60295 : Squad leader runs ahead without squad

[arthur666 10]

In an ambush mission I made where 1 USMC rifle squad waypoints set to SAFE, STAGGERED COLUMN, LIMITED (speed), and OPEN FIRE. The squad walks thru a town that is scattered with small groups of OPFOR. With all earlier patches, the team sort of stayed together when enemies were sighted. Now the SL takes off running towards the next waypoints, about 150 meters up the road, (set completly to NO CHANGE) leaving the rest of the team behind, who are acting more cautious and defensive. Anyone else see something like this?

On the flip side, in another mission were I'm in a CDF squad assaulting Elektrovodsk, my team moves together much better than they did before. Their waypoints are set on AWARE, NORMAL, OPEN FIRE and DELTA or WEDGE.

[alx 20]

I use the first single player game as my test, and indeed, I found the squad leader just runs off into the village. They also tend to just stand around in the open like turkeys. Plus, when I'm injured, the medic, who is not threatended, takes an age to come and heal me. So from a test of just one, I don't see any improvement in this patch.

[Alex72 1]

Happens to me too. Squad leader runs away very far ahead. This is carried on since earlier builds. However sometimes the leader does not run far ahead and thats an improvement.

I found another thing though. Sometimes in DANGER a whole AI group can get stuck. They just stand and turning around etc but never walks away from the spot. Sometimes ive observed the leader move away a bit and the rest just stands still. Even sped up time and waited but nothing.

BIS seems to be working with the AI atm so i think we will see more improvements over the next betas.

[NeMeSiS 11]

Ive also seen vehicles just drive off and leave their squad far behind. Seems to happen most often when behaviour goes from aware to combat but it doesnt always happen so i am not sure.

[Alex72 1]

Seems to happen most often when behaviour goes from aware to combat

Your right. Thats when i observe it as well. Good you pointed that out cause i think this is the problem. Have a mission where i have the squads set to AWARE and then the next WP to DANGER (COMBAT), and the next after that is SEEK & DESTROY. And they get left behind when it switches to DANGER.

Good observation. :) Hopefully helps BIS.

[suma 8]

Your right. Thats when i observe it as well. Good you pointed that out cause i think this is the problem. Have a mission where i have the squads set to AWARE and then the next WP to DANGER (COMBAT), and the next after that is SEEK & DESTROY. And they get left behind when it switches to DANGER.

Good observation. :) Hopefully helps BIS.

This will be most likely easy to fix, however I need a repro. I tried it briefly, but I did not see the problem.

[arthur666 10]

Your right. Thats when i observe it as well. Good you pointed that out cause i think this is the problem. Have a mission where i have the squads set to AWARE and then the next WP to DANGER (COMBAT), and the next after that is SEEK & DESTROY. And they get left behind when it switches to DANGER.

Good observation. :) Hopefully helps BIS.

Definitely happens when contact is made and the squad automatically gets ready for combat.

I also went back to vanilla 1.04, played same mission 2 times both ways, and the SL did not seem to stray as far in the earlier build, but the squad as a whole didn't move as well. Overall, I like the new AI better. If my leader stopped playing Rambo, it would be that much better.

[Alex72 1]

This will be most likely easy to fix, however I need a repro. I tried it briefly, but I did not see the problem.

Rgr that Suma. Will make a test now and give you the steps. Will EDIT this post.

EDIT:

Tested, and it seems to be more likely to happen when the AI is set to COMBAT and SEEK&DESTROY with radius. At least from the various tests i did.

Repro: Put out a group Force Recon.

1st WP: MOVE(100m-ish), Formation=COLUMN COMPACT(FILE).

2nd WP: SEEK&DESTROY Radius 200m, Behaviour=COMBAT.

When the group passes 1st WP the leader - often - runs ahead far from the group. If it doesnt happen the first time - test again. I thaught first it happens only where there is no cover and the leader tries to get to the first cover, but where i tested (Utes) there was cover and he still run away really far. Change places around with this WP setup as well and im sure you will see it.

Alex

Edited November 22, 2009 by Alex72

[mrcash2009 0]

Maybe link up the mission?

[arthur666 10]

Hey Alex,

Dosen't setting your 2nd WP to a radius of 200m make the actual WP just appear somewhere randomly within that 200m diameter each time you load the mission? Wouldn't this give you less uniform results in your testing?

Just a thought, although it's quite possible that I'm wrong about how all that stuff works. :)

[suma 8]

Hey Alex,

Dosen't setting your 2nd WP to a radius of 200m make the actual WP just appear somewhere randomly within that 200m diameter each time you load the mission? Wouldn't this give you less uniform results in your testing?

Just a thought, although it's quite possible that I'm wrong about how all that stuff works. :)

There are two radii - placement radius and completion radius. I am unsure which one Alex meant. Yes, it would be a lot better to add the mission as attachment, even if the mission design seems simple.

[Alex72 1]

EDIT:

Ok so WP radius is used to get AI's to move randomlly inside that WP everytime they reach it. For fast and simple setup of a AI group that you want to move first to a village - but not run exactlly to the same place everytime you make a radius on that WP. If you have CYCLE in the end then they will run around the WP's continously but to different places within the radius you setup. Very simple WP stuff. The radius plus 90s timeout in the S&D WP is to have the AI group search inside it for that time. Nothing new - always worked before (ArmA1 for example).

