[AI/pathfinding/Formation ideas] Walk in leader's f'steps | UPD.: formation ideas, 360° rot.

caruga

Update: added these ideas to the thread--make this the generalised thread for pathfinding and formation features?

To quote the beamdog thread:

have (as [a toggle]) the AI make the other party members walk exactly in the leaders' footsteps rather than each performing their own pathfinding independantly. Would be useful for goose-stepping around traps or avoiding encounters you know the location of in advance, where one member might wander slightly off course and 'touch' an undesirable zone.

Lunever

Good suggestion

Winthal

I think they had something like this in IWD, and if I recall correctly, it wasn't working very well :P

caruga

I think they had something like this in IWD, and if I recall correctly, it wasn't working very well :P

Never played it; can you enlighten me on what the flaw was?

Winthal

@caruga well, let's just say the less than satisfactory pathfinding messed up a good idea

caruga

An extension to this idea just occured to me.
1. Make it possible to maintain a formation around the party leader in this mode (or any other?). Straight line would be the default (imagine the game 'snake'). I'd just like to see them maintain the formation consistently rather than constantly breaking apart and regrouping like they do now, only reaching the formation as they reach their destination and stop moving (and sometimes they manage to screw it up anyway).

In other words, a stronger tandemisation of the group formation mid-motion, if you catch my drift...

caruga

Update: Probably redundant/ already implemented

2. I never actually relied on formations in BG because they were unreliable due to having little control over the orientation of the formation--e.g. they could be in an arrow shape, but it wasn't easy to predict which way that arrow would face.

Maybe allow one to get a visual of the formation orientation prior to clicking and have it possible to reorientate the 'formation-to-be' (maybe with the A & D keys as per WASD).

To clarify, imagine a faint outline indicating the formation that will group itself located at wherever you hover the mouse prior to clicking. It will adapt (as it currently already does) occording to the shape of the space occupied and the direction they are heading, but you can also use keys to rotate a full 360° as an offset from the default (i.e. each one of these possible orientations gets rotated a fixed amount wherever you place the pointer).

caruga

3. as a part of improved AI configurability, and yet another alternative to the above: make it possible to make 1 formation the default (let's say 'straight line') and on a trigger (let's say: seeing an enemy) they instantly morph into another formation.

wbouvy

@caruga if you right click and hold, you can change the direction of the formation

caruga

4. Also perhaps a whole subwindow could be accessed dedicated to formation customisation (esp. useful if you have 6 members and want finer control over where each member will go).

caruga

@caruga if you right click and hold, you can change the direction of the formation

Thanks! Was that ever in the manual? Because I missed it.

wbouvy

@caruga yup: "R click and hold, and drag, rotates the formation if more than one character is selected" under "mouse buttons and control" and "R-click cancels an action and also does formation rotation and movement when a group is selected" under "the main interface".

caruga

@wbouvy

Fair enough. I still wouldn't use formations as they are, because I felt that they maintained their formations rather clumsily, hence my other idea.

lansounet

Also hold shift and click to queue movements (with R click and rotate if you like) as a workaround for bad pathfinding and group splitting.

caruga

Also hold shift and click to queue movements (with R click and rotate if you like) as a workaround for bad pathfinding and group splitting.

Yeah, I know that one. But it is, as you say, a workaround.

trinit

i liked how they walked a bit spontaneously. i gave them and order and they followed in naturally chaotic walking-in-group fashion (since copying leader's footsteps would make them look like little robots).

i think simply a pathfinding in general needs to be improved for those stupid instances of looking for a way across the bridge that is in front of you on the opposite side of the map.