Baldur's Gate Gamble/Tactics
kamuizin
Member Posts: 3,704
I just made a search on the forum and i didn't find anything as this idea so lemme expose it.
I played FF12 some time ago, i just remember this now and something there that i found very interessing were the gambits, in fact the gambits are a successful implement in Dragon Age 2 too, with the name of Tactics. Both vary in each game but the objective are the same, a semi-controled AI for the party members.
What are the Gambles/Tactics/ They're AI slots that each NPC has, so you can configure a single action.
Ally: Shar-Teel < or = 50% life, Action: Cure serious wounds spell.
Ally: Self < or = 50% life, Action: use minor healing potion.
Enemy: Hasted, Action: slow spell.
I really don't care much if this idea will have place on Baldur's Gate or no, i would use this if the implement come to be made, but i'm from the old school and i like to pause the game to take my decisions, however to make the game a little more versatile, this idea can come in hand.
On FF12 you had to buy the gambles to use them with skill points, the same in DA:O. But in Dragon Age 2 you gain a x number of gambits per level (and based on the class if i remember well to).
This can make some new customers with ppl that don't know baldur's gate and please some of the hardcore gamers here (making possible a no pause game if ppl use the AI well), but i will play the game with or without this implement.
I played FF12 some time ago, i just remember this now and something there that i found very interessing were the gambits, in fact the gambits are a successful implement in Dragon Age 2 too, with the name of Tactics. Both vary in each game but the objective are the same, a semi-controled AI for the party members.
What are the Gambles/Tactics/ They're AI slots that each NPC has, so you can configure a single action.
Ally: Shar-Teel < or = 50% life, Action: Cure serious wounds spell.
Ally: Self < or = 50% life, Action: use minor healing potion.
Enemy: Hasted, Action: slow spell.
I really don't care much if this idea will have place on Baldur's Gate or no, i would use this if the implement come to be made, but i'm from the old school and i like to pause the game to take my decisions, however to make the game a little more versatile, this idea can come in hand.
On FF12 you had to buy the gambles to use them with skill points, the same in DA:O. But in Dragon Age 2 you gain a x number of gambits per level (and based on the class if i remember well to).
This can make some new customers with ppl that don't know baldur's gate and please some of the hardcore gamers here (making possible a no pause game if ppl use the AI well), but i will play the game with or without this implement.
5
Comments
However, you would need a lot of rules to get your party members to act intelligently, which might add a lot of complexity both to the interface and the handling of these rules. An alternative would be to allow multiple scripts to be selected and provide a lot of small scripts; this would be a less customizable option that would provide approximately the same feature.
- prioritize survival and healing (I'm sure the AI is able to determine by itself what spell or potion to use without the need to complicate the interface too much)
- if an enemy starts casting a spell, stop whatever you are doing and attack him instead. Healing is still more important.
- if you don't have anything better to do (meaning, higher in the priority list), attack the same enemy than party leader.
That's just an example, but I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. You have a limited set of possible actions, and you just arrange them in the order you want, like in Tales of Innocence.
I think the Tactics mod also gives enemy casters a pretty good AI, able to analyze which protection spells you have on you and use spells you're not protected against.
... so hum, yeah, it seems the game itself allowed quite advanced AI scripts. I don't know how the ones for your party work (again, I've never used them) but it could be a good idea to make us program our own. And then it'd be Ragnarok Online all over again with the homunculus/mercenary scripts, not that I'd complain.
By the way this is not a new request, but an improvment of the scripts that already are in the game.
So what i'm asking is something that has already been done in other games and had sucess.
Ally: Shar-Teel < or = 50% life, Action: Cure serious wounds spell.
Ally: Self < or = 50% life, Action: use minor healing potion.
Enemy: Hasted, Action: slow spell.
That is already possible with modded content and AI scripts (although casting healing spells in combat is rarely efficient) you can cover pretty much any situation
You told that this implement already exist in mods or that shoud be made in a unofficial mod?
