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AI Consultant Working On Heart of Thorns
XAleX360
Member UncommonPosts: 516
in Guild Wars 2
Dave Mark, President and Lead Designer of Intrinsic Algorithm, revealed today to be working on Heart of Thorns.
https://twitter.com/IADaveMark/status/559039305965113345
The company provides contract-based AI design and programming services to other companies needing services in Artificial Intelligence (AI), simulation design, game balancing and mathematical modeling.
Too early to be excited, but I hope this brought some major changes on multiple levels to improve Guild Wars 2, both in open world and instanced content.
Executive Editor (Games) http://www.wccftech.com
Comments
I would need to know what titles they worked on before I get excited.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
For it's faults, Asheron's Call 2 added some very interesting AI elements to their game with the SHRETH squads. For awhile people rumored that they were controlled by devs since the AI was using tactics like strafing to avoid fire and weaving in and out of range. Turns out Turbine added some interesting AI elements to those mobs in particular.
If ANet can add things like better AI for their mobs within zones, mobs that can react appropriately, it'll make the PvE game much more interesting.
Little forum boys with their polished cyber toys: whine whine, boo-hoo, talk talk.
I think this is the same company that worked or is working on EQ Next.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs1EtESFC34
Close enough. It appears that they have worked from early 2013 to February 2014 as a sub-contractor with Storybricks on EQ Next AI. He announced to be working on GW2 since April 2014, stating the following:
Suffice to say they have some excellent ideas about how to improve their product in many different areas. I’m pleased that they have brought me in to assist them in this exciting project.
Executive Editor (Games) http://www.wccftech.com
Well, the problem is that heroes don't work well in open world content. For dungeons and other instances then finebut I rather not have an open world zone where 4 out of 5 players are bots.
The problem is more from the controls aspect of things tbh. GW1 had a hybrid of click-to-move and 3rd person movement. (wasd)
However, GW2 is all 3rd person. There is no top-down control scheme, so it's hard to command multiple units as you would in an RTS (or in GW1). Even with the limited pets the game currently has, controlling them is very simplistic. They could add heroes, but they would end up being fairly cumbersome to control, especially with how important things like dodging are in GW2.
Sounds like good news.
I'm not sure what you took away from the reveal cinematic, but to me it was very clear they have upped their game when it comes to PvE encounters.
One of my hopes when I first caught wind of Heart of Thorns, was that they would learn from some of their experiments with the aetherblade content. Which were some of the first PvE challenges to actually have decent fight mechanics. Luckily enough, it looks like I may have gotten that partially backwards. It seems to me now, that some of those features were Anet's way of testdriving some of the ideas for Heart of Thorns.
Either way, though brief, the fights in the cinematic showed actual boss mechanics involved. Which I am very much glad to see.
If they are able to have more stuff like molten alliance, like triple-trouble, or even the teq revamp, I'll be gleeful.
It makes me wonder if they're aiming at some sort of emergent AI as EQN suggested they'd be offering.
They couldn't do it like either of those games.
There would have to be a lot of special caveats to make them work within the current PvE setting. For example, just imagine taking a champ with you to fight lupicus in Arah. They would die instantly due to the multitude of high damage / insta-kill mechanics that boss has. And that boss is hardly the exception in that regard. Even outside of dungeons there are many world bosses / champs with insta-kill mechanics. Things that need to be avoided or dodged.
In SWTOR / EQ2 you don't really have that outside of endgame dungeons (which you aren't supposed to bring your companions into anyway). Both of those games, and GW1 as well, were able to do companions because most of the damage mitigation was done through stats, not situational awareness. You could buff stats / skills to passively give people enough meat to avoid dying, but it's an entirely different thing to try to control a handful of AI champs to each avoid certain death on a regular basis.
If you buff those champs to avoid the instant death mechanics, then you have the opposite problem. They become way too strong in PvE and start to trivialize the content. Most of the game can be soloed with a skilled enough player, now imagine adding supercharged AI minions to that mix, and you have some pretty insane solo farming potential.
*** I hear ya on the DPS thing, though. I really do. But you have to remember this game is not built like a standard trinity. By forcing such a mentallity, you tend to miss out on some good things. For one, you can solo most of the game regardless of spec. You may have a tough time soloing Lupi as a bunker guardian, but it can be done (but will take a really long time).
The game is built around a series of toolboxes. You get to choose what tools you use for the job you're doing. You don't need to use a knife for everything. There are things where utility saves a lot of trouble, areas where being tanky / defensive work great. Areas where having high sustain (healing) work surprisingly well. It's not all about damage, unless you're trying to speed run everything.
Interesting. I wonder what this means for EQN then, and if they're still using this A.I. or just improving it until it releases.