make custom AI scripts IN-GAME, much like the Tactics in Dragon Age but with more options and be more complex.
This is honestly one of my favorite aspects of Dragon Age. Tweaking the AI to allow for all the various exigencies of combat on my own terms and seeing the fruits of that labor.
@UrbanHound, I'd forgotten how satisfying that was. I used to have programming the Dragon Age tactics screens for all my npc's down to an art. It was great to be able to just play my own mage, while letting the others do their own thing, and they actually fought *intelligently* and helped me out during battles without my having to give them any orders, other than the ones I had pre-programmed myself.
But there are few things as spectacular as watching an Improved Hasted Mazzy tear through a horde of hobgoblins at a rate of 10 goblins/round... It's just not the same when you have to assign her a new target after every swing.
You don't have to assign her again and again. Even with the AI off, the NPCs will still attack the next closest monster in range. They just won't do weird things like switch weapons or charge or use items with the AI off. It's really the best of both worlds.
Strange, it doesn't work for me... when the AI is off the characters literally do nothing unless I explicitly tell them to do something. Which is a good thing; sometimes I don't want characters attacking at all so I turn off AI.
They have to be within HTH range (or possibly being attacked physically). If they are even a short distance away, they do nothing, as intended.
Generally speaking, it's a waste of my time to manually control the party for trash encounters when i can just not do anything and watch the fighters beat them to death. Since most encounters in the game can be handled with letting someone beat it to death without any player intervention, technically I spend most the game using AI. For all the important and memorable encounters instead of just a few gnolls, I definitely use my characters.
I also set my characters to either standard attack or ranged attack scripts so I don't worry about casters wasting spells on meaningless trash.
I always play with the AI on, though I never allow for spellcasting. I generally plan the battle myself but it does streamline fighting trash mobs (of which there are TONS in the game) if I don't have to tell each character to switch to the next enemy to destroy. Casters are generally passive and I keep them back and only send them in melee after the enemy has locked onto one of the main fighters, I never waste spells unless fighting something that could actually threaten to kill a member of my party (beyond the occassional lucky Kobold getting a good shot in)
Comments
BG2:EE I've nearly given up on the AI, it's terribly buggy in comparison to BG1:EE. I am trying with just the "Custom (Default)" script at the moment, which helps a little bit in that my characters will attack nearby enemies but don't really try to do anything else. With any of the other scripts, I find my characters completely ignore any orders I give them so I stopped using them. For example telling a mage to move away from melee, the mage would take a half step then turn around and attack again. Or if I told a caster to cast a spell, it would appear on the portrait as the next action, but then the caster would immediately start attacking again without casting the spell etc.. very very frustrating.
I turn it off for two reasons.
1. casters who do not have appropriate weapons to fight foes (immunity or insufficient enchantment) or when I want to control their casting (buffing/debuffing/damage).
2. when I want to prioritize enemies (since the agressive script retargets when the character has been hit)
BGEE - yes, all the time. In early game it required some directions from me, but later on I could just leave my party to lay waste to enemies unless it was boss.
BGIIEE - they really need to fix it...
I am however a huge fan of the new controlled thief and controlled bard scripts and always have them on my main thief and any bard in the party!
I pretty much never use any script that entails automatic spellcasting as I tend to be VERY conservative with spells and don't want the AI "wasting them"!
That of course carries on to potion and wand use as well both of which I tend to stockpile - find storage units for and let them sit there collecting dust until I REALLY need them only to discover they are still in the storage unit and unavailable at that time. ;-)
For me personally, I'd love to see another turn based game like ToEE. That would be 'The Best' of all possible worlds for me. I have endless fun tactically planning out the battles in that game. It really allows you to make the most out of what you have. Or is that just me?
The thief script to constantly look for traps or hide in shadows is so useful... Hell, I use the same script for Minsc so he can hide as well.
The Cleric script that allows the turn undead ability to only turn on when undead is nearby is also very useful, all my clerics use it... Even Dorn, when he is in my party.
Mages get the ranged fighter script, keeps them out of trouble. Lets you overide when casting spells and forgoes the need to look after them once the spell is cast as they will go back to ranged attack and even run away from being attacked... Although, I once had Neera spawn a whole map of woopass, as she was hasted and ran away only to spawn monsters, that she would run away from, causing more... Anyway you get the picture... But then I turned the AI off and had Neera run back to my party and we had an Xvart death party. The kind of party where you can never leave blue!
However, I will shut the AI down when I need to fight an enemy in a tricky location (enemy surrounded by traps), I wish to carpet bomb the areas with napalm (lets chuck all our potions of explosions and fireball spells here!) or the monsters require a tactical engagement to remove them from the face of faerun quicker (we need to take the mage / the guy backstabbing me first).
But the AI stays on... My AI is powered by Cauliflower...
in bg1 i think it was broken so casters interupted spells if they had ai
I also set my characters to either standard attack or ranged attack scripts so I don't worry about casters wasting spells on meaningless trash.