Anyway i think it's too messy to make a system like this in a mod fashion (a recipe for bugs in my view, this system must review most of the AI options of action).
The introduction of this FAQ from gamefaqs explain suffice of the FFXII gambits: http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps2/459841-final-fantasy-xii/faqs/42021
For the Dragon Age Tatics, there's a wikia link here: http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Tactics
As i said it's a feature that already has proved itself in other renowned games.
You can add as many checks as you want for a single action : range/hp/current state/class/ pretty much anything really.
Gonna have a look at those links now, to make sure I'm not missing your point completly ^^
FFXII's system, for the most part, was really great.
Addendum : It's actually quite feasible I guess but you would only get 1-5 conditions maybe for 1 action, whereas AI script can do a lot more
I'm not sure it should use a tactic/gambit system verbatim, but it should start off with that as a base. I think there should be an in-game user-friendly interface for configuring AI behaviour. The ones in FFXII and Dragon Age were a bit restricted.
Here's a feedback improvement off the top of my head: instead of having a tactic for such-and-such % hp, you have a single one for N hp, and there's up and down arrows (or a field you can type the figure into) to change the hp, and alongside that in the description it shows what that percentage would be in real HP for the character you're currently applying it to.
It's the little things that make a nice interface. Not really, contingency has no casting delay.
However, a script will miss nothing. What I mean is that if you have an "on enemy=hasted" in the script, the party member with the script will always detect a hasted enemy for you even if you missed it.
For example: In a complex fight you, as the player, might have missed that one fighter that chucked a haste potion and then almost killed your mage and severely hurt your priest. After 2 rounds of chaos you find out he's hasted, you dispel and end up winning the fight. A script would end his haste right after he drank the potion, making the fight a lot less memorable.
A counterargument to this would be that as a player you are alone and the party consists of 6 people, who would in the real world think with 6 separate minds, not just the one of the player
In short I think that scripting shouldn't be too powerful, but a bit better scripting could surely add to the enjoyment of the game.
As i told in other posts, i don't have a problem with pauses, but today to adapt to the new needs of our time, a best game flowing can give us a new perception of baldur's gate playability.
Taking in fact that no huge change will happen on the game graphics or bases, what probally gonna be a negative point when compete with other actual games on the market, a good game flow joined with the awersome plot that already exist could balance this, giving BG:EE more competitiveness in the market.
@TrentOster, i know you're a busy person and can't look to each feature request in this forum, but can you or other member of the Team BG:EE evaluate and say if this is a viablle feature?
I was thinking along the lines of Dragon Age's system, where you can prioritise a series of actions based on HP, enemy proximity etc. It wouldn't even necessarily need to be integrated into the main game, a little .exe that creates a script for you to drop into the appropriate folder could work just as well. I'm not a programmer or modder, so I'm not sure of the practicality of it though.
Oh, and @kumuizin, I entirely agree with you about the vanilla scripts. Standard attack was the only one that was really useable because of its murderous simplicity. Casters and rogues demanded micromanaging (or better scripts).
Also, tactics scripts like this could be used to increase party member survival, drinking potions at 25%-50% HP and so on. They wouldn't necessarily be all-encompassing, but even a relatively simple Dragon age style system could cut down the repetitive minor bits of casting and let us concentrate on the big picture.
I don't believe that a huge option of actions gonna be a problem if the work made is good.
Ps: FFXII EVERITHING could have a script, to use items, spells, techniques and a lot of other things. I just want a battle script interface for BG, a lot simpler.
If this is implemented, instead of configuring individual conditions, I'd rather it be simply balancing between categories of actions. Such as deciding the order of: Buff, Heal, Debuff, Offensive, etc. Something far more simplified than simply making GUI for current scripting, which is pretty much on the level of DA games.
I don't intent to copy those works, but use them as a base to make Baldur's Gate own friendly interface for AI.