Anyway i dont know that this is the exact problem with the "runaway leader". I made a super simple 2 WP situation again, and out of a couple of tests the leader ran away. I know you cant really see the leader but he is there (good camo). The others kind of just stops. Even stands up although its COMBAT. I think they want to run, but something is stopping them from doing that. Possibly the leader tells them to stay maybe?

RUNAWAY LEADER

WP SETUP

Is this enough info for you to know what the problem is Suma?

Edited November 23, 2009 by Alex72

[nomdeplume 0]

Anyway i dont know that this is the exact problem with the "runaway leader". I made a super simple 2 WP situation again, and out of a couple of tests the leader ran away.

I did a sample mission based on this, but only had the runaway leader on 1 out of 3 or 4 goes maybe 3 or 4 out of 10 runs (with 60309). Mostly they leapfrog nicely. Sometimes it seems like the AI is deciding that it wants to go straight to whatever cover/concealment it's located, over a hundred metres away, and the leader will shoot off for that while the rest stay back to provide cover. In my last run through, the leader went ~ 180 metres from me before stopping and the next guy started.

I've watched it occur 3 times and the squad leader always seems to go to the same patch of ground.

Mission: FullSteamAhead.7z (4 KB)

Layout: fullsteamahead.jpeg (132 KB)

Video:

(22 seconds)

It's possibly not a completely bad tactic - the AI can engage effectively at that kind of range so they are still providing some kind of cover. And it doesn't happen very often, so perhaps it's just one of those things where occasionally they make less than ideal decisions. Don't want the same thing happening every time! (Though I do think moving 200 M ahead is pushing your luck more than a bit.)

I at first tried this setup going west - east on the airfield, but they always headed for the cover of the control tower and leapfrogged across to the next building. Really impressive to watch. A thousand kudos to you all @ BIS!

Edit: just noticed 60309, ran it about 6 times in a row without it occurring, so at first I'd thought it wasn't happening at all. Decided to go to 10 runs but kind of lost track of the numbers... had it a few times though.

Edited November 24, 2009 by some kind of guy
New build

[suma 8]

This should be hopefully fixed in 60393, which should come online within a few minutes. I have used my own testing mission (attached), repro rate was about 1/6 with previous versions.

I did not try your repro yet. Unless someone else does meanwhile, I will try it tomorrow.

[suma 8]

A side-note - it will be interesting to see what is the time between the fix is implemented and available to the end users. I have finished implementing the fix at 17:30 local time. We shall see when you can really get it. Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker? :)

[MQ-9 Reaper 10]

393 is up, downloading ;)

[TRexian 0]

Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker? :)

No, and that's my final answer.

(What do I win?) :D

[Yoma 0]

A side-note - it will be interesting to see what is the time between the fix is implemented and available to the end users. I have finished implementing the fix at 17:30 local time. We shall see when you can really get it. Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker? :)

Don't worry, you're totally cool :D

[Alex72 1]

Suma: This should be hopefully fixed in 60393

Thanks a lot Suma & BIS team for being so damn awesome. You know our reports are just that - reports. We are not sitting here angry because we know you always come through. :)

Time to test it.

EDIT:

Suma: Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker?

Let me think........ Uhmmmm..... ehmmmmmm... hmmmmmm... NO!!! Like i said before - all others sit in your shadow. :D

EDIT2: Works perfect! Good work guys. Now if you could get the detection range increased it would be awesome. Shooting friendlies from 400 meters so i go RED wont make them shoot me back. When i moved slowly towards them to see when they "saw" me, i had to go up to like 60m from them - thats when they killed me.

Same with trying to reveal bad guys. Through my scope i see them clearly like 150m away. I can tell easily what side it is and what type of soldier. But my RMB reveal never happens. "MAN" is all i see. Im sure your working on it. Just reminding you. :)

Thanks again for the fast fix of the runaway leader.

Regards

Alex

Edited November 24, 2009 by Alex72

[NeMeSiS 11]

Did you make any changes to the 'formation stickeyness' compared to previous beta's? They seemed really eager to stay in formation, even in combat. While in the last previous beta's i almost never recognized the wedge formation, and this was a big improvement.

[twisted 128]

A side-note - it will be interesting to see what is the time between the fix is implemented and available to the end users. I have finished implementing the fix at 17:30 local time. We shall see when you can really get it. Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker? :)

this is what i call support! good one guys!

[arthur666 10]

Thanks alot. Can't wait to install.

[Stryker_1 10]

A side-note - it will be interesting to see what is the time between the fix is implemented and available to the end users. I have finished implementing the fix at 17:30 local time. We shall see when you can really get it. Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker? :)

Since I've been following the beta patches, I was surprised to see 60393 and before I even read this thread, I was thinking man they have a lot of beta patches and they are quick on the trigger....lol...Great work and thanks BIS, looking forward to Arrowhead!

[jw custom 56]

A side-note - it will be interesting to see what is the time between the fix is implemented and available to the end users. I have finished implementing the fix at 17:30 local time. We shall see when you can really get it. Is there any other gaming company to beat us and deliver a fix quicker? :)

You are deadly fast :cool:

[nomdeplume 0]

This should be hopefully fixed in 60393

Just confirming I'm no longer able to reproduce it in build 60393, at least not with my test mission. Tried it 10+ times, and then a few more with different formations, and the squad stuck together well on every single